Dino Crisis 2

With Capcom cashing in on the success of the original game and straying from its Resident Evil roots, Dino Crisis 2 brings a ton of dinosaur-shooting action to its survival-horror predecessor. However, as it branches toward a bullet-riddled shoot-em-up, while keeping the same characters of Regina and the now moved to the spotlight, Dylan—does the game lose some of its original appeal?

Jurassic Park with Guns

While comparing this game to Jurassic Park is merely surface level—it’s also near impossible to avoid the film franchise’s inspiration on most anything dinosaur-related in modern times. Set in the year 2010, ten years after the game was actually released, Dino Crisis 2 sees our two lead protagonists of Regina and Dylan on a mission to save Edward City, having been overrun by dinosaurs from the unsafe opening of a time portal in the previous entry.

However, while dinosaurs in the last game were hinted at and Regina was ill-equipped to handle them (having to run from most encounters)—this game is a different beast entirely. Armed with a shotgun, nearly unlimited ammo, and combos garnered from killing dinosaurs to collect the currency known as extinction points—Dino Crisis 2 really wants you to solve the crisis rather that run from it.

Short-Lived Survival-Horror

While Dino Crisis 2 is in no way a bad game, sporting some amazing visuals for the time and non-stop action with varied set-pieces including tropical forests, active volcanos, and an underwater level—it simply is nothing like its predecessor. Even though most of the fans at the time asked for a more action-packed sequel, a departure from the Resident Evil roots, it’s strange how prevalent that occurrence is.

Looking back to movies like Alien as survival-horror to Aliens as an action-packed sequel—that methodology moves to games extremely often. From an engineer in the original Dead Space using mining equipment to a full-fledged soldier rendition of the character in Dead Space 3 is like playing two totally different series—the same can be said for the transition of Bioshock to Bioshock 2, where you go from running from ‘Big Daddy’s’ to becoming one. Even Resident Evil has had bouts of action before its recent survival-horror resurgence in Resident Evil 7: Biohazard. While it’s not necessarily a problem for the evolution of different series, it’s just interesting how often it happens.

Does It Hold Up?

The strangest thing about the evolution of survival-horror games is how they enact certain changes but disregard others. In regards to Dino Crisis 2, they keep the same predetermined camera moving between locations but expect you to be able to focus in on five raptors that charge the screen all at once. While there’s a certain tension to that—it’s also a game designed for one thing and used for another.

Pros:

• Solid and varied visuals
• Exciting combat and a lot of enemies
• Interesting time-bending story

Cons:

• Repetitive enemies
• Limited camera movement
• A good bit of grinding for best equipment

It's Nice to see that, while the GameCube's just been furnished with a souped-up version of Resident Evil, us PC owners get lumped with a no-frills conversion of this old PSone offshoot sequel. And graphically, it stinks. Foregoing the original's pseudo-3D backgrounds, it regresses back to painted inanimate surfaces. Designed for low-res TV screens, on modern monitors it looks risibly awful, as if someone's smeared Vaseline on the screen, and as turning up the resolution only results in key objects and characters sharpening, it often looks like they're not even part of the same game.

In gameplay terms, it's not the best example of the survival horror genre, the emphasis placed on shooting rather than traditional puzzling and ammo conservation. So you backtrack through long sections, firing at respawning dinosaurs, trading in your score for more ammo and health. Except the outdated control mode stops it being very intuitive. Attempts have been made to fix problems with better quick-turn and instant aim options, but laborious controls and bad camera angles let it down.

The B-movie plot gets suitably silly and awful towards the end, and the game tries to add a few different shooting sub-games but there isn't enough to save it from feeling average and anachronistic. A poor and tardy console conversion indeed.

What's the deal?

It's pretty easy to sum up the original Dino Crisis Resident Evil with Dinosaurs. Sure the backgrounds were fully polygonal, but everything else was pretty similar to the survival horror standard set by Capcom's big zombie games. So is the sequel just more characters, more big lizards and better graphics? Hell no! Well wait, yes actually, but it's also so much more.

Capcom gutted the gameplay, and totally rebuilt it into a run-and-gun action fest for this sequel. You amass points by blasting down enemies, with bonuses awarded for speed and combos; later you can turn those points in for new weapons and ammo. It's more like Final Fight with guns than Resident Evil.

So why is It a must-get game? The first game was great, but we have been dying for something new to break out of the RE mold--especially now that every company from Asmik Ace to Jaleco has their own survival horror rip-off. Just from the short demo we've played, DC2 looks like it will deliver the teeth-gnashing, shotgun-pumping shot in the arm the genre needs.

Capcoms other survival horror series returns this October, with a crapload of new features: the ability to equip two different weapons at once, two playable characters (Regina is back along with a new special agent named Dylan), underwater sections, and over 10 different types of dinos. Most of the game takes place outdoors this time around, and is supposedly more action and battle oriented-- you even get points for each beastie you take down, which you can use to purchase weapons, ammo and healing items.

So how come all the big lizards are stompin' around again? Even though Dr. Kirk was successfully captured at the end of the first game, the government confiscated and continued his work, leading to (surprise!) another accident. When the research site, Edward City (close to Raccoon City?), disappears and is replaced by a patch of prehistoric jungle, Regina and Co. are sent in to rescue the scientists and figure out what went wrong. Check back after E3 for hands-on impressions.

We got our hands on the first short demo of Regina's new adventure Capcom was showing at E3 and we're really impressed by how it's shaping up. When they promised to up the action, they weren't kidding: Dino 2 is more of an arcade game than a Resident Evil clone.

First of all, there's a lot more dinos about; they attack almost constantly in packs of two and three. Luckily the controls are more combat-friendly: You dash automatically and can fire while running forward or walking backward. You've also got two weapons accessible at any time now, a main gun and a secondary weapon (like a knife). Points earned for killing dinos, with bonuses for "combos" (killing multiple baddies within seconds of each other) and for getting past rooms without being injured, can be exchanged for new weapons, ammo and healing items at save points. You may also notice the backgrounds are prerendered now, to allow for outdoor jungle locations and more nasties on screen at once. More on DC2 as the October release approaches.