
The single player game features a number of changes from Quake. The Quad Damage power up from Quake is present in Quake II, and new power-ups include the Ammo Pack, Invulnerability, Bandolier, Enviro-Suit, Rebreather, and Silencer. The six newly introduced weapons are the Blaster, Machine Gun, Chain Gun, Hyperblaster, Railgun, and BFG10K. The remainder of Quake's eight weapons (the Axe, Nailgun, Super Nailgun, and Thunderbolt) are not present in Quake II. The game retains four of the eight weapons from Quake (the Shotgun, Super Shotgun, Grenade Launcher, and Rocket Launcher), although they have been redesigned visually and made to function in slightly different ways.

The gameplay is very similar to that featured in Quake, in terms of movement and controls, although the player's movement speed has been slowed down, and the player now has the ability to crouch. Quake II is a first-person shooter, in which the player shoots enemies from the perspective of the main character.

The soundtrack for the Nintendo 64 version of the game was composed by Aubrey Hodges, credited as Ken "Razor" Richmond.

The soundtrack for Quake II was mainly provided by Sonic Mayhem, with some additional tracks by Bill Brown the main theme was also composed by Bill Brown and Rob Zombie, and one track by Jer Sypult. It is not a direct sequel to Quake id decided to revert to an existing trademark when the game's fast-paced, tactile feel felt closer to a Quake game than a new franchise.

It was developed by id Software and published by Activision. Quake II is a first-person shooter video game released in December 1997.
