Jurassic Park The Game

[Datadog]

Here's a review from a website called Gaming Blend. I've never heard of them before, but so far it seems the better known review sites (Gamespot, IGN, etc) haven't bothered to write anything about JP:TG yet.

The review sounds about right. Although I'm amused that his biggest gripe comes from how hard he thinks the actual "adventure gaming" puzzles are.

[Collector]

Lots of developers feel that issuing PC demos is worthless, for some reason or another. All that does is make people pirate games more.

And that is part of why many of people pirate games. For the "Why spend money on a game that I am not sure that I'll like" attitude a good demo is the answer. They may intend to buy the game if they like it, but if they already have a working pirated game they may never get around to it. I have often put off buying games that I was not sure about until they have hit the bargain bin or I have completely forgotten about. Of course on the flip side, if the demo is not very good, it can diminish sales, even if the game itself is good.

I'm amused that his biggest gripe comes from how hard he thinks the actual "adventure gaming" puzzles are.

Perhaps there is some hope for it, then. There should be a difficulty setting for the puzzles the way many action games have combat difficulty settings à la Monkey Island 3 or multiple paths of varying difficulty.

[DeadPoolX]

And that is part of why many of people pirate games. For the "Why spend money on a game that I am not sure that I'll like" attitude a good demo is the answer. They may intend to buy the game if they like it, but if they already have a working pirated game they may never get around to it.

Another reason people pirate games is because not all games are available in all regions. I'm seen numerous complaints on Steam regarding publishers who refuse to allow their game to be sold (through Steam or otherwise) to certain markets.

I have often put off buying games that I was not sure about until they have hit the bargain bin or I have completely forgotten about. Of course on the flip side, if the demo is not very good, it can diminish sales, even if the game itself is good.

I remember when demos used to come out BEFORE the actual game was released. Nowadays PC gamers are lucky if they even see a demo (and if one exists, it'll be released quite some time AFTER the full game is out).

[Datadog]

In finishing the game, I feel more compelled to call it an "interactive movie" rather than an "adventure game." It's a whole other genre. The real treat in playing it is not the satisfaction of solving puzzles, but simply getting experience the story and adventure. In other words, what it lacks in game-play, it makes up for in awesomeness.

It's actually quite astonishing what they pulled off here in terms of animation. The action sequences are massive, and there's dozens of fail-states all over the game (I counted at least twenty alone during the game's climax.) And some of these sequences are impressively long even without failing. I've already replayed a few scenes that blew my mind the first time around. It's very film-worthy the way they put it together.

I'm still surprised that a lot of reviewers are saying it should be a shooter. I can't see a shooter working for JP at all. If you're running around the island shooting all the dinosaurs, then the thrill is gone. Squaring off against four Velociraptors is an everyday occurrence in a shooter. But in a game like this, if you're unarmed, you're trapped in a small room with four of them, and your only means of survival is pressing buttons at the right time, they become the scariest things ever. Even a movie-style shooter or survival horror like "Uncharted" or "Silent Hill" doesn't have the same punch since you've got the health bar of safety on your side.

And every time the T-Rex shows up... I love the T-Rex.

[MusicallyInspired]

It's not an adventure game. At all. Datadog is right, it's an (somewhat) interactive movie. A lot less interactive than Heavy Rain, really.

This game sucks. I've been trying out the 360 version and it's utterly boring. It's cringingly loaded with cliches and bad movie tie-in jokes. And the gameplay is only a silouhette of what Heavy Rain was. I enjoyed Heavy Rain. The gameplay (we are still dealing with a GAME here) was actually good. The speed in which you performed the controls, for instance, actually affected the timing in the game. In Jurassic Park, it almost never does. And the control schemes are usually pretty simple and straightforward. No challenge at all. Heavy Rain did it in a far more interesting way.

Oh yeah, and you can't save. You have to solve each "chapter" so it can be unlocked so you can play it at any time. If you're almost to the end of a "chapter" and have to run quickly, well too bad. Next time you come back you'll haev to start all over. And there's NO WAY TO SKIP CUTSCENES. So if you DID have to quit prematurely then you'll have to sit through the same cutscenes all over again to get to where you were.

Also, at least in Heavy Rain you could WALK. I was right. This "game" is garbage. I don't even feel like finishing it and I'm trying to make myself. I never thought I'd ever say it, but Back to the Future is a much better game. I'm glad I never bought it. I would not recommend anybody sinking their hard-earned into this...interactive movie. I don't even care what happens to the barbasol can.

This IGN review pretty much sums it up nicely. http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/11/17/ju ... 89&show=HD About the only time I've ever agreed with them.

Also, check this out.

http://www.gamespot.com/features/jurass ... d-6346288/

[DeadPoolX]

It's not an adventure game. At all. Datadog is right, it's an (somewhat) interactive movie. A lot less interactive than Heavy Rain, really.

So I was right, it's really nothing more than a modern-day version of Dragon's Lair or Space Ace. Hell, it sounds less interactive than many early CD-ROM FMV games!

Oh yeah, and you can't save. You have to solve each "chapter" so it can be unlocked so you can play it at any time. If you're almost to the end of a "chapter" and have to run quickly, well too bad. Next time you come back you'll haev to start all over. And there's NO WAY TO SKIP CUTSCENES. So if you DID have to quit prematurely then you'll have to sit through the same cutscenes all over again to get to where you were.

That's completely inexcusable. I don't think I've ever come across an Adventure game that lacked the ability to save.

I don't know why TellTale would do this. If they were making an all-action, no-story game, I could maybe see using a limited save mechanism. Call of Duty 2, for instance, uses save points and although I dislike that (I prefer being able to save whenever I want), it's preferable to not being able to save at all!

http://www.gamespot.com/features/jurass ... d-6346288/

Yeah, I heard about this. If I were going to secretly rate my own game, I wouldn't give it a perfect score. It's too suspicious, especially when most review sites are giving it a poor rating.

[pppp]

Just finished it.That was terrible.The graphics are ugly,the music is terrible and the story is as uninteresting as watching paint dry. They wanted to replicate Heavy Rain? Well congratulations, they did it: The gameplay is just as shallow,boring and dumb as that overrated piece of ****. I'm a huge fan of Telltale(The Back to the Future game rocks) and this really saddens me. The King's Quest reboot better not be like this

[DeadPoolX]

Just finished it.That was terrible.The graphics are ugly,the music is terrible and the story is as uninteresting as watching paint dry. They wanted to replicate Heavy Rain? Well congratulations, they did it: The gameplay is just as shallow,boring and dumb as that overrated piece of ****. I'm a huge fan of Telltale(The Back to the Future game rocks) and this really saddens me. The King's Quest reboot better not be like this

I think TellTale's major issue was acquiring the JP license in the first place. JP does not lend itself well to the Adventure genre; not really, anyway. It's always been more about action, in some form or another, than story.

Sure, the book was more story-heavy, but far fewer people read that than those who simply saw the movie. TellTale was aiming for a "cinematic experience" based on the movie and therefore played up the action.

The problem was that TellTale figured -- rightly or wrongly -- that most Adventure and casual gamers wouldn't be able to handle action themselves. So instead of giving direct control to the player, they used Quick-Time events to make it "easier" on the players.

Unfortunately, this made JP a "press-this-button-or-die" sort of game. It wasn't Adventure or even Action. It didn't do either well and only succeeded in disappointing fans of both genres, not to mention JP fans themselves.

KQ, on the other hand, is already well established and I doubt TellTale would do anything like this with that series. Unlike JP (or even BTTF), they're strictly catering to Adventure gamers with KQ. I imagine that the worst that'll happen is KQ will have a similar engine to that of the ToMI or BTTF.

[Datadog]

As a JP fan, I wasn't disappointed since the game experience did feel like I was "playing" a Jurassic Park story. Timed-based button-mashing mini-games are generally more stressful than regular action game-play, so the constant rush of adrenaline did provide me with a unique game-play experience. I think the worst parts were really the adventure puzzles where I'm just clicking around hoping for the characters to solve the puzzles on their own. "Hmmm... a rock... I don't know what to do with it. Hey, a window! I don't know what to do with it either... hey, a rock again! I can use it to break the window! Me smart!"

People were worried that "Jurassic Park" would be like "Back to the Future" and were clearly wrong. So "King's Quest" being like "Jurassic Park" should also stand a good chance of being wrong - and wouldn't make any sense from any design perspective. Chances are good that KQ will be a traditional Telltale-style adventure much like "Hector" is right now, except probably more cinematic in style - probably closer to KQ7 in terms of exploration and puzzle-solving (chapter breaks and single cursor interface with inventory). I'd be surprised if they managed to create an episodic open-world game.

[MusicallyInspired]

The QTE isn't even difficult, for a QTE-based game. At least Heavy Rain made some interesting controls. In JP it was all the same thing. Press this button quickly! (oh but it doesn't really matter how fast you press it, just press it) Press this button then this button! So easy.