Remember that game that you played when younger, slashing and killing dinosaurs? Of course you do! Well, I don’t remember any storylines of the game, and only remember getting mauled repeatedly by raptors and other dinosaurs. Well Turok is back and finally hit the next generation consoles, but how is the gameplay, and what do we think?

Get Your Shotgun Ready…

It seems that the newest version of Turok has taken some advice from other games, a mixture of Halo, Gears of War and Jurassic Park. These are all good games and or movies, so its actually a compliment of sorts to be compared to them. However, as much as the game tries to steal ideas and components from other games, is also where it somewhat fails.

First off, the game feels like Halo controls with Gears of War graphics. Since the game runs off Unreal Engine 3, its not a real big surprise that it looks similar to Gears. If anything, that’s a good thing, since quite personally, I always wanted a game that played like Halo, yet with better graphics. The game really does look good though, especially on a 42 HD screen, from the bullet wounds and gun shots, to the blades of grass moving as the raptor hides in front of you. Graphically, the game looks pretty. Yet, its the little things in terms of graphics that you just sit there and wonder how it passed certification. Like for example, when wathing the cut scenes, you can’t miss the shinyness of many of the characters, and how it looks like someone is holding a spotlight on top of them. Just one small example where the game almost pulls off the Gears look, but somehow at the end proves that its not Gears, or Halo… its Turok.

Round 1: I Got My Money On…

As for the sounds, the dialogue is actually… good. I can think of some recent games where I sorta laughed at how pathetic the language and dialogue was [Vampire Rain comes to mind right away], but the conversations are pretty well done in Turok. Same with the sound effects and the machinery noises. Then again, have you played a game lately with bad sounds effects? It not surprising that Turok manages to get the sound down though. The story of Turok is conveyed through top Hollywood voice talent, including Timothy Olyphant, Powers Boothe, Ron Perlman, William Fichtner, Donnie Wahlberg and Gregory Norman Cruz as Joseph Turok.

If the game has any flaws, its the frustration of some of the weapon sets, and a few other annoyances or lack of’s. The game has no radar and limited ammo count [in terms of ammo on the current clip, whereas some guns have it, and others don't]. The lack of radar is extremely frustrating, especially in multiplayer. My first time playing online, another reviewer from Kotaku was able to stab me behind my back… 5 times in a row. Another problem is that the gun is very hard to aim, and the sensitivity is very high. The first thing I had to do was change my settings, which would be one of the tips I would give to a new player. Yet, even after changing the settings, it still nearly impossible to lock onto an enemy, and with the rate of fire it takes to actually kill an enemy, you’ll either be passing by enemies easily, or dying repeatedly with the insanely increasing and decreasing rates of difficulty. Finally, my last gripe is the knife. While its as cool as hell to use, its also extremely hard to use in combat. Too many times I would be right in front of my enemy, but wasn’t given the option to stab him. Again though, the knife animation takes about 5-6 second to show, which will give any enemy - both human or AI - enough time to get enough shots to take down all your life before even exiting the animation.

Smile For The SMG!

The game isn’t bad, but it isn’t great. The idea all seems there, but its just a few flaws that seem to ruin the rest of the experience. If a patch was made to reduce some of these flaws, I would guarantee that many of the reviews would score this game much higher. It wasn’t the best single player campaign, but it wasn’t bad, actually somewhat enjoyable if you don’t mind the checkpoint style save method and the insanely difficult parts like fighting a giant tank and being forced to retry the entire part over and over again. As for the multiplayer, it actually shows a lot of promise. Many different game types, and even an online co-op mode for up to 4 players. Yet, the same problems that existed in the single player also exist in the multiplayer. Some people are going to enjoy this game, and some others are going to get irritated by the lack of melee and other problems addressed earlier.

What Kind of Dinosaur Is This?

If you have any other questions for the game, feel free to comment below.