Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis

"I hate this genre, but i like this game!"

A walk through the park can lead to death and maiming, please use caution!

Let me start off by saying that I despise this genre of games, I have never liked playing Sim Earth, Sim City, Sim Theme Park, The Sims, I think you get the point. So when I was called upon to review the latest “Sim” style game I started to weep in a corner. Of course everything changed after I started playing, something about the game grabbed me and wouldn’t let go, maybe it was because I liked Jurassic Park so much, but I doubt it. This game is top notch for an entry level simmer like myself, complete with the death and carnage every game of this type should have!

Graphics

Jurassic Park won’t wow you like some other Xbox games on the market, but it does get the job done in almost every way. The island your park is built upon is in the middle of nowhere, so you can expect it to be surrounded by the Ocean on all sides, and what a nice looking ocean it is. The water effects for the most part are nicely done with just the right amount of reflection and distortion. Of course for some reason there are never massive waves on the ocean…or any waves for that matter, and even when the Dinosaurs escape their pens (or did I let them out muwhahaha) and tromp through the water it never so much as moves or splashes, why?

The island itself isn’t very detailed either, it does have lakes, trees and mountains, but it doesn’t employ any Xbox specific effects that could have made it look real and exciting. Buildings are the same, while they don’t look bad, they don’t look all that good either, at least not as good as current PC fare. Chalk it up to port syndrome because we all know Xbox can do a lot better.

The dinosaurs are well done, but again they don’t shine like they should, their skin looks flat, and dead. Bump mapping and vertex shading could have fixed this little problem without much effort, but of course that didn’t happen because we live in port hell 60% of them time. The animation is good, almost movie caliber, of course it has to be somewhat generic because there really is no limit to how many dinosaurs you can have on your little island, at least not a limit I ever hit while playing. Visitors are great, best served cold on a rainy afternoon…no wait that’s not right, never mind that. The visitors have a generic look to them, which for this genre is acceptable since we only see them up close 5% of them time during game play. We all know why they are here anyways, Raptor food right? When one of your Carnivorous dinosaurs escapes, and they will escape, they begin one of two things, either they wander around, or they eat people. As soon as one breaks loose the people freak out and run in all directions only to be eaten because you removed the parks exit by accident…whoops.

Sound

For the most part the sound is boring and plain, you get the average screams and yelps from the people, and dinosaur sounds from the movie, some reused again and again for various reptiles. To be honest I never noticed the music, and you can consider that a good thing because it was always on, but was never annoying or in the way. There are a few voice-overs, but for the most part they are limited to the email you receive and are simply one-liners “What should we do?”, “What should we do now?”, “What should we be doing?”, ''Why do i ask stupid questions over and over?''

Game play

Standard sim fare here, stick some dig teams in a mountain and wait for some fossils, extract the DNA and breed some carnage. Of course there are more things to do, like tell your research teams what to invent next, which can be anything from rides to remote turrets for sending Denver (80’s joke!) to hell!. You can also Set up cleaning crews, rides, and all the fees for each and even hop into those same rides and see what your visitors see. One of the most enjoyable parts of the game is flying the helicopter around. You can rescue guests when they are in danger, or just shoot things with many types of ammo, this is also how you transport your beasts around the park, put them to sleep and move them around, sometimes mistakenly leaving them free to wonder and freak out the park guests. It doesn’t sound all that deep, but if you have played a game in this genre before you know it is, and would take 10 pages to tell you everything there is to do, just take my word for it when I say its addictive.

Control

Everything is done with X for the most part, you are presented with an easy to use menu, from that you have access to everything you need to make a successful park. Going back to the helicopter again, you get to fly it, with controls somewhat like those in the Strike series on Sega Genesis, there is however a twist. You can enter shoot mode, complete with zooming in and out, and yes headshots count when taking down dinosaurs.

Graphics 7
Sound 6
Gameplay 7
Control 8
Replay 9
OVERALL (not an average) 7

At the end of the day this is a fun addictive game, if you despise this genre like I do, then give it a rent first, but if you're a Sim freak with an Xbox fetish get to the store now.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 04/06/03, Updated 04/06/03