Quake 2 is probably my least favorite out of the single-player Quakes. I don't like the music and not a huge fan of the orange color palette. Also some enemies and enemy placements are bullshit. Of course it's not nearly as atmospheric as the first game either. There's a reason Nine Inch Nails decided not to do the soundtrack this time around.

But other than that, it's still a solid game with a cool setting and scripted scenes, and the gameplay isn't much different from Quake 1, which was great. The level design can get a bit confusing sometimes, but the remaster kinda fixes that problem with the addition of a compass.

That being said, something of exploration is lost with the compass. I remember playing the old version and constantly reading the tasks and paying more attention to the environment to find the locations I must reach. There were only a couple of moments in the remaster when I had to do that. I was playing co-op (which I'm not sure existed in the original?) with my friend, and we basically talked about other stuff while blazing through the levels without putting too much thought into it. With the exception of a few moments when the compass wasn't working, and we had to stop and discuss where to go.

I like that this remaster allows you to turn off the graphical improvements. And the addition of hit markers on the crosshair is very useful.

Other than that, it plays more or less the same as the original version, which is a good thing. You don't want a remaster messing with the original game too much.