Quake II

I purchased Q2 on GOG a long time ago and just heard about the update. After watching a YouTube video about the update I was ready to buy the game again. Lo and behold GOG is letting owners of Q2 have the updated version without paying anything extra. I played the N64 version of Doom when it was made available for the PC and I really enjoyed that. I was looking forward to playing the N64 version of Q2 and I'm very happy with it. I like the smaller levels in that version. The PS2 port of Q2 was good but the levels were really big. The N64 port has short levels and brutal gameplay. The only drawback is the bigger download. Pick this game up if you don't own it already, whether you have played Q2 or you're new to the game.

Q2 improved immensly over its predecessor. The weapons look killer (unlike in Q1), enemies and locations are way more diverse and interesting and it has more colours and sometimes it looks really beautiful. Level design is complex with a lots of backtracking but you somehow always find the right way very quickly even thanks to monsters spawns that lead you in the right direction. It also has some kind of story and a cool badass factor. The first Quake is a creepy survivor horror FPS while Q2 is more action like and it feels like you have it under control. Mission packs are as usually sub-par but the main game is amazing.

For anyone over 30, this game is essential ownership. Who could resist buying this classic under $10? And with a heap of mods? Not me, at any rate. And what a treat, just stepping through the first few stages was like a step back in time, and I have to say, that gut wrenching feeling of walking around the corner and hearing "Get him!" is still there. The level design, music, controls, all just timeless. The fact of what makes the game still so appealing is the simplicity of the game itself. Hunt them down, clear the levels. Yes this is a legacy of its tech era, but not having constant distractions or side-quests coming up, you can lose hours on this game and it still feels like minutes. The weapon selection is simple and straightforward, but man, it's still so much fun to fire that double-barrel shotgun. The movement and animation is still fluid, the controls are minimal but effective. Strafing and shooting just work brilliantly as they ever did. The puzzles are still challenging, and the AI, now some 20+ years old is still hard-as-nails to beat especially on the higher levels. Can't wait to break out some multiplayer action. (A side note: to get this working on Windows 10, I had to load the Yamagi client. Once I did that, the full screen sizing worked properly with 1920x1080 resolution and the mouse worked.)

pfffff.... No music.

Quake II tends to get a bad rep. This is mostly due to the fact that it's a follow-up to one of the greatest FPS ever released, which is Quake. Quake II lacks the Lovecraftian world, is much slower, and nowhere near as frenetic and challenging. Once one has accepted that Quake II is a very different game, one can begin to like it for what it does well. The enemies are varied, encounters nicely balanced, weapons progression makes a lot of sense, and the levels manage to be semi-open yet you still always know where to go and what to do. The only real issue are the bosses: You pop quad damage and that's it, each of them takes 5-10 seconds to beat. Also, if you don't like brown or gray, the graphics may not be to your liking. Each of the mission packs are roughly half as long as the original. The Reckoning essentially is more of the same, albeit not as inspired. New enemies are just old enemies with new abilities, the levels can get confusing at times, and some of the new weapons are game-breaking good. The last few levels get really tedious, as you're fighting an enemy capable of one-shotting the player over and over again. Ground Zero is usually panned, but for no good reason. The first Unit is clearly the weakest: overly complex and confusing, with lots of backtracking and 'What now?' moments. From there, it gets better and better: Challenging new enemies, decently original weapons, and some imaginative level design. Sure, the turrets are tedious, but two rail hits and they're scrap. Some have said Ground Zero is unnecessarily hard, but even on hard difficulty, it really still isn't. Bosses can still be vaporized within seconds by abusing power-ups. Overall, while not as memorable or genre-defining as its predecessor, Quake II is a straightforward and fun little FPS that aged surprisingly well. I recommend playing this in a source port. I've used Yamagi and had zero issues at any point.