What happened to the Jurassic Park video games?

[ninjainspandex]

With the announcement of the new JP movie coming out it got me thinking, what happened to the video games? JP actually had some great games bucking the "Movie games always suck" trend, the Genesis games rocked, the Game Gear/Master System games are incredibly overlooked and underrated, Operation Genesis was addictive as hell and let my inner child out, and then there was Trespasser. Let's talk about Trespasser.

I feel like Trespasser was a game that came out too early, it had so much potential. It had an expansive and immersive world that pushed the limits of what PC's could do at the time, it was the Far Cry of it's time and that's it, it shares so much resemblance to the Far Cry series I can't imagine the developers of FC didn't take any cues from Trespasser. With the wide open world and the realistic perspective and lush enviroment. Unfortunately the game ended up feeling rushed and unfinished with the ending being incredible underwhelming.

I feel there is a huge missed opportunity to make a truly epic JP game, all they have to do is give the rights to the makers of Far Cry series. Just imagine FC 3 and 4 but with Dinosaurs, instead of bases to take over your taking over research labs to steal Dino DNA to sell to the highest bidder to make cash to buy new weapons and equipment. Instead of hunting or being hunted by tigers and wolves it's Raptors and T-Rexes. Instead of riding an elephant into battle your riding a Triceratops wielding a Light Machinegun. Maybe you will say to me, we don't need another game to try to rip off Far Cry, but look at the latest Tomb Raider reboot, it obviously copied the Uncharted formula but it worked flawlessly and was truly epic.

While playing Far Cry 3 a couple years ago I felt like it was so obvious that they were going to make a JP movie game or at least DLC with dinosaurs. If you listened to some of the enemies talk to each other you could hear them make references to another island and saying stuff like "At least were not on that other island with the dinosaurs" ah well maybe I'm just dreaming here.

[Tanooki]

I've only bothered with the first Far Cry, but that engine was ahead of its time then too. I can see it with just that game having a JP Lost World type thing going for it, and it could work out pretty well. Depending how it all was handled, and hopefully single player only like Wolfenstein last year, as to not dilute the quality of the game, it could be just fantastic. The whole island area setup in high detail, death around every corner in each open stage of the game as you move along in a ways kind of mirroring but not the plot of the upcoming movie and that could work out very well. Such an engine could also be pretty open to some extreme modding or self made stages to add to the experience for those into that.

[BogusMeatFactory]

I want to talk about Trespasser as well! When I get home I want to spend some heavy duty time discussing this game.

[RyaNtheSlayA]

I have never played Trespasser but I did watch Research Indicates from the Something Awful forums play through it. It's an excellent let's play and it goes into the development of the game and it's absolutely fascinating. If you have a few hours it's well worth the watch. You can find that here:

I'm getting hyped over Jurassic World. Did you know they're releasing a new arcade game in the vain of The Lost World game? http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=938065

[ninjainspandex]

Keep in mind trespasser came out way back in 98, I remember reading about it in a PC gaming magazine at the time and it just blew me away it seemed so realistic. But sadly I knew my old Pentium 3 computer would probably explode if I tried to play it. I had a friend who bought the game but his computer wasn't powerful enough and it just chugged along at like 5 FPS on his machine. Wasn't until the mid 2000's that I was able to play it at max settings, really was ahead of it's time and would set the stage for the Far Cry games.

I could see a Jurassic Park game being very good if they just gave the license to the devs of FC 3 and 4 and said just make a Far Cry game with dinosaurs set in the JP world, no deadlines just make it quality and big budget. I could see it be Game of the Year. But sadly I'm pessimistic and I forsee that if they do decide to make a JP game they will try to pump it out before the movie release to build hype for the movie and it will be crap.

[Pulsar_t]

All of those dino games on Steam are wank, unfortunately. Maybe Sega could task CA to make a jurassic park survival game akin to Alien Isolation?

[BogusMeatFactory]

Trespasser truly was a game that was too big for its britches. The concept put forward was to create a dynamic, living, breathing island set in a sandbox style. Dinosaurs would have hunger and moods that would change based on their situations, feeling fearful, protective, aggressive, docile etc. and could roam freely through the island. Trespasser was trying to create something that even today in this modern age of gaming would be considered ambitious. Of course, they could not even come close to the original vision, leaving the game buggy and near impossible to play because of finicky programing and a poor, sewn together design.

I actually owned Trespasser when it came out and was lucky to have a computer that could run it (after upgrading it and spending a fortune on a palfrey amount of RAM) and even though the game itself was horrifically flawed, there was a sense of charm and wonder still infused in the game. It really wasn't about what it was, but what it was trying to do. It failed miserably at it, but regardless you could see the intent and potential. The star it tried to shoot for still shined there in the clouds.

Imagine a game like that now in this modern era. A sandbox Jurassic Park with a very open-ended, no-hands-holding game that allowed you to explore, uncover secrets and escape in a multitude of ways. It would be a survival game, with hunger and thirst and a need for shelter against the elements and dinosaurs. You could set up traps and root through dinosaur lairs to collect eggs and DNA to get a better ending, all the while avoiding the multitude of dangers the island had in store.

I would want this more than I would a standard shoot-em-up like Far Cry in all honesty.

[Exhuminator]

I feel there is a huge missed opportunity to make a truly epic JP game, all they have to do is give the rights to the makers of Far Cry series.

Well if Ubisoft bought the Turok IP maybe this would happen.

[Xeogred]

The better question is to ask... what happened to dinosaurs in general?

Dinosaurs ruled the 90's. From Jurassic Park, to Beast Wars, to Dino Crisis, to Extreme Dinosaurs, etc... anyone else?

Now it's zombies. Yay.

[ninjainspandex]

yea I don't get the Zombie craze, not really a scary enemy. They are slow, clumsy and brain dead, just get somewhere they can't climb and your just fine. Dinosaurs on the other hand can be fast, stealthy, and smart. What would I be much more afraid of? Clever girl