The reptilian hero returns in Argonaut Software's sequel to Croc, Croc 2. Croc 2 has over 40 levels including secret levels and over 30 characters. The graphics are like eye candy and the sound quality is excellent.

The story line of Croc 2 is nothing earth-shattering, but is simple and mediocre. The introduction of the game begins with a scene with a Gobbo, the furball race that raised Croc, inventor being captured by the Dantinsis after witnessing the plot of the return of Baron Dante. Then the scene goes to Croc and the Gobbos playing on the beach. Croc finds a bottle that contains a message with a crocodile footprint on it. The message said that the senders were searching for their long-lost child. This message causes Croc to decide to leave the island to find his parents. Using a seesaw, Croc catapults all the way to the distant land to begin his search.

Although the game has a banal story line, the gameplay quality is good. The game starts in the first of the four Gobbo villages. In these villages, Croc can purchase some items that can be used in the levels by using the crystals that he collects in the levels, which makes the game a little like The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time. There are also doors that lead to the secret levels of the village, but these can only be opened if all of the colored crystals have been found in all of the levels. There are also several mini-games that can be quite entertaining like the boat race in the first village.

Each village contains several doors that lead to levels. Each of the levels has a gobbo standing in front of the door. The gobbos ask Croc to find something specific in each level, which gives a good variety of levels. For example, a gobbo asks Croc to find five treasures, so Croc the objective of that level is to find the treasures.

The worst feature of this game are the camera angles. It is not like Nintendo's Super Mario 64 where you can switch the camera angel to virtually any position. When you move Croc around, the camera angle automatically switches, which can make it a little difficult to control. The lack of altering the camera angles can also make jumping on to ledges irritating. If camera angles could be changed, then the gameplay value would have been better.

At a glance, Croc 2 may seem like a 'Mario 64 clone', but Croc 2 is indeed a very impressive game. It has a good blend of the aspects of Nintendo's Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time and UbiSoft's Rayman 2. The only gripe is that the camera angles can not be changed like Mario 64.

· · · Kane