Tron 2.0
| Tron 2.0 | |
| Missing image Tron2.0box.jpg | |
| Developer(s) | Monolith Productions |
| Publisher(s) | Buena Vista Interactive |
| Engine | Lithtech: Jupiter |
| Release date(s) | August 25, 2003 |
| Genre | First-person shooter |
| Mode(s) | Single player, multiplayer |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: Teen (T) |
| Platform(s) | PC (Windows), Mac, XBox |
Tron 2.0 is a computer game developed by Monolith Productions. It is a sequel to the 1982 motion picture Tron. The PC version of the game was released by Buena Vista Games on August 25, 2003. The Mac version was released by MacPlay in July, 2004.
The game is a first person shooter, with a "Light Cycles" game as part of the plot as well as available in multiplayer mode across a network. In the game, Bruce Boxleitner reprises his role from the original movie as Alan Bradley. Cindy Morgan, who also starred in the original movie, voices the new character Ma3a. Rebecca Romijn-Stamos provides the voice of Mercury. A new Light Cycle design was contributed to the game by Syd Mead.
The idea of Tron 2.0 was originally explored as a movie concept, but it was eventually decided to make it as a game; rumors were that if the game sold well, there might be a better chance for it to be made into a movie.
A four-issue Tron 2.0 comic book series based on the game was going to be released by 88 MPH Studios, but was cancelled before the first issue was completed due to licensing issues with Disney.
| Contents |
Story
Two decades ago, Kevin Flynn entered the world inside the computer and got Tron's help in defeating the MCP. However, in destroying that powerful program, the ability to digitize human beings into the computer world was lost.
Now it is 2003. Flynn departed the company years ago. Alan now runs ENCOM; he married Lora shortly after the events of the movie and they had a son Jet, but an accident later took Lora's life. Alan has been putting a lot of work into the development of a new artificial intelligence named "Ma3a"(pronounced "mah-three-ah"), which eerily has the voice and personality of his late wife.
ENCOM was recently the target of a hostile takeover by Future Control Industries (fCon), which is very interested in the ability to place humans into the computer world. Specifically, fCon intends to use skilled hackers called "DataWraiths" to infiltrate the global computer network and control banks and commerce. The problem is that digitizing humans still doesn't work properly; errors during the process corrupt and mutate people. Alan has come up with a new error-correcting subroutine to prevent this, but when he finds out about fCon's nefarious plan, he encrypts the code and hides it within Ma3a.
fCon kidnaps Alan in a futile attempt to get the code from him. Meanwhile, Thorne, the fCon security officer, digitizes himself and becomes a virus which begins to take over the computer. Ma3a safely brings Alan's son Jet - now a talented programmer in his own right, though rebellious - into the computer against his will, and recruits his help in fighting the virus. Jet gets some help from Byte, a flying polygon (which is quite a bit more conversational and opinionated than the movie's Bit).
As the plot progresses, Jet must rid the computer system of the virus and protect his father while thwarting the efforts of fCon and the DataWraiths.
Gameplay
Single Player Campaign
The campaign takes place entirely inside the computer world (though some cutscenes are shown around the ENCOM research laboratory). The goal of each level is generally to complete tasks and find keys ("permission bits") which allow access to the next level. Some conventions which don't make much sense in other first-person shooters, such as the ability to carry a half-dozen weapons or to heal instantly with a medkit, are much more appropriate to this setting.
The design of the game's levels is linear; there are no choices about how to proceed or about what to say during the interactions with other characters. The levels are abstract as the ambience seen in the movie, not to say surreal: they feature energy bridges and gates, neon-glowing contours, vibrant colors, floating boxes and tiles, teleports and deep chasms. However, some conventional physics apply: Jet will be harmed if he falls from a height (or killed if the height is great enough). Some moving objects may also crush Jet.
Jet's weaponry starts with the same disc as seen in the movie. In time, he obtains other weapons, not surprisingly similar to the ones found in other titles: a shotgun, a submachine, a sniper rifle and grenades, accordingly reshaped to fit in the computer world reality. The ammunition for these newly acquired weapons is simply "energy" that Jet can collect in some spots (the disc uses no energy).
Jet's abilities are customizable. He acquires new abilities, and also the aforementioned weapons, in the form of "subroutines" held in "archive bins" scattered around the levels, and he has a limited number of slots in which to "install" these subroutines onto his person. Subroutines start out as "alpha" but can be upgraded to "beta" and "gold" to take up less space while becoming more effective.
Jet has to engage lots of "lower" enemies, none of them particularly powerful, but they usually show up in gangs. Among the regular levels, there are some with boss enemies that add to the thrill of the game.
Interspersed with the "shooter" levels there are some Light Cycles races. Originally the player was required to win these races to advance the campaign, but consumer feedback led the vendor to release a patch that eliminated this requirement. Many felt that the computer-controlled light cyclers were impossibly precise in their controls (turning at angles a human could not, for example), forcing players to wait for the enemy lightcycles to destroy themselves.
Single Player Light Cycles
In this mode there´s no campaign. Instead, the player is presented to several arenas where he can race with the Light Cycles made famous by the movie Tron. The arenas have improvements like "speed zones" that affect the cycles´ speed, more complex layouts with walls and other artifacts (instead of the "empty box" as seen in the movie) and power-ups that can be grabbed during the race.
In addition to Tron´s regular Light Cycles, there are the Super Light Cycles that sport a more modern design and offer more speed.
Multiplayer
Tron 2.0 offers some multiplayer scenarios, both in the "shooter" mode and the Light Cycles mode. Internet and LAN play are available, although the vendor does not recommend the Light Cycles to be played over the Internet due to its generally long delay, even for broadband users.
Subtle things and trivia
It is amusing to note that the plot, before the game was released, is in some ways quite different than what appeared in the final product—possibly intentionally.
In the level Packet Transfer, the player must jump onto a regulator tug in order to escape. This tug is a retrofitted Recognizer.
While Thorne and the corrupted programs are indeed enemies of Jet, they are not the main enemy past a certain point in the game, as the marketing implied. Thorne himself is defeated, mostly off-screen, by the security programs the player assumes are "Bad Guys" (combined with the rampant Tron Legacy program). In Tron 2.0, the red-colored programs are actually "Good Guys".
Another hinted-at aspect of Tron 2.0 is the nature of Ma3a. Voiced by Cindy Morgan, it is implied that she is the result of a incomplete digitation of Jet's mother, Lora. It is unknown if Alan knows that his original Math Assistance AI contains these aspects of his late wife, but he trusts the AI enough to give it the digitation correction algorithms, the exact things Lora was attempting to re-discover during the accident. Ma3a, it seems, is equally ignorant.
References to Marathon
The designers of the game were aware of the popular Mac game franchise Marathon (or like many gamers, learned of them through Halo). In the most 'corrupted' sections of the computer the player plays in, the name of a corrupted program often is either Durandal or Ra*mpa*^ncy. Also, the corrupted system often shoots out a strange error message - Fr0g bla#st the v@ent cor^e!. These notes are especially poignant, as the typical color of corrupted programs is Green - the color often used by Durandal in his messages, and the color of all simulacrum (corrupted) BOBs.
External links
- Tron 2.0 official website
- Frictionless Insight review
- GameSpot review
- GameSpy review
- IGN review
- Info and gallery for Tron 2.0 Comic (never completed)