In my opinion, this is the definitive Quake game!
Graphics (7/10)
Playing Quake II on standard Software quality is pretty bad, but since the game comes with OpenGL right out of the box, the graphics can actually look pretty good. They aren't as good as today's standard, but it all look nice.
Story (5/10)
Id games aren't very well known for their video game story lines, and Quake II is not much different. The story is that you are a lone space marine on the planet Stroggos. The inhabitants on the planet are cyborg like beings called the Strogg. They are made up of humans body parts, as well as machinery. Your job is to disable the planet's defenses, as well as defeat the dreaded Makron, who is the leader of all the Strogg. Not much of story, but in an action game like Quake, a story isn't really important.
Gameplay (10/10)
Quake II is a first-person shooter. All you need to do is run around the maps, killing Strogg aliens, and picking extra guns and ammo. The guns in the game are the Pistol, Shotgun, Super Shotgun, Machine Gun, Chaingun, Grenade Launcher, Rocket Launcher, Hyperblaster (an automatic plasma gun), Railgun (a plasma ray that shoots one quick beam at a time), and the BFG 10k (a large gun that shoots huge blasts of plasma). All the guns are fun to use, but some are better than others. There are a bunch of enemies to kill. There are melee Strogg, grenade Strogg, machine gun Strogg, and a ton of others. Some are big, some are agile, and some fly. The maps are very well created and are always fun to play on. There are usually a large amount of switches to pull, and buttons to press, and a generous amount of trick and traps. You won't be bored when you play Quake II.
Multiplayer (NA)
I have not tried Quake II multiplayer, online or linked computers. Since Quake II is a rather old game (1997), I would think it would be difficult to try playing against your friends. There may be some source ports out there that make it possible, however. I'm sure it would be fun.
Putting It Together (9/10)
Quake II's gameplay is the thing it does best. Graphics and Story can do little to bring it down. It is an extremely fun game to play, and you since the campaign is actually quite long, you'll be on your computer for many, many hours. Quake II is a PC game that all FPS lovers should own.