Just like Quake 1, if you already own Quake 2, the enhanced version is available as a free update. Although unlike Quake 1, Quake 2: Enhanced is also available on GOG day 1.
In addition to visual updates, there’s a new episode “Call of the Machine”, Quake 2 N64, a pass to the enemy AI which changes a few behaviors and attacks, removes machine gun recoil, a new infinite use item that shows the player where to go next, and a number of other qol and accessibility options.
Anecdotally, I find the addition of Q2 N64 very appealing. It’s a mish-mash of pared-down maps from vanilla Q2 and the expansions in a strictly linear fashion - no backtracking. Of course, there’s also changes to the lighting and a new OST by Aubrey Hodges. Being able to control the game from keyboard / mouse is a godsend. I played the game in emulator with a modern gamepad and it was barely, barely doable, even when I could manually set deadzones and sensitivities and the like. It was awful.
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I’ve seen this sentiment in a few places, and feel like I’m going nuts over here. Am I really the only one who thinks Quake 2 RTX looks like absolute ass?
It’s got nice real-time shadow effects, obviously, but everything else is a washed out mess of stretched textures and normal maps that make everything look like it’s made of plastic.
This is one of the official screenshots used to promote it and it looks like a 2007 tech demo.
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