Video game review: Telltale's Jurassic Park

The game which I am going to be writing about today is based upon one of my all time favorite films and shares the same name, it's Jurassic Park: The Game. (Just to get it out of the way, the sequels are all mostly ass) This Jurassic Park game is a point and click adventure game that is presented in an episodic format which should come as no surprise, as it was developed and published by Telltale games who is well known for this style of gaming. Apparently it was made due to a licensing deal that they made with Universal, something I had no clue about. The game was released in November of 2011 for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Android platform and the Windows/Steam platform.  

Now, I have to say that I personally really love Telltale Games. They've made quite a few series that I have grown to enjoy and love, such as their Walking Dead series which I think is hundreds of times better and more interesting than the TV series, The Wolf Among Us which is a fanastic fantasy/mystery series that places you in the center of a fairy tale universe and their Borderlands game which expands the universe for the Borderlands series and is generally just a hilariously well done game. I am, however, sad to say that this game doesn't fall into the category of games that I love from Telltale. Which is some BS considering this is a game about freaking genetically altered dinosaurs. Why would you screw this one up?!

The narrative of this game takes place at two different times, occasionally during the events as well as directly after the events that transpired within the original film. There are references and callbacks in the first episode of the game, noting back to characters from the film as well as bigger events that happened. The main focus of the story is based around Nedry's failed attempt at stealing a canister of dinosaur embryos which was disguised as a can of shaving cream, and trying to recover them while also inadvertently finding out his fate. Your point of view is given through a group of survivors who have been left on the island during its evacuation.  

The characters we are given are the parks dinosaur veterinarian Gerry, (something which I kind of laughed at considering the fact that dinosaurs went extinct for so long, so how the hell could you have a vet expert already on hand for them? Seriously, was he a caveman that you thawed out and cloned or something?) his teenage daughter Jess, Nima who is one of the people sent to steal the canister back, a bitter geneticist named Sorkin and a small group of mercenaries who have been sent onto the island to try and recover all of the survivors still left. While the premise of the game doesn't really stand out all that much and it's stuff that we've seen before, it could have been at the very least a decently well done game at the end of the day. Instead, it really fails to live up to expectations and falls short. 

This isn't because the story is terrible, though it isn't good at the same time. One of the bigger reasons the game really doesn't work is because you hate the characters that you're given to play and work with. Not at any point in this game did I ever really care about the well being of most of the characters, nor did I even find myself liking them in anyway. Almost all of them are just flat out unlikable, especially so after you start getting more and more into their backstories, something that unfolds as the game progresses. I'm not really sure why giving your character crappy personalities seemed like the smart thing to do, as it doesn't allow the player to emotionally connect or feel engaged really. Maybe it was done on purpose so you felt happy when these people get devoured by dinosaurs. Who knows? 

While there are elements of the story that get flat out insane such as riding a roller coaster that was built into the side of a cliff, only for it to be besieged by a pack of dinosaurs which you then have to fight off, the story isn't the main problem of the game at all. In addition to the narrative which goes too far at times, and the horribly done characters, there's also the issue of the gameplay being absolutely boring. I thought I knew what I was getting into as it was Telltale game, and their games tend to have the same style of gameplay entirely. While they use quick time events fairly often for their games, they usually only make up a small portion of it as a lot of the gameplay is exploration, conversations and puzzle solving. 

Here, it feels like about 70-80 percent of the gameplay is doing quick time events, with some puzzle solving and dialogue here and there. It becomes very tedious and tiresome after awhile, and I found myself losing interest in playing the more I went on. The input for these QTE's is poorly done as well, especially so for the parts where you have to hit multiple arrows one after another. Instead of just hitting A or B for a QTE, it requires you to hit a sequence of directional arrows often times with barely any time to look at the screen and see what you need to do. On your first try these sequence parts can be challenging as you'll find yourself going to the death screen fairly often. Either way, you feel pretty unsatisfied whether you get them nailed or not. Oh, speaking of the death screen, lets talk about that briefly. 

You would expect that a game that takes place on a dinosaur park would provide some brutally gruesome deaths, right? Well, you're wrong there in this case. Often times in other games they've made you get very intense death scenes when you mess up. Here, they're honestly more laughable than anything, which may have been what they were aiming for for all I know. You get a few seconds of being chewed on by a dino, or occasionally just swallowed whole and that's about it before you get the game over screen. I dunno, I expected some horrible, intense death scenes for this game and instead I got some goofy ones instead. They're so short and to the point that you don't feel the weight of your mistake, and they come off as more annoying than anything. 

Other than the boring gameplay and mediocre at best story, the game doesn't offer much. Even with the puzzle sections of the game, there's nothing engaging to be found. Most of all of the puzzles are simple to the point where a small child would be able to solve them, as they're done by just clicking all of the investigation icons until something happens in the environment. Throughout the entire game I would say there was only a small handful of actual puzzles, with most of them just being "Click! Click everything around you! Clickity click click, bitch!" They're literally so simple that they just solve themselves without you having to do much of anything. I can't really say the puzzle sections are anything good. 

The game at least does use good graphics, with the island environment and dinosaurs having been designed pretty well. They continue to use their style of cel shading for most of it which gives everything a nice stylish look, though I will say I think the human models could have been done much better. Specifically the animations for the face and mouth when they're trying to have a conversation. Something just looks off about them, to the point where it's kind of uncomfortable to look at them. Beyond the graphics being decently done, the only other thing I think I can mention is that the game has a decent sound design and musical score. While it certainly isn't John Williams composing it, it sounds like it is in the same vein and it doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. 

Overall, I can't say that I would really recommend this game to any of you guys. The quick time events are so poorly done that it makes the action sequences no fun to play through, and the puzzle sections can't even really be considered actual puzzles. Not unless you have an IQ of 70 and your name is Forest. The plot is irritating and ridiculous at times, and is littered with unlikable characters. I won't say this is the worst game of all time or anything, but it is a below average game that could have used some big improvements. I'd personally rate this game as a 3.5/10 as someone who is a big fan of Jurassic Park, if it wasn't a Jurassic Park game then I'd be more open to giving it a 4/10. So, yeah, I can't say I would pick it up if I were you. There are far, far better Telltale games available for you to play that you'll actually enjoy.  

Anyways, thanks for stopping by to check out the review. Appreciate it!