trivard676It’s tough to be a movie fan and a game fan. On one hand, there are so many movies that would make awesome games, and vice-versa. On the other, games based on movies (and vice-versa) always seem to fall short of the awe-inducing expectations we have set up for them. Roger Ebert once said what makes a great game doesn’t necessarily make a great movie – and the same can be said for the other way around. When Telltale Games announced that they were expanding their catalogue to include our favourite dinosaur movie, we didn’t know whether to be filled with excitement or dread. Having played the game (you can trust, we’ve played it without being paid to do so…), we can’t quite say that our expectations have been fulfilled, but they haven’t been crushed, either.
First thing’s first though. It was pretty evident when we got into the game that this outing to Isla Nubar is not a horror venture. Seeing as how this is Rely on Horror and not Rely on Barbie-dolls, we kind of wish it were (a horror game – we don’t like Barbies…anymore). However we’re not exactly ready to penalize the game because it was catered to a different audience. That audience likes Telltale games – point and click puzzle adventures. Like a nice, fully loaded chili dog. As a hot dog, it’s pretty good, but if you look at it as a Thanksgiving feast, then you’re just not going to be left very satisfied. Jurassic Park is like the chili dog, and a lot of people’s expectations were for the full-course Thanksgiving feast.
So how did we like our chili dog?
Visuals are about what you’d expect from a Telltale game and better than we expected. While they weren’t mind-blowing, they look nice. The game (on PC) supports a wide variety of resolutions (although getting there was a pain, having to go through each resolution). The video wasn’t the smoothest, however – we got caught in a couple of hiccups and snarls during our playthrough on a fairly decent rig. While the sound and audio are pretty good, there were some problems we definitely had with the characters’ lips not syncing with the audio. It’s almost as if they’re not even supposed to. This is unacceptable, especially since when characters talk, most of the time you’re looking at their faces. It breaks the immersion that Telltale tries so hard to set up.
You were saying something? No? Just as well – your mouth wasn’t moving…
It’s important to note that Jurassic Park isn’t exactly gory. Telltale keeps it well within the teen rating that the game’s been given, due in part to Universal Studios keeping a tight leash on the game to ‘keep it in line with the spirit of the original movies.’ The game definitely is not the Dino Crisis remake we’ve all been hoping for, but that’s not to say that the game has been treated with kid-friendly gloves. There are some pretty nasty moments with dismembered limbs and dead bodies, but don’t expect to be soaked in blood. As a matter of fact, there’s a distinct ‘lack’ of blood to be found here, save for a few places making this more appropriate for a younger audience.
Jurassic Park the Game (JPTG from here-on in) is a different story. There are undoubtedly familiar set-pieces and we found ourselves giggling with geeky glee when we heard some familiar phrases and names, but it’s different – and that’s a good thing. Set semi-concurrent/shortly after the events of the first movie, we see Dr. Grant et all’s triumphant escape from Isla Nubar early in the game. JPTG’s perspective switches from Dr. Harding and his daughter Jess, a group of mercenaries, a doctor and an unknown individual in their escape from the island. Each of the characters have their own motivations for being on the island – most of which are elusive, and oftentimes they change. Is it hard to follow along? Not really, so long as you pay attention. Their stories and motivations are interesting enough and the writers have done a nice job of wrapping up some of the loose ends of the canon material. In the end, we wanted to see them get out alive.
One of the bigger overlying stories is between Dr. Gerry Harding and his daughter Jess. Gerry plays the typical divorced dad, devoted to his job and rarely seeing his daughter while Jess plays the stereotypical rebel child. She smokes, she’s quite the little thief, she fails chemistry and she spouts out a couple of anachronistic catch-phrases. The two of them follow almost a predictable plot course: he protects her, then becomes overprotective, she becomes angry with his ‘sudden’ fatherly-like actions. At one point the annoying sound of her voice begs for her to be gulped down by a T-Rex.
So close…
Say what you will about the stereotypical nature of it, but the character interaction between the key players, especially Jess and Gerry seems authentic. They argue and bicker and then joke around like everyday people would. One particularly wrenching scene occurred when we flubbed a QTE fighting some raptors. In the chaos, Gerry grabbed hold of Jess to protect her. While we couldn’t see the messy result, but we could see Jess close her eyes and wrap her arms around her father as the both of them were torn apart by raptors. Not sure why that scene stuck with us, but it certainly did. Jurassic Park has something against kids – they’re forever traumatized by their experience there.
Ultimately the game play is what’s going to be the major deciding factor here. While millions of fans may attest that a few QTEs never killed anybody (but missed ones do, mind you) whether or not you want to play this game will ultimately depend on how you feel about that. WSAD, arrow keys, tracking mouse movements onscreen are all used (PC version here, mind you). If you were expecting running and gunning dinosaurs, then prepare to be disappointed. Even when controlling the mercenaries, guns weren’t used in the traditional sense.
The pain-in-the ass about quick-time events is that they seem so easy. Put on the spot though, the potential screweditupitis skyrockets. So much so that we actually found Jurassic Park punishing in some areas. With all of the reviews stating how easy it was, it’s no easy feat to admit that – and no, we don’t suck. How well you perform these QTEs is graded and you’re awarded a medal at the end of each section. Screw up enough times and you get NOTHING! We found ourselves wanting to go back just to achieve a higher score.
“If I don’t get a gold medal, what’s the point of even running?”
The game isn’t just QTEs – there are puzzles to be solved to advance, one of the earlier puzzles involving moving a baby triceratops out of the road, which was easier said than done. We felt pretty damn proud of ourselves when we solved them, proudly looking over at our diplomas and knowing we did our teachers proud. Of course our moment of glory with the baby trike was rather fleeting when the mother found out, turning the easy-going head-scratcher into a frenzy of mashed buttons and squished bodies. We’re pretty glad graduation was not like this.
It’s times like this where the game gets its scare-moments. Going through a relatively simple puzzle, or just watching a cut-scene and you know something is going to happen, but that’s where the horror ends. We wouldn’t even call it horror: more like anxiety. Telltale unintentionally turned the anxiety up to 11 when the cursor glitched and failed to show onscreen for several puzzles or mouse-pull QTEs, resulting in a reloaded save and a cruddy end-level result. This happened more than once, and it was a piss-off every time. It needs to be fixed.
When you look at Jurassic Park for what it is, it’s a pretty decent game. We wish it leaned a little further towards the horror-genre, but as we said previously, we’re not going to trash it because of that. It’s a good addition to the numerous Jurassic Park games and eats up a few hours to play through. Medals on PC and Achievements/Trophies (for console versions) offer some replayability too. At $30 for the standard version, it’s a good choice for a younger gamer on a budget, or someone who’s really not knee-deep into the blood and guts kind of games yet. We wish we could have had access to the limited edition version for some extra material goodies, which is available through the website.
It’s too bad Telltale artificially bolstered the scores on Metacritic, because we feel that this game would have done pretty well on its own. Now it seems like many won’t even give it a chance, and that’s a shame.
