Propaganda Games was formed nearly four years ago by a group of former Electronics Arts staffers. Within months of announcing the studio’s creation, it was acquired by Disney Interactive. General manager and vice-president Josh Holmes says the company had been working on an original concept for a third-person action game, but scrapped it when they won the right to develop the new Turok video game for Touchstone, a division of Disney Interactive.
The first Turok video game — Turok Dinosaur Hunter for the Nintendo 64 — was one of the first shooters to appear on a console gaming system. The character of Turok was born as a comic character created in 1954 by American writer Gaylord DuBois, who was known for writing outdoor adventure comics for such characters as Tarzan, Roy Rogers and Sergeant Preston of the Yukon. Turok has changed over the years, depending on who was using him and to what purpose, but one thing has been consistent: Turok is a Native American.
“Reimagining is in vogue in entertainment today,” Propaganda game director Joel Manners says. He cites Batman Begins and Battlestar Galactica as good examples of how existing movie and television characters have been reinvented. Another way to treat an existing concept, he says, is to take classic ideas and update them. “There are really good stories that need to be retold in a way that is relevant to today,” he says. “There’s nothing irrelevant about dinosaurs.”
The company’s development team was acutely aware that their protagonist was aboriginal. “It means a lot,” admits Manners, “and it doesn’t mean anything.” The game, he explains, doesn’t make a point about heritage, it makes a point about heroism. In an effort to not fall victim to clichés and stereotypes, Manners says the game’s developers simply treated the story and the characters with respect. “When you justify a character because of their heritage,” said Manners, “you have to be cautious.”
“The fact that Turok is of one heritage or another is not important,” Manners continues. “He’s a hero. The heroism that he is displaying comes from his heritage, but it’s something anyone is capable of.”
Manners says the development group talked about other game genres in early meetings, but never seriously. “The first-person perspective lends an intimacy. Having dinosaurs coming at you is central to the feeling of terror. It’s not as scary when you see creatures jumping on someone else.”
I LIKE TUROK
Turok (publisher: Touchstone; platform: PC, PS3, Xbox 360; rated mature)
The first video game from Vancouver’s Propaganda Games, this is a rambunctious re-creation of a character created more than 50 years ago. A science fiction-themed first-person shooter, you play as Joseph Turok, a Native American former black ops commando who is part of a mission to apprehend Roland Kane, the leader of Wolf Pack, a rogue commando unit that went AWOL somewhere in space three years ago. As a former member of the Wolf Pack, though, you don’t have many friends in Whiskey Company, your new squad.
En route to your destination, your ship is shot down and crash lands on a distant planet that happens to be inhabited by dinosaurs. That’s right, dinosaurs, and as one of the loading screen tips reads: “Dinosaurs eat meat. You are meat. Run away!” As if dinosaurs weren’t enough, you’ll also have to deal with the heavily armoured and weaponed Wolf Pack troops who control the planet. And the artificial intelligence controlling your enemies will have them flanking you at every opportunity.
You’ll engage in both melee and firefight combat. While you’ll have access to a variety of automatic weapons, including a few futuristic varieties, you’ll find that Turok is plenty dangerous with only a knife and a bow. At times, you’ll find yourself in close combat, and pushing the correct button sequence will execute a special knife attack to get Turok out of trouble.
In addition to the single-player game, there are multiplayer-game modes, and you can play with up to three friends in co-operative play, in a variation on the single-player story mode.
Turok sports a cinematic look, with dizzying swoop and zoom effects used to smoothly transition between movie and interactive sequences. Not to mention the vertigo that comes from the sense of scale. What might seem to be a rock wall may turn out to be a giant skull, which foreshadows the types of creatures you’ll confront later in the game. Don’t forget that dinosaurs are not only smart predators, but they have the benefit of being camouflaged in this lush environment. Watch your back.
