Jurassic Park III: Island Attack! - Puzzles and Pitfalls... and Dinosaurs, I guess.

20/11/23

Jurassic Park - one of the most beloved movies of all time that, despite the special place the original holds in many people’s hearts, has in my eyes never really been a critical success in, well, any of its endeavors past the original. People aren’t so hot on either of its sequels, and the less said about Jurassic World’s trilogy, the better. But what about its history in gaming? The series received a trilogy of titles for the Game Boy Advance, and whilst I’ve never been the biggest fan of dinosaurs nor the franchise that features them, as I always I went in with the hope that I’d find something special. I found… I found something, all right - an experience that, whilst consistently frustrating and unwieldy, did have a handful of moments that stuck as very true to the franchise, and almost nostalgic in its arcadey glory.

I don’t have much to say about my history with Jurassic Park. A lot of people, both my age, older and younger, rank the original as one of the best movies ever made. Me? It’s… fine, I guess? I guess I’ve never been a huge dinosaur fan, my love of giant lizards belonging more to the fantasy contingent. Anyway, whilst I’ve seen the original movie a couple of times, my only memory of Jurassic Park 3 was watching it on TV with my Dad when I was like… six? And the fact I was bored then, as a child who doesn’t know what quality is really says something about it. I don’t even know how this game ties into that movie at all - it doesn’t seem to feature, or even mention any Jurassic Park characters, rather opting to have the simple framing device of the player becoming shipwrecked on the island, fleeing and fighting their way across the island to be rescued at the harbor. It's a very SNES slash arcade setup, not that there's anything wrong with that - though then again, this was released near the very beginning of the GBA’s life cycle, a very transitory moment for gaming as a whole.

Rather than sticking to one unified gameplay style, Island Attack chooses to adopt three to bounce between. The most common takes place in an isometric setting, One of these, taking place in the museum, has the tiniest aroma of Resident Evil attached to it, featuring a more circular level design with minor puzzles to solve and unique dinosaurs to deal with. The second gameplay style is a 2D, side-scrolling platformer that features many of the elements of the former, just, y’know, flat. Finally, there are auto-scrolling ‘action’ stages, where you’ll be piloting a vehicle, dodging dinosaurs and traps, and praying you’ll make it to the end. It’s an interesting decision - putting stock in range rather than really nailing one particular gameplay style - reminds me of old arcade beat’em ups that would sometimes throw the player into a totally different kind of style, like Battletoads going from beat’em up to a horrifying auto-scrolling vehicle section. I’m not picking that example randomly, by the way.

The isometric sections I give props for actually feeling a bit like a survival game; with only the tools to really repel the dinosaurs, not defeat them, there were entire sections were I opted to just dodge the dinos, leaping over obstacles and firing tranquilizer clouds just to delay my pursuers. These moments, whilst few and far between, really got the adrenaline pumping - less so from the actual danger, but from the brutal consequences of failure. The fact that the only way to take dinosaurs down - sometimes only temporarily, is to make use of the environment. Blowing up crates, mostly, which can feel a little basic, but it’s the perfect mid-ground between a struggle to survive, and going over-the-top and just gunning down the dinos. These sections also feature the greatest variety of locations which do a lot to break up the sameness the forests and plains Jurassic Park is better known for, the very best of which is the various abandoned infrastructure we’ve come to know over the years of Jurassic Park movies. The Museum, which features the widest ranging and most puzzle-focused section of the game is a highpoint, though it left me slightly bitter with the wish that the entire game was closer to this format.

The 2D platformer sections are not only far less interesting, but additionally are far and away the weakest and most frustrating sections of the game. Look, I’ll give this game credit for variety, but variety is only a boon when you actually *want* to engage with it all. When I say platforming, I don’t really mean anything more complicated than jumping over pits and swinging on a basic grappling hook, but somehow even such a basic and singular gameplay element is unsatisfactory. The player character just feels *bad* to control, with a really weird sense of momentum that’ll lead your jumps either flying too far and coming up short - usually, in my case, ending up with myself plummeting down into one of the incredibly numerous, somehow consistently narrow pits. Look, I know the park is run down, but why are there so many bloody bottomless pits? How are there still dinosaurs if they too, hilariously enough, run into these pits just like me? I’m just glad they aren’t the bulk of the game; clearly y’all have worked out I’m not the biggest fan of this game, but if *this* was the main gameplay style? Yikes.

Finally, there are a couple of ‘auto-scrollers’ where you’re mounted on some vehicle, moving too and fro to avoid obstacles and a small army of dinosaurs who’ve got nothing better to do than ram a man riding a motorcycle. Compared to the other major modes of the game, these are fairly inoffensive, if perhaps a bit too long - which makes game overs all the more brutal. But yeah, they’re tepid and inoffensive enough that they’re a net positive for the game, but I wasn’t exactly chomping at the bit for more - especially that motorcycle sequence. Damn, that was long - though maybe it wouldn’t have taken me so long if I’d realised earlier that you can kick the rampaging raptors away from myself. That… that would’ve made things easier. Anyway - these sections, they’re exciting enough in the moment, I suppose, but not enough to actually want to replay them.

There are honestly a decent amount of moments that I genuinely would’ve enjoyed more if not for the sheer jank this game exudes at every moment. Let’s talk about one of the boss fights - I mean, come on. It’s a dinosaur game, we all knew we were going to take on a T-Rex at some point. The T-Rex battle flow is simple - T-Rex sticks it’s head through the hole, roars, drops rubble on you along with an explosive barrel that you must time its head-peeking with to damage it. Coupled with a banger track that sounds like it’s from Metroid Zero Mission, it sounds pretty good, right? Well, it would be, if the timing to actually hit the barrel *without* taking a hit from the rubble (which follows you as you run around, by the way) feels next to impossible, making these fights exercises in frustration *at best*, which sucks because I actually think they’re a basic, yet compelling way to portray someone without a proper gun taking on a bloody T-Rex. The game throws a few of these kinds of encounters at you - requiring somewhat puzzling, unorthodox methods to take down certain dinosaurs. Tricking tiny dinos into getting smushed by falling boulders, or trapping a red raptor in a cage, they’re interesting, almost engaging scenarios that are let down by one or two, sadly major, issues. I think of the red raptor ‘puzzle’, using fake dino calls to lure it into a cage, which I thought was bugged because it just wouldn’t enter the room - turns out, I hadn’t clicked the lever to lower the cage *which I knew wouldn’t work because the raptor wasn’t in the room yet*!. The game is just chock full of little decisions like this that frequently undermine anything interesting it’s trying to do.

Almost from the jump, Island Attack is brutally difficult - and, as I said above, not for the reasons you hope. Yes, it’s just as I always fear; it’s short, and so it’s gotta be hard to milk out that playtime. Dinosaurs hit hard, falling into pits will sap your HP rapidly, and the game has a general imprecise and unwieldy movement system that you’ll be taking just as many hits from falls and mistimed movement then you’ll take from your average dinosaur bite. All this is coupled with a limited, unreplenishable life system. Each time you die, you’ll lose a Continue and throw you back to the start of the level. Run out of continues, and it’s all over. A concession the game gives us is the fact you’ll be able to save after each level, so as long as you’re actually getting through levels it doesn’t make too much difference - it’s just beyond annoying to have to trudge all the way through a difficult, yet doable level, to be stonewalled and brought down by a brutal finale… or, if you’re me, inherently bad platforming skills combined with horrid actual platforming.

If the game just gave you more openings to react, I’d think it would push the title into something I could possibly, actively, recommend. Flying Pterodactyls hitting you from off-screen in an instant, the T-Rex rubble situation, the sheer length and lack of checkpoints in the auto-scrollers - the list goes on. There’s fun to be had, but it felt like every stage had one or two elements that just killed any sense of momentum or enthusiasm to keep pushing through it. Like I said; this isn’t a long game. Without deaths, I can imagine you could clear it in little over an hour, but it took me the better part of a week, on and off, to push through it. WHen the difficulty is the only thing keeping it from being anything more than a transient experience, you gotta make it fair. Not like this.

On a little tangent; Jurassic Park 3: Island Attack gives me a very specific feeling that I’m not quite sure how to convey. In some ways, it feels like an arcade game, like one of those constantly scrolling shoot-em-ups, and this really shows in certain stages of the game. But even the more ‘traditional’ stages, the isometric and side scrolling It reminds of going to arcades, and playing those lightgun games where you’re just shooting zombies or dinosaurs or whatever… This isn’t one of those games, but it *feels* like one of them. That’s not to say I particularly loved, or even really liked Island Attack, but there are times that it reminded me of arcade memories I hadn’t recalled in over a decade and a half, and I think that’s something worth mentioning about the game. I *was* still getting frustrated almost the whole time, but for any of y’all who’ve actually played games like this, with continues and whatnot, in an actual arcade, I think you’d understand that frustration is an element both these experiences share.

I mentioned it before but for some reason, this is one of those games where whilst I’m rather critical on most elements, the soundtrack is a hell of a banger. Chief amongst this is the T-Rex boss fight theme sounding like something pulled directly out of one of the more atmospheric zones of Metroid: Zero Mission, it’s genuinely fantastic stuff. The whole soundtrack has this whole eerie and genuinely spooky vibe to it, even in its lowest moments. The graphics are… fine, I guess? They’re a bit indistinct, but we’re dealing with dinosaurs; I can tell what kind of dinosaur I’m dealing with, and I don’t care about my nameless stand-in, it’s fine. This came out in the first year of the GBA, back in 2001, so the fact it’s not cutting edge stuff isn’t as important. At least the environments, for the most part, really do feel as if they fit within the canon of post-disaster Jurassic Park.

I don’t think Jurassic Park III: Island Attack is that bad, but it’s certainly not that great, and that sometimes bums me out more than the real stinkers. There are moments that display the shadows of brilliance, evocating a real arcadey, pseudo-survival game experience, before being let down by spreading it’s net too wide, and the inherently dodgy and awkward controls. Overall, I didn’t hate my time with it, but I couldn’t imagine ever touching it again. It’s just too frustrating. Dinosaur fans, you’ll probably be eating well, but that’s sadly not enough for the simple man I am.

Thank you so much for reading my review of Jurassic Park III: Island Attack! Whilst I wasn’t the biggest fan of the game, it’s been nice to be able to bang out a few faster games rather then the double-digit slugfests like Superstar Saga or Castlevania - though it would’ve been nice if the experience of this game wasn’t *quite* so transient. Anyways, next review will be another brief licensed title, so look forward to that slop. As always, you can find me over at Twitter @Lemmy7003 or email me either at cckaiju@gmail.com or mgeorge7003@hotmail.com if you have any questions or requests. I'm always happy to chat! Thanks again for reading, and I’ll see you on the next Game Boy Abyss review as we take a look at another movie tie-in.