A Dinosaur Safari with Jurassic: The Hunted
When will we humans ever learn? Many of us would love to see dinosaurs in the flesh, but if we ever actually got the chance it would probably be a terrifying experience. Numerous movies, comic books, and video games have been based upon this love-hate relationship, and last week saw the release of video game that carries on in this tradition called Jurassic: The Hunted.
Asking about the story played out in the game is a bit superfluous. Any plot that involves dinosaurs, the Bermuda Triangle, and a gritty heavy-weapons expert does not merit too much thinking about. The entire reason for the game’s existence is to allow players to run around shooting dinosaurs with a variety of big, highly destructive weapons.
If this sounds familiar, it should. Another dinosaur shoot-’em-up, Turok, was released early in 2008. In fact, the new game shows many similarities with Turok, and it looks like Jurassic: The Hunted is a game meant to satisfy players who want to keep blasting away at dinosaurs. I have to admit that Turok had a pretty good storyline, though, something that this new game seems to have foregone.
Though gaming systems are continually changing, dinosaur hunting games have been around for a while and probably will continue to pop up for many years to come. Such games allow virtually anyone to be a heroic monster slayer without leaving the comfort of their couch. It seems that the only thing more fun than bringing dinosaurs back to life is sending them into extinction again.
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Do any of these games allow you to play as the dinosaur? I mean, what could be more fun than playing an oversized raptor hunting down Michael Crichton characters?
Comment by Blake Stacey — November 17, 2009 @ 12:12 pm
Blake; I’m with you. None of the current crop of dino games allows the player to to stomp around as a dinosaur (at least as far as I know; please correct me if I’m wrong!), but the original Jurassic Park game for Sega allowed players to be either Alan Grant or a “raptor” (ditto for the special “Rampage Edition” of the game).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurassic_Park_video_games#Sega
The problem with games in which you play as a killer critter is that they can often become rather repetitive. JAWS: Unleashed is a good example of what can go wrong with such a game:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaws_Unleashed
Comment by Brian Switek — November 17, 2009 @ 12:44 pm
You won’t get to chomp on Crichton characters, but I’m quite fond of the retro-styled Dino Run, which can be played for free online.
http://www.pixeljam.com/dinorun/
Comment by Michael Stearns — November 17, 2009 @ 4:40 pm
RE “Play as a Dinosaur”:
I know of one game where you got to do so. In “Turok: Rage Wars” for Nintendo 64, in the multi-player death match you could play as the raptor.
Comment by Doug — November 17, 2009 @ 7:42 pm
Does anyone know what the rating on this game will be?
Comment by Eric — November 17, 2009 @ 8:54 pm
I believe the PSOne version of The Lost World lets you play as several dinosaurs, including compies and T.rex. I’m super-excited about this game. It looks more like the original Turok on N64 than the latest few Turok games have. As long as the dinosaurs are either cartoony or closer to the JP dinosaurs than the Walking With Dinosaurs dinosaurs, I’ll be happy.
Comment by Zach Miller — November 18, 2009 @ 3:22 pm
Looks like they’re definitely going for the JP route, Zach. I think I saw a frilled Dilophosaur in there.
Comment by Davor — November 19, 2009 @ 12:16 am
Wait, games with dinosaurs as player characters? Well, there’s always “Off-road Velociraptor Safari”. . .but it still involves running down and killing dinosaurs. Darn, thought I had something there for a minute.
Comment by Gray Stanback — November 23, 2009 @ 5:06 pm