Quake II Playthrough (Actual N64 Capture) - Strogg Outpost

This is part 1 of my 100% playthrough of Quake II on the Nintendo 64. This is not an emulator. This footage was captured directly from my Nintendo 64 using a real Quake II cartridge. I'm playing on hard difficulty.

Following up on my Quake playthrough from two years ago, here’s Quake II. I picked up a complete copy off eBay back in 2013 but I’m just now getting around to completing it. Just like the first Quake, Quake II has a dark/violent theme that fits well with Halloween and my tradition of celebrating October with darker games.

Quake II, despite its moniker, is not a port of the PC game. Instead, it’s basically an original title along the lines of Doom 64 since it basically has originally stages and a different atmospheric soundtrack closer to Doom 64 or Quake 64. However, it’s still generally based on the PC version (such as the weapons and overall graphics).

The Nintendo 64 version of Quake II is a technical marvel. Not only is it graphically impressive, but it runs at a fluctuating frame rate varying anywhere from the high 20s to 60 frames a second, which is substantially better than the first Quake on the console. Also, Quake II supports the Expansion Pak, which not only improves the graphics automatically (no high resolution mode though), but causes the game to run at a slightly better frame rate – something I’ve never seen before.

This game isn’t very long since it only features 19 regular stages, but it is quite a bit of fun, and the added four-player multiplayer is quite impressive and adds a bit of replay value. It’s a shame I didn’t play this game back in the day, but I can make up for that now. In this playthrough I will be getting 100% kills and secrets, which is not terribly difficult.

In this first part I completed Level 1: Strogg Outpost.

Recorded with the Hauppauge HD PVR and the official N64 S-video cable. I used a Toshiba model D-R550 DVD Recorder to upconvert the N64's native 240p signal to 480i so that the Hauppauge could capture the console's audio/video signal.

I'm using a standard Nintendo 64 controller.