For better or for worse, my Switch is just a first-party Nintendo machine. I still prefer the PS4/Vita and the accompanying ecosystem, and I have more than enough games to keep me busy for years to come I feel.
I'm the same way. My switch is for first party Nintendo games only. Only non first party games I own on it is golf story and danmaku. But switch has the weakest hardware, worst online experience, and so on. so I only use it for first party exclusives. I won't ever buy a cross platform game on it.
My ps4 and PC are what I use for 95% of my gaming and my switch comes in when I feel like Mario or zelda.
I agree with pretty much all of this, and given the choice I tend to go for PS4 versions of games. With all the hype the Switch gets, and owning one myself, I'm still not that into it. It doesn't really feel that much different from the Wii U to me, in that it's mainly the first-party Nintendo titles on it that interest me. Except, it loses some of the Wii U's ingenuity and fun gimmicks (stuff like Nintendo Land was super fun with 5 people and asymmetrical gameplay), and the 3DS and Vita are still my go-to portables since I feel like the Switch is a bit too big to be a "true" portable, the battery life doesn't compare at all, and lack of a real D-pad makes a lot of my favorite genres way more of a pain to play than they should be. That leaves me using it almost exclusively docked, where as mentioned, compared to the PS4 it's less powerful, with worse online functionality and digital ecosystem, feels a lot more bare-bones, missing stuff like trophies, and I have to buy a separate $70 controller just to have a decent D-pad option.
I like the idea of a system being able to be both a home console and portable, but it feels to me like they had to make too many compromises to both aspects, so it doesn't really do either as well as it should. I preferred how the GBA did it, where it was a dedicated portable, and later the Game Boy Player came out for like $50 that you could just put the games into if you wanted to play on the big screen. Or more recently, the Playstation TV, if that didn't have all the memory card and compatibility restrictions.
So ya, there was not much else to play on N64 and that absolutely allowed Turok to fill a void. Being almost 20 at the time maybe part of the reason it failed to impress me. I absolutely agree with 6.5/10 or so.
Also agreed. Even when it was first released Turok was silly fun (turning on cheat codes to access all the ridiculous weapons and exploding people into orbit was always a good time), but as an actual game I was never impressed much by it either. The whole "dinosaur hunting" thing didn't come into play much aside from shooting some raptors here and there, and the human enemies were way more common, and boring. Playing the remaster more recently on PC, and making an attempt to actually complete the game, it feels a lot more like Doom and Quake than I remember, with the speed of the game and focus on item pickups and building an arsenal, and learning which weapons to use in various situations. Which might be appropriate given the timeframe, but it's missing a lot of the clever level design, the environments are extremely bland and repetitive, enemies and bosses aren't really fun to fight, and the entire game is just one massive key hunt, with some being well-hidden despite being needed to progress. Progression mainly being, now find more keys in this slightly different-looking jungle/temple/ruins, for pretty much the whole game.I wouldn't go so far as to call it terrible, and being the first 3D shooter on the N64 market gives it some distinction, but it's still just pretty average.
Turok 2 I had a lot more fun with back on the original N64, with the even better weapons (Cerebral Bore!) and more varied, distinctive levels to explore and interesting enemies to fight. Although I'm not sure how I managed to stomach it, given how nearly unplayable it was due to the atrocious framerate. I guess I had become accustomed to it from too many 4-player Goldeneye matches with proximity mines or something. The remaster makes it feel like a completely different game with how smooth it is, so it's interesting to me to see the game as it always should've been. The most common complaint is the levels being too large for their own good, with a lot of pointless wandering and backtracking for that one switch or whatever you needed to hit in order to move forward. I haven't gotten far enough yet to judge that complaint on my own yet, but critical objectives and switches being highlighted when you're near them in the remaster feels like it goes a long way towards fixing that problem.
I don't remember where, but recently I read someone's comment that Turok 2, and to a lesser extent 1, are sort of forerunners to the Metroid Prime series, with the persistent world and ability to backtrack, platforming aspects, and also just as sort of a general feel. Talent from Turok dev Iguana being part of Retro Studios further cements that connection. It never really occurred to me to compare the two series before, but I found that interesting and it sort of makes me consider Turok in a different light.
I remember buying fukun Wayne Gretzky hockey it was so dry on the N64 front.
Yeah, I remember renting that a couple times, even as someone who has absolutely zero interest in hockey. But hey, it was like the NBA Jam of hockey, and it was the first 4-player game on the N64, so there was fun to be had with it! Finally putting those extra 2 controller ports to use, and being able to have 4 people all playing something together besides Bomberman was huge at the time! Of course everyone was just waiting for Mario Kart 64, but still.
ing GARBAGE!
