Download Turok - Dinosaur Hunter

First and foremost, this game is gorgeous. Before I go rambling on about anything else, I’d like to tell you I was blown away by its looks. We’re talking about year 1997 here, when mainstream graphics were around the quality of Blood. Yet here we have Turok, featuring sleek, sexy, and bootylicious 3D that you can savor, squeeze and writhe all over while screaming in ecstasy. Maybe I’m exaggerating a bit, but since I’m a seasoned abandoneer, and I’ve gotten used to staring at the most grainy, hideous, and abysmal visuals ever, my eyes sighed with relief after encountering such smooth 3D. Well, now that has been dealt with, let us continue with the review.

Okay, to be honest, I have no idea what the storyline for this game is. Even after playing it through completely, I am hopelessly lost. If the story happens to be that Tal'Set, our Native American hero, is running around with weapons of destruction, then massacring anonymous people, dinosaurs and small animals, then yes, it is all explained. As said in the previous sentence, there is plenty of massacring, and, indeed, I found it satisfying. All enemies have a variety of death animations, be it wailing and gasping for air as blood pours out of their necks, or falling back as blood sprays in every direction. You’ll never have a lack of violent and pointless death around you.

Now what fun would this senseless violence be without the proper tools to commit it with? Why of course, here at the Turok National Armory, you get everything from the standard hunting knife to the classic pistol, and much, much, more! One of Turok’s poor aspects, unfortunately, is held within its combat. When it all boils down to it, the only thing you’re doing is shooting stuff, and looking for keys. Every now and then, a nice booby trapped dungeon, or a jumping puzzle (God blessed us here, none of the jumping puzzles in Turok are overly difficult) breaks the massacre of anonymous people and animals. Your enemies are actually varied quite nicely. As mentioned before, you spar with armored humans, who posses an arsenal of different weaponry, from knives and pistols, to grenades. Along with the good old thugs, you’ll come across good old fashioned dinosaurs, ranging from the fast and deadly raptor, to the massive and intimidating T-Rex. To spice things up, there are some monsters that I can’t really define. Although they aren’t out of place, they pop out at random intervals, and aren’t really as well situated as the other monsters. These can be trolls, or ogres that pound the ground and send out shockwaves, and many other strange creatures.

Enemy AI is simple, after just encountering a few enemies, their tactics will become obvious, and you can dispatch them with ease. For example, pistol bearing thugs tend to send a few rounds in your direction, and then move around a bit as to avoid any projectiles you send their way. Turok does fine with its major objective, finding keys. It’s not as much “finding” them actually, as they’ll naturally come across your path. This is excellent level design on the developer’s part, because as we all know, key hunting is irritating beyond belief. Although I generally have few problems with Turok, saving was one major annoyance. It employs a console style checkpoint save system, which is irritating to say the least, as they decrease in numbers later on in the game where difficulty ramps up significantly.

When it all boils down, I recommend Turok. It’s a satisfying romp through a pretty world that will leave you happy after a good play session. Turok isn’t a monumentally fantastic game, but in my opinion it’s definitely worth your time, so try it out. If you don’t like it, you could at least credit it with its nice level design, and the amazing graphics.