*when those heroes are Native American dinosaur hunters

Turok Revived

With the news that Turok is getting a new installment, it’s time to take a trip back to the 1990s where it all began. (The gameplay trailer for Turok Origins is below and it does look pretty cool)

Of course that’s a lie. The premise of the previous paragraph, that is. The truth is that I saw the remastered first game on sale on the PlayStation store and started playing it before I had any notion of a new entry in the franchise. It was one of my co-workers who highlighted the upcoming Turok Origins. And if we’re still telling the truth? Turok hasn’t aged well.

Yes it looks a little more polished than the 1997 version, but it’s hard to overcome the fundamental issue with the whole thing. It stops being fun after a short while as you are exploring areas and doing stuff, but without a firm idea of what it is that you are doing. I know I’m collecting keys, but I have no idea why. Shooting dinosaurs is cool, but there’s only so far that can get you. I could’ve sworn there was more to it, but I doubt there really was.

I enjoyed the fact the map appeared to have been hastily drawn in MS Paint by a schoolboy on a library free period. The whole thing feels rough as would be expected from a game of this era. But that isn’t entirely true either. Quake felt a lot more fleshed out, and a lot more crunchy. There is something about the way you glide around in Turok that isn’t as satisfying as the weight you have in Quake. The weapons feel better in Quake, too. Maybe I should just go play Quake…

Turok was a game that I desperately wanted to play back in the 90s and that required us to have a different graphics card that we briefly borrowed (if I remember correctly). The sheer difficulty in getting to a point where we could play it added to the mystique around it.

I’m not going to go into the story in depth as I have no idea what it entails. Yes, I can read about it on Wiki, but games should be able to convey that during the playthrough. There was next to no indication of what was going on. I was immediately thrown into the ring with a bunch of people and dinosaurs (the game was called Turok: Dinosaur Hunter so don’t act too surprised).

I did rather enjoy Turok Evolution when it came out on Xbox. It looked a lot better in my imagination. Games have come a long way, although other games from the time did look better…

I didn’t come here just to hate on these games, though. I recognise they are a step along the way, and a necessary part of what got us to the AAA high fidelity games we all take for granted these days.

Thinking about Turok got me thinking about other FPS games I was playing in the 1990s (mostly demos): Blood 2: The Chosen and Hexen 2 stand out in my mind. And Quake, of course.

Garden Gone Mad

Eating outside on a beautiful morning was a great way to start my day off. A classic meal of “whatever’s left in the fridge and least likely to poison me” accompanied by a truly “flat” white. Flat because the milk didn’t really foam properly (thank you Overherd). Overherd is dried oat milk powder that, despite my best efforts, is just not quite as good as the barista oat milks. It’s a shame as being able to make up the right amount is ideal for a household with a relatively low milk consumption. It’s fine for cooking, cereal, and tea, but just doesn’t hit the spot for coffee.

While we’re out here, we should check on the raised beds. They have exploded with life after a slow start. One has been almost entirely taken over by potatoes.

The courgettes that were slow to get started have rapidly grown to silly sizes. If you forget to check for a day or two, a tiny courgette can spiral out of control into a massive marrow. Recipe ideas are more than welcome. I recently read a courgette cake recipe that promised to use up a glut of courgettes. It required 450g courgettes. If that’s your glut, you’ve never grown courgettes! The harvest was so disappointing last year due to the slugs that I overplanted and they’re now out of control.

There are worse problems to have, I suppose.

There is something majestic about seeing deer roaming around a housing estate in Plymouth. One thinks they may have gotten confused with the meaning of “estate”. Then again they have free rein over the hospital so it’s not exactly a surprise.