Last night during the Game Awards, Saber Interactive and Universal Studios revealed Turok: Origins, a third-person co-op shooter that marks the first new entry in the franchise since 2019. Origins doesn’t have a release date yet, but is being developed by the same studio that was behind the fantastic Space Marine 2.
On December 12, during the (better than expected) Game Awards 2024, Turok: Origins was officially unveiled with a snazzy trailer featuring cinematic pre-rendered action and actual gameplay. Here’s that trailer, which you might have missed if you were watching as it got somewhat buried under all the other big reveals of the night.
If you’re a Turok fan like me, after watching this trailer your probably had a similar question: Wait, this is a third-person shooter? And yes, it is. In a new post on the Official PlayStation Blog, Saber Interactive game director Jesus Iglesias explained why they made the shift to third-person, considering the classic franchise is mostly known as an FPS series.
“We’re all big fans of the previous games and the franchise overall,” said Iglesias. “But ultimately we wanted to explore a different direction from the previous Turok titles.”
“Saber has a rich history of making third-person shooters and our experience in that space gives us a unique opportunity to evolve the franchise while keeping familiar elements that make for a great Turok experience. We’ve created a fresh take on the classic Turok franchise that fans both old and new will enjoy.”
I guess it does make sense that Saber Interactive, who previously developed World War Z and this year’s well-reviewed Space Marine 2 (both third-person shooters), would go that direction with Turok, but it still seems odd to me. However, I loved Space Marine 2, so I’m still excited to play Turok: Origins.
As for just how this latest Turok ties into the bigger franchise, Saber Interactive isn’t ready to say, but does suggest it will have some connections. Iglesias also confirmed that while Turok: Origins supports co-op, like Space Marine 2, it can be played solo as well.
The shift to third-person is unexpected, but I suspect fans will be more open to this entry in the series than the last new release, which was 2019’s cuddly isometric action game Turok: Escape from Lost Valley.
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