''Tron 2.0'' is a
first-person shooter
First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the pl ...
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...
developed by
Monolith Productions
Monolith Productions, Inc. is an American video game developer based in Kirkland, Washington. The company has been a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment since August 2004.
History
Monolith Productions was founded on October ...
. The
Microsoft Windows
Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
version of the game was released by
Buena Vista Interactive
Buena ( ) is a borough in Atlantic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 4,603,[Mac OS X
macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...]
version was released by
MacPlay
MacPlay is the name used by a series of three American publishers of Macintosh video games.
History
MacPlay was founded in the early 1990s as a division of Interplay Entertainment. It was led by producer Bill Dugan. During this period, M ...
on April 21, 2004. The game is a sequel to ''
Tron
''Tron'' (stylized as ''TRON'') is a 1982 American science fiction action-adventure film written and directed by Steven Lisberger from a story by Lisberger and Bonnie MacBird. The film stars Jeff Bridges as Kevin Flynn, a computer programmer a ...
'', a 1982 science-fiction film, although it's set in an alternate continuity since its events were decanonized by ''
Tron: Legacy''.
Jason Cottle voices the player character Jethro "Jet" Bradley, the son of ENCOM programmer Alan Bradley (voiced by
Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce William Boxleitner (born May 12, 1950) is an American actor and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series '' How the West Was Won'', '' Bring 'Em Back Alive'', ''Scarecrow and Mrs. King ...
, who reprises his role from the original film).
Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan (born Cynthia Ann Cichorski; September 29, 1954) is an American actress known for her appearances as Lora/Yori in ''Tron'' and Lacey Underall in ''Caddyshack''.
Life and career
Morgan was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Polish and ...
, who also starred in ''Tron'', voices the
artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech re ...
"Ma3a".
Rebecca Romijn
Rebecca Alie O'Connell (née Romijn ; born November 6, 1972) is an American actress and former model (person), model. She is known for her role as Mystique (comics), Mystique in the original trilogy (2000–2006) of the X-Men (film series), ...
provides the voice of Mercury. The game features a new "light cycle" design by
Syd Mead, and provides explanations for the
''Tron'' arcade game (which makes an appearance in this game) and Kevin Flynn's experiences inside the ENCOM mainframe as shown in the original film.
According to ''
Tron
''Tron'' (stylized as ''TRON'') is a 1982 American science fiction action-adventure film written and directed by Steven Lisberger from a story by Lisberger and Bonnie MacBird. The film stars Jeff Bridges as Kevin Flynn, a computer programmer a ...
'' creator
Steven Lisberger
Steven M. Lisberger (born April 24, 1951) is an American film director, producer and writer famous for directing ''Tron'' in 1982.
Early life and education
Lisberger was born in 1951 in New York City and grew up in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. Of h ...
and ''
Tron: Legacy'' director Joseph Kosinski, ''Tron 2.0'' is not part of the ''Tron'' movie canon.
Gameplay
''Tron 2.0'' plays primarily as a
first-person shooter
First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the pl ...
. Gameplay takes place inside various computers, such as
mainframes and a
personal digital assistant
A personal digital assistant (PDA), also known as a handheld PC, is a variety mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. PDAs have been mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of highly capable smartphones, in partic ...
(PDA), while some custcenes are in the ENCOM research laboratory outside the computer world. Levels are liner in format. The goal of each level is generally to complete tasks and find keys, known as permission bits that allow access to the next level. While searching for these bits the protagonist, Jet, can find upgrades and
lore
Lore may refer to:
* Folklore, acquired knowledge or traditional beliefs
* Oral lore or oral tradition, orally conveyed cultural knowledge and traditions
Places
* Loré, former French commune
* Loré (East Timor), a city and subdistrict in Lau ...
surrounding the game's world.
Jet begins the game with his Identity Disc, which is used for both storing data and for combat. The disc is the same format featured in the films, and when thrown can bounces off enemies and objects, but always returns to the user. Jet can also acquire computerized versions of real-life weapons, such as a shotgun, submachine gun, sniper rifle, and hand grenades. Each weapon aside from the disc uses energy as ammunition, which can be collected at various points in the game.
Jet's abilities are customizable, as his in-computer program earns version upgrades - when earning a level, Jet 0.0.0 becomes Jet 0.0.1, and so on. He acquires new abilities, and also the aforementioned weapons, in the form of subroutines held in archive bins scattered around the levels, but has a limited number of memory slots in which to install these subroutines onto his person. Subroutines start out as alpha-grade software, but can be upgraded to beta and gold statuses, similar to a
software release life cycle
A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...
. Status upgrades both take up less space in memory and become more effective. The layout of Jet's memory slots changes from level to level, with immovable base stats taking up various slots and limiting the number and size of the abilities Jet can equip. When attacked by viruses, subroutines can become
fragmented or infected and cannot be used until Jet repairs them. If Jet encounters a program unknown to him, he can import one of its unique abilities to his own system.
As he moves through the levels, Jet must engage many lower-tier enemies. Although none are particularly powerful, they usually appear in gangs, making them more of a threat. Among the regular levels, there are some with boss enemies. Interspersed with the first-person-shooter levels are several
light cycle races. As seen in the movie, these races are actually arena duels in which each light cycle attempts to destroy its opponents by driving them into its jetwall. The arenas contain improvements, such as speed zones that affect the cycles' speed, more complex layouts with walls and other artifacts, and power-ups that can be collected during races. In addition to Tron's regular light cycle, Jet can also gain access to the super light cycle that sports a more modern design and offers more speed.
''Tron 2.0'' offers some multiplayer scenarios, both in campaign mode and in light cycle mode. Internet and LAN play are available, although the vendor does not recommend that the
light cycle mode be used over the Internet due to its generally high lag.
Setting
The game, like the film, is set "inside" a
computer
A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...
. Areas within the game feature glowing neon-colored highlights similar to the original film's aesthetic, with colors denoting the type and general ambiance of the system - for example, part of the story takes place in the flaming red environment of a firewall, while a
PDA
PDA may refer to:
Science and technology
* Patron-driven acquisition, a mechanism for libraries to purchase books
*Personal digital assistant, a mobile device
* Photodiode array, a type of detector
* Polydiacetylenes, a family of conducting poly ...
is colored plain white. Levels contain such features as energy bridges and gates, floating boxes and tiles, teleport spots, and deep chasms. Jet can take damage (or even die) by falling from too great a height, and can also be crushed by falling objects and moving platforms.
Like the film, ''Tron 2.0'' uses many computing conventions to explain in-game events, characters, weapons, and other phenomena. For example, players battle
viruses
A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea.
Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's 1 ...
while fleeing a
system format, and wield a
sniper rifle
A sniper rifle is a high-precision, long-range rifle. Requirements include accuracy, reliability, mobility, concealment and optics for anti-personnel, anti-materiel and surveillance uses of the military sniper. The modern sniper rifle is a por ...
known as the
LOL
LOL, or lol, is an initialism for laughing out loud and a popular element of Internet slang. It was first used almost exclusively on Usenet, but has since become widespread in other forms of computer-mediated communication and even face-to ...
, additionally amplifying its damage with a skill called
Megahurtz. Programs in the systems bear various names based on their functions, including names based on their creators (like ''Brian.exe''), system tools (e.g. ''servwatch.exe''), parodies of popular software (e.g. ''
reelplyr.exe'' and ''
netscope.exe''), and viruses and malware scripts (''HA-HA-HA-0X0->???'', ''Durandal'' and ''(Ra*mpa^ncy)'' - the latter two being references to ''
Marathon
The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...
''). Datawraiths, which are in essence digitized humans, feature email addresses such as ''AndyG@fcon.net'' and ''GeoffK@fcon.net''. Jet can also find and read e-mail messages in certain systems, which partly reveal the game's background story, but also provide insight into the relationships between Alan, Jet, and Ma3a.
Plot
The plot of ''Tron 2.0'' centers around Alan's son Jethro "Jet" Bradley. Since the events of ''Tron'', ENCOM has been taken over by a company called FCon (Future Control Industries). During a phone conversation between Jet and his father, Alan is kidnapped. Ma3a, an artificial intelligence designed by Alan, digitizes Jet into Alan's computer. She informs Jet that she needs him to aid her against J.D. Thorne, an executive from FCon who attempted to digitize himself into the computer as well, but became corrupted during the process and turned into a
virus
A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea.
Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's 1 ...
spreading throughout the system.
Upon arriving, Jet is captured by Kernel, the system's security program, and is accused of being the source of the corruption. However, Kernel spares Jet on the recommendation of Mercury, a program also tasked to help Ma3a, and sends Jet to the light cycle arena. After winning several matches, Jet escapes the arena with Mercury's help. After the two reunite with Ma3a, the server is reformatted due to its rampant corruption, which results in Mercury's demise. Jet escapes to the original ENCOM grid with Ma3a and accesses an archive with the help of an antiquated program, I-No, to retrieve the source code for "Tron Legacy", an update to the original TRON that Alan wrote to protect Ma3a. Jet and Ma3a then access the Internet and find a
compiler
In computing, a compiler is a computer program that translates computer code written in one programming language (the ''source'' language) into another language (the ''target'' language). The name "compiler" is primarily used for programs that ...
, which they use to begin compiling the Tron Legacy source code. During the process, Thorne attacks them and appears to kill Ma3a, while Jet receives a communication from Guest, the User who had assigned Mercury to help him. Accessing a video uplink, Jet sees his father trapped inside a storage closet, who holds up a sign telling him to not compile the Legacy program. However, the compile finishes before Jet can abort it, and Legacy activates, revealing that its sole function is to kill all rogue Users in the digital world. Jet escapes in a light cycle, and FCon inadvertently saves him by capturing Ma3a with a Seeker search program.
Having recovered the correction algorithms necessary to digitize a human, Alan is sent to Thorne's corrupted server and assists Kernel and his ICPs (Intrusion Countermeasure Programs). Meanwhile, Jet finds Thorne at the heart of the server and confronts Kernel in a duel that ends in Kernel's destruction before he can kill Thorne. Thorne, in a moment of lucidity, begs Jet for forgiveness and tells him how to enter FCon's server before he dissipates.
Alan and Jet break into FCon's server, which the corporation is planning to use to distribute Datawraiths - digitized human hackers - across the worldwide information network for purposes of corporate and international espionage. After Alan and Jet crash the server, the CEO of FCon (which the game implies could be Ed Dillinger, the ENCOM senior executive from the original film) orders Baza, Popoff, and Crowne into the system themselves. Alan, wanting to verify the purity of the correction algorithms, removes them from Ma3a to inspect them. As a result, when the three FCon employees are digitized, they become a monstrous amalgam that chases Jet into the digitizing beam. Jet battles the monster amalgam and ejects the employees out of the beam, releasing their code from the corruption one by one. Severing the CEO's control, Alan and Jet extract and save the Tron Legacy code as the ENCOM servers crash. The game ends with Alan planning to reassemble the digitized FCon team and bring them back to the real world.
Reception
The PC version received "favorable" reviews, while the
Game Boy Advance
The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console developed, manufactured and marketed by Nintendo as the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, in North America on June 11, 2001, in the PAL region on June 22, 2 ...
and
Xbox
Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft. The brand consists of five video game consoles, as well as applications (games), streaming services, an online service by the name of Xbox network, and the development arm by the na ...
versions received "average" reviews, according to the
review aggregation
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
.
''
The Cincinnati Enquirer
''The Cincinnati Enquirer'' is a morning daily newspaper published by Gannett in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. First published in 1841, the ''Enquirer'' is the last remaining daily newspaper in Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky, alth ...
'' gave the PC version four-and-a-half stars out of five and said: "Whether or not you're a fan of the movie, ''TRON 2.0'' oozes with style and substance. Developer Monolith Productions deserves credit for creating one of the finest and most unique PC games of the year to date".
[ '']Maxim
Maxim or Maksim may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Maxim'' (magazine), an international men's magazine
** ''Maxim'' (Australia), the Australian edition
** ''Maxim'' (India), the Indian edition
*Maxim Radio, ''Maxim'' magazine's radio channel on Sir ...
'' gave the same console version a score of eight out of ten and called it "a must for those out there who still like their CGI old school". However, ''The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'' gave the Xbox version three stars out of five, saying that "the controls take some time to master, and there's a surfeit of useless jargon seemingly designed to prevent you getting to grips with the gameplay. Nor is this a game for the short-sighted, since the on-screen captions that supposedly offer guidance are minute and virtually illegible".[
Despite the good reviews, the PC version underperformed in sales and BVG eventually dropped support for the game two years after it was released. Despite the lack of support from BVG, additional levels and multiplayer maps have been developed by fans of the game, including an expansion game and modification.
]Slave Labor Graphics
Slave Labor Graphics (SLG) is an independent American comic book publisher, well known for publishing darkly humorous, offbeat comics. Creators associated with SLG over the years include Evan Dorkin, Roman Dirge, Sarah Dyer, Woodrow Phoenix, Jhon ...
produced a ''Tron 2.0'' comic book
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...
sequel miniseries called '' Tron: The Ghost in the Machine''.
''Computer Games Magazine
''Computer Games Magazine'' was a monthly computer and console gaming print magazine, founded in October 1988 as the United Kingdom publication ''Games International''. During its history, it was known variously as ''Strategy Plus'' (October 1 ...
'' named ''Tron 2.0'' the fourth-best computer game of 2003, and presented it with awards for "Best Sound Effects" and "Best Art Direction", the latter of which it shared with '' Uru: Ages Beyond Myst''. The editors called ''Tron 2.0'' "easily one of the year's best looking games, and a textbook example of how graphics rely just as much on art design as they do technology". The editors of ''Computer Gaming World
''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through ...
'' nominated ''Tron 2.0'' for their 2003 "Shooter of the Year" and overall "Game of the Year" awards, which ultimately went to ''Call of Duty
''Call of Duty'' is a first-person shooter video game Media franchise, franchise published by Activision. Starting out in 2003, it first focused on games set in World War II. Over time, the series has seen games set in the midst of the Cold W ...
'' and '' Knights of the Old Republic'', respectively. It was also nominee for ''PC Gamer US
''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games ma ...
''s 2003 "Best Action Game" award, although it lost again to ''Call of Duty''. The editors declared it "a movie license done right".
In 2009, GamesRadar
''GamesRadar+'' (formerly ''GamesRadar'') is an entertainment website for video game-related news, previews, and reviews. It is owned by Future plc. In late 2014, Future Publishing-owned sites ''Total Film'', '' SFX'', ''Edge'' and '' Computer ...
ranked the game third on their list of the seven best Disney games, saying "Not to discount the gorgeousness of 2.0’s neon
Neon is a chemical element with the symbol Ne and atomic number 10. It is a noble gas. Neon is a colorless, odorless, inert monatomic gas under standard conditions, with about two-thirds the density of air. It was discovered (along with krypton ...
lined environments, nor the wonderfully tech savvy 1337 speak
Leet (or "1337"), also known as eleet or leetspeak, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via reflection or other resemblance. ...
..but the Light Cycle arenas remain the game’s crown jewel. All the nausea-inducing camera angles and impossible turns of Tron’s deadly game of competitive Snake
Snakes are elongated, Limbless vertebrate, limbless, carnivore, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other Squamata, squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping Scale (zoology), scales. Ma ...
were preserved, and you could bring the action online where it ran like a fanboy fever dream."
Ports
In addition to the Mac, the game was ported to mobile phone
A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...
s in two versions: the first, called ''Tron 2.0: Light Cycles'', which was released on November 21, 2003; and the second, called ''Tron 2.0: Discs of Tron'', which was released on May 12, 2004. The same game was later ported to the Xbox
Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft. The brand consists of five video game consoles, as well as applications (games), streaming services, an online service by the name of Xbox network, and the development arm by the na ...
with significant changes to the single and, especially, the multiplayer modes. The Xbox
Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft. The brand consists of five video game consoles, as well as applications (games), streaming services, an online service by the name of Xbox network, and the development arm by the na ...
version is titled ''Tron 2.0: Killer App''. Changes to the single player mode include optional jumping sequences, and overall console-tailored controls. The real changes were made to the multiplayer modes. Added is up to sixteen player multiplayer disc arena, light cycles, or overRide modes for system link or Xbox Live
The Xbox network, formerly and still sometimes branded as Xbox Live, is an Internet, online multiplayer video game, multiplayer gaming and digital media delivery service created and operated by Microsoft. It was first made available to the Xbox ...
. The new overRide mode allows for first person mayhem with the ability to ride light cycles at any time. There is also a version of ''Tron 2.0: Killer App'' for the Game Boy Advance
The (GBA) is a 32-bit handheld game console developed, manufactured and marketed by Nintendo as the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21, 2001, in North America on June 11, 2001, in the PAL region on June 22, 2 ...
that has a different story and gameplay elements from its Xbox
Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft. The brand consists of five video game consoles, as well as applications (games), streaming services, an online service by the name of Xbox network, and the development arm by the na ...
counterpart. A version of the game was planned for the Gizmondo
The Gizmondo is a handheld gaming console developed by Tiger Telematics. It was released in the UK, Sweden and the U.S. starting in March 2005. Its first-party games were developed in studios in Helsingborg, Sweden, and Manchester, England. Gi ...
, but was canceled during development.
References
External links
*
*
Gamasutra technical article about the glow effect
Tron 2.0 retrospective
{{Monolith games
2003 video games
Cancelled Gizmondo games
Climax Group games
First-person shooters
Game Boy Advance games
LithTech games
Mobile games
MacOS games
Monolith Productions games
Multiplayer and single-player video games
2.0
Vehicular combat games
Video games developed in the United States
Windows games
Xbox games
Works set in computers
Digital Eclipse games
Lavastorm games