The original Turok: The Dinosaur Hunter for the N64 first promised FPS gamers large spaces and difficult, though inventive combat, forcing the player to survive, not just run and gun. It delivered an outstanding, memorable experience. Alas, the reincarnation of that game, now titled simply Turok, on the 360 and PS3 does not quite demand the same… but it still manages to provide a damn fun experience anyways.

The story is simple - you play Joseph Turok, a Native American who was once forcibly recruited into a vicious fighting force known as Wolf Pack lead by Roland Kane. Turok seemed keen on the tough-as-nails combat - until the child-murdering began that is, and then he bailed. Some time later, Turok was more willingly recruited to Whiskey Company, whose next mission happened to be going after Roland Kane, to bring him down or capture him.

The crew is unfriendly to Turok for the most part, due to some vaguely explained incident where an entire squad was killed, and Turok survived. But they don’t get much time to bully him for his past (and his silly hairdoo) before the ship comes under attack, and crashes to the planet in pieces.

The mission changes from simply going after Roland Kane, to simply trying to survive. The whole planet you find yourself on has been inexplicably terriformed and populated with resurrected dinos, hell-bent on killing everything. Surprisingly, the story rides along pretty well at the beginning, but towards the end of the game, starts to peter out. It almost felt like the developers began to forget what the real point of the game was.

Still, the game does many things well - firefights manage to be fun, thanks to awesome weapons, useful secondary fire modes, and options to use the knife or the bow to take out enemies differently. Fighting against dinosaurs is especially fun, and best done with the knife. One might think that shooting the dinos would be the best method of dispatching them, but in reality, you want to let them get close, and then outmaneuver with dodges, strafing, and jumps to take them down with a quick, fatal knife move. Human enemies can also be brought down in this way, as the knife provides an immediate execution sequence that kills any enemy it’s used on. Of course, not all enemies can be killed in this way, large dinos in particular, but it still makes for a good time.