Turok dances with dinosaurs -- again

Gamers who played the original "Turok" games for the Nintendo 64 eagerly awaited the release of "Turok: Evolution" on all next-gen platforms (me included), but by comparison, this game doesn't make the technological advances of the first two.\nIn wake of games like "Halo," which took the first-person shooter to incredible new heights, "Turok" plays far more similarly (or even worse, due to its somewhat herky-jerky controls) to its 64-bit predecessors and thus is a disappointment.\n"Turok: Evolution" is the origin tale Tal'Set, the Native -American lead from "Dinosaur Hunter," and picks up as he's in the midst of battling his arch-nemesis, Captain Tobias Bruckner, in Texas circa 1886. Amid all the chaos, both Tal'Set and Bruckner fall into this funky time portal oscillating between their own time and place and the Lost Worlds, where all hell is set to break loose.\nThe graphics are pretty solid in the Xbox port of the game, with lighting effects and character animations registering most clearly. The gameplay is pretty much the same but slightly improved through new features, including squad dynamics in which troops take cover and establish strategic positions, dogfights via an armed-to-the-fangs pterosaur and an improved multi-player mode that works well beyond the constraints of the game.\nThe strongest element of "Turok" is the vast selection of weapons. Included are the simplistic brutality of the war club, the flechette gun (which is a watertight, air-compressed gun that fires steel darts) and the remote-controlled spider mine ("Wild Wild West" flashbacks, anyone?), amongst many others. \nFans of the old-school "Turok" games or the first-person shooter genre as a whole would be well advised to give the game a rental before buying it. And Akklaim would be wise to improve this franchise before it becomes extinct.