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I will try Reckoning tomorrow, Ground Zero I stopped playing, it's just terrible.
It's a mix of frustration, nothing else.

Few things to add to what I wrote before.
That slow firing ETF rifle that has just sound ripped from Q1's nailgun is mostly pointless. Its projectiles have very low chance of hitting anything, unless it's a slow moving target. Really bad combination if it's the only weapon left and one encounters a pack of those idiotic stalkers. Those not only evade most of the shots with their quick jumping on the ceiling, but also manage to fire that annoying laser at player where they also predict the player position according to his movement.
These encounters are simply killing it. And if that's over, than yes, just like you said, those turrets that also predict player movement will finish it with a help of 2 shotgun and 2 machine gun guys who stand far from the player somewhere atop. Hitting those with ETF while trying to evade two turrets that I would have to take care of with the ETF as well? No, thanks.
Jeez, who came up with this nonsense.

Great info in this thread.
I was in a mood to have Quake 2 run after some long years. '1964' seems like some great effort, I will definitely play that one. It's from the same guy who created DOPA right?

Anyway, I agree that Q2 isn't that good as Q1, but that's just an opinon, perhaps based on the general theme, not playability.
Q1 appeals more to many people, maybe also because it has more themes mixed in, while Q2 is just one Strogg scifi-military thing. But if I'm honest, Q2 generally plays better. The movement itself I like a bit more, although the air control is limited. But the way movement is done and the slow changing of weapons also make it feel a bit more immersive.
What I  don't like though, is sometimes a bit of confusion of where to go after some switch or something is activated. The generally similar architecture doesn't help it either. But all in all, it plays well and that's about it. It doesn't have the strong sort of Q1 personality, no, but it's better in other areas and it just depends on who one asks.

I'm playing Ground Zero now and frankly, I start to hate it. Some monster placements, monster combinations in some areas and sometimes more of the Q2 progress confusion mixed in is annoying.  One thing about Ground Zero is sure, those custom enemies in general are plain headache.
Well, but I will try to get over it and try with fresh head in a day or two. :D

Thanks for all the links, people in this thread! I was never a big fan of Quake 2 as a game, but for some reason I got curious about Q2 custom SP maps, and some of these are pretty nice! It's also interesting to see what some big names in Q1SP have done for Q2.

Having just replayed most of the original game before trying the custom maps, I have to say I (still) mostly agree for several reasons (e.g. I think that Quake 2's slowed down, more "realistic" mechanics are a lot less fun than Quake's, I personally find the very overtly macho/military/army theme incredibly boring/annoying, and I feel that the game takes itself far too seriously), yet I think it's mainly a matter of Q2's stock SP maps -- they all look and play more or less the same (in my opinion).

Quite a few of these custom maps, however, take things out of the stale vaguely industrial-ish/military-ish/base-ish setting and have fun gameplay too. What I'm trying to say, I guess, is that even if you hated Quake 2, you might still find some of the custom maps worthwhile. And though it is a completely different game, the fact that the engines are not that different and that a lot of Q1SP mappers mapped for Q2, arguably makes it part of Q1SP history ... right?

Sadly one of the links Cocerello posted above (Ten Four) is already dead, and one of the others (markshan.com) has dead links. Krypto's link is dead too. I'd like to echo what quakis said above -- it's a shame there isn't a reliable Quaddicted equivalent for Q2SP content...

Your choice!

Add them on https://www.quaddicted.com/links :)

Greetings folks!

Well at the potential risk of being attributed to an Abandonware site, here is the most comprehensive pack for Q2 I've come across which contains a grand total of 109 SP Mission Packs and 243 Single Levels. As for distinguishing between which maps are recommended and which are mediocre, I recommend reading under the Q2 review section over on 3D Gamers Edge or Ten Four. Their are a number of great levels in this pack which I never had the opportunity to play years ago owing to dead/inactive links on Ten Four, which was the only site which catered towards Quake II reviews at the time.

http://3dsl.game-host.org/shooter/game/7163

Note: You'll have to read the associated instructions on the site in order to gain access to the download archive.

Anymore Quake 2 maps or mission archives been found or shared?

Renaming them would be enough? If yes give me a list and then I'll save you the trouble.