Overview:

It’s a top down perspective based on the hit 1990s movie with genetically engineered dinosaurs breaking loose of their confines in a theme park. The game doesn’t really follow the movie but rather the book with you collecting eggs and ID cards through the park “levels” so you can get helicopter evacuated to prevent dinosaurs from reaching the mainland. Sound simple? Good! That’s about the only thing that’s simple in this game!

Visuals:

I hate to say it, but this is one ugly game. Dr. Grant looks like a stumpy version of himself and the entire world is just one giant confusing map. It has a very cartoonish look to it with the dinosaurs looking more like comic book creatures rather than real life animals. They are all vastly different so that’s a plus for them but everything just looks so flat. The weird isometric view is also such a sharp angle everything just is squat. There are 3-D levels whenever you go into a building but these run at such low framerates that it is such a chore and a bore to play through them. Also they are severely pixelated which makes going through them kind of hard on the eyes.

Audio:

This is where the game truly shines. The music is so wonderful it kind of feels like Disneyworld. You go from one zone to another and the music changes completely with nice fade outs. The songs themselves are very memorable and I find that I have been humming these songs for, as of this writing, over 30 years at this point. The other sound effects are a drag though. Grant makes grunts when he gets hit, the roars are not what was in the movie, and the weapon sound effects are rather flat and dull. My fav fav FAVORITE thing throughout this game, besides the amazing music, is every time you come to a pole with some things jutting out of it, one of the survivors of the park say, “Dr. Grant!” and give you a little factoid. Like the music, I still say this stuff all the time, especially in rewatches of the movie or rereads of the book.

Completion:

I have never been able to finish this game. Even when I first rented it to when I played it now…even with cheats…I could not finish this game! For one, it’s really hard to control and the stumpiness makes it hard to judge jumps. You can get one shotted by certain dinosaurs or just fall into rivers. You have a set amount of lives and continues but man, they go fast and the world is so confusing you get lost pretty easily. I dunno, though, I still love playing it though.