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Some may argue that Quake should win this category by virtue of its true-3D game engine and dynamic light sourcing. While I tend to agree, I found that the restricted palette in Quake--with its profusion of dark green, brown, and gray tones combined with the gloomy lighting--eventually became tiresome. Granted, some of the gloominess is because of the light sourcing making demands on the current system palette, restricting the number of colors used for textures and other objects. All this dreariness definitely has its place when you're blasting your buddies into bits with a nail gun, but having to look at the same mud-gray screen for hours is a bit much.

Marathon 2 can't touch Quake's game engine and light-sourcing features, but it does offer some first-rate visuals and animation of its own. The colors are generally brighter and more varied, giving the game a high-tech, science fiction feel in spots. Marathon 2 also provides a large amount of static and animated supplemental imagery, from displays on computer terminals to stunning segue artwork.

Quake's dynamic light sourcing and true-3D graphics technology is hard to beat, but Marathon 2 matches Quake with a more varied palette of colors and stunning static imagery.

next round: weapons of the trade