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Activision, Ported by Logicware |
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B&W G3 400Mhz w/128 mb RAM |
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Reviewed by Marty Dodge
All images in this review can be enlarged by clicking on them
Quake II came out at a rather sad time for Logicware; their buddies at ID had just released Quake3test and damn if it wasn't released for the Mac FIRST! You would think amidst all the hype and gloating of Q3test, QII would have gotten lost in the shuffle, especially for those only interested in the multiplayer aspect of QII.
To be honest, I
thought QII was too little too late when it first came out
for the Mac, having come out over 6 months after its PC
version. It seemed to me that Q2 was blinded like many games
by the tour de force that is Q3test. That was before I
discovered the pleasures of GameRanger beta (soon to be
shareware,) a nifty little piece of software that allows
online players to find other Mac gamers to battle with from
all over the world. Then in a bit of luck for old Logicware,
ID messed up its test releases for Q3 and delayed the Mac
version (but not the PC or Linux) for almost a week.
Suddenly denied of my Q3test fix, and then unable to get to
Beta 1.08 working for another week, QII began to look at lot
more interesting. I suspect that I was not the only feeling
this way.
Believe me, once you
play QII online, you will find it pretty damn near
addictive. With its larger variety of maps, from Capture The
Flag to Action Quake II (both of which work on the Mac), it
takes a lot to get bored with QII. Q3test still only has
three maps, and now is even worse for high pingers, due to
some network coding changes. QII however has some of the
best network coding I have ever seen. It runs smoothly and
is playable at all but the highest of ping rates. You might
not win but with a bit of skill, it is possible to get in
the upper third of the rankings, and very possible to have a
hell of a lot of fun in CTF.
But wait, some may
say, how about the solo play? Well as you would expect from
a Quake game, the solo play is not much to write home about.
For one thing, despite my setting my game video settings to
max, it was too dark to see anything. The plot is
Quake-like: pretty non-existent. The baddies are nasty
looking alien creatures with all sorts of cybernetic
enhancements. The most impressive are the diabolical Tank
and Tank Commander. Some of the movement for the monsters is
a big ungainly and nowhere near as graceful as say the
aliens in Unreal. The AI falls short of that in Unreal, and
the levels are just not that exciting. In short, if you are
looking for satisfying solo play, other than basic practice
with the weapons for Internet play, consider purchasing
Unreal or Klingon Honor Guard instead. Graphically QII does
not hold a candle to Unreal or KHG or even Dark Vengeance.
There is one bonus from the its non-intensive graphic
engine; the fact that requirements for QII are way below
that of any of the games listed above, Q2 is not a RAM pig
like Unreal and runs quite smoothly at 60 Megs of RAM
dedicated to it as compared to base 96 for Unreal.
QII requires OpenGL
and a 3D card in order to be seen in its full glory. On the
box it states that this is limited to Rage 128 only, however
you can download the latest Mesa Drivers to play it with
your Voodoo card. The game also requires OS8.1 (for 3D
accelerated play, 7.5.3 for non-accelerated software mode),
at least a 603e PPC, 4x CD-ROM drive, virtual memory and 48
Megs of minimum RAM to run. Logicware have produced a good
port, that while having a PC-ish feel, is still user
friendly enough for a Mac user. Moreover this port is very
stable both in solo and Internet play.
I would highly recommend this game to anyone interested in high speed, adrenaline filled on-line or LAN based Deathmatch play, but for anyone looking for solo thrills, look elsewhere.
