That's right Dinosaur Hunters! Buena Vista Games new development studio, Propaganda games is currently working on the latest addition to the Turok series. An early version of the game was previewed at the Buena Vista booth at E3 2006 and so far the results look promising.
Complete with a brand new story line, Turok takes place in the future, with players fighting as Joseph Turok; a member of a Special Forces squad hunting a madman named Roland Kane and his army. Shot down and stranded on the planet, Turok and his squad must battle against their enemies and the creatures of the jungle in order to survive. While some have opposed this new storyline as too much of a transition from the original series, the change may just be exactly what the franchise needs to get back on its feet (Look at what Crystal Dynamics did for Tomb Raider). I'm excited to see how things go.
Of course… it just wouldn't be a Turok game without dinosaurs, and there will be plenty of them. Dinosaurs will be a neutral entity in the game, meaning that for the most part, they will leave you alone if you leave them alone. With an independent AI system, you may not ever have to fight a dinosaur if you don't let them notice you, but what would be the fun in that? Propaganda will allow players to utilize these dinos as a sort of tool, using them to distract and even battle enemies to even the odds… or totally eliminate them. The player would need to be cautious though, the reptiles would just as soon attack Turok as they would a bad guy, unless you hide.
Yes, Propaganda has included an interesting twist to the gameplay this time around. Players will be able to utilize stealth if they so choose, sneaking up behind an enemy and dispatching them with a knife in the back, or sneaking by while enemies are distracted by a dinosaur attack. You could just forgo all of that and jump into the action with a really large weapon and waste everyone yourself if you wanted to. The choice is yours.
The game will utilize a modified version of the Unreal 3 engine, allowing for some awesome particle effects as well as realistic textures and some killer AI. The game promises multiplayer although only team death match is confirmed so far. Weapons will range from the standard FPS arsenal, to the really big guns that Turok games are known for. I hear the cerebral bore (a particularly nasty weapon that launches a projectile drill that zooms in on an enemies head, proceeding to drill out their brains in a shower of gore) is even making a comeback! To top it off, Propaganda has stated that Turok's environment will also offer some level of destruction. I can only imagine blowing off the side of an unstable cliff to crush a squad of enemies below or knocking a patch of trees over onto some unsuspecting soldiers.
The game is currently slated for an April 2007 release on both the X-Box 360 and Playstation 3.
More as it comes!!