At a glance...

Reviewer	Platform	Publisher	Developer	Players	Screenshots
Unknown	Xbox	Capcom	Capcom	1	Here
Requirements					Buy from Amazon.co.uk
At the time of writing, we did not have a requirements section.					Click here to buy Dino Crisis 3.

Dino Crisis 3 review

This game has been a long time coming. It has a lot to live up to after the two previous Dino Crisis games. Dino Crisis was more of a Resident Evil clone with Dinosaurs instead of Zombies. While Dino Crisis 2 was more of an adventure-arcade type game which took the Resident Evil feel away from it.

It was going back some time when Microsoft and Capcom announced the third instalment would be an Xbox exclusive which angered many Dino Crisis fans. And when they found out that Regina from the first two games was not in it, and that it was set in space they started to dismiss the game before it came out. Were they right to make this premature judgement or were they wrong?

Well, in my opinion, they were wrong. The story of the game is actually very good and it explains itself to the extent that it can be believable. What are a lot of peoples concerns, however, are the camera angles in the game. Yes, they are not what you call great and should have done better, or they could have at least added a rotating camera angle for the right thumb stick. It may even put a lot of people of the game as it does make some parts harder than they should be. But all is not lost as at least they did add auto-aim which does counter some of the problems. Once you have played the game for a while and got into it you do tend to forget the problems. I personally think that the camera is not any worse than in either of the two previous games, as you were often shooting Dinos that you could not see, as they were not on the screen. That said, the first two games did have pre-rendered backgrounds and Dino crisis 3 is fully 3D. We'll put this camera issue to one side and get on with the rest of the game.

You play Patrick, a member of the SOAR (Special Operations And Reconnaissance) squadron. The year is 2548 and the Starship Ozymandias, which has been missing for 300 years, suddenly re-appears and all attempts to communicate with it fail. So, your captain, Jacob Ranshaw, and his team are ordered to go and investigate the re-appearance of the Ozymandias. On approaching the ship she opens fire and destroys your ship and only a hand full of the team survive. So, making there way onto the Ozymandias through air locks thinking this would be an easy mission to find out why the Ozymandias had re-appeared and why she opened fire on your ship. So when you and Sonya, one of the surviving team members, walks into a big storage bay they are more than surprised to what they find; a big monster that looks like a some sort of mutated Dinosaur which seems to have no skin and two rows of extra large teeth. Yes, Capcom must have thought a T-REX's mouth and teeth were not enough and added a second row to make it look more fearsome. After chasing you round the hanger deck this big monster stops and starts to look concerned. What on earth is going to make a monster like this stop and look worried? It's not like it is a small thing and is indeed a formidable opponent. And all this is even before you take control of Patrick. Well, I am not going to spoil that bit for you, but I just wanted to get you thinking about what happens next.

Back to the review again.

After being separated from your team mate Sonya you have to go it alone, and not only do you need to survive the mutated monsters but there are floating bombs that seem to appear out of nowhere. They are instantly attracted to you along with little laser turrets which also appear from seemingly nowhere. They slow your progress through the game more than anything, and do tend to get annoying. But, then again, they are great to shoot and build up your combo tactical credit which is used to buy upgrades, new weapons and recovery item at save points throughout the game.

The Ship Ozymandias is not just a normal ship; it has several control points in which the ship will change formation. This helps you get to new places that you were not able to get to earlier. Once you have changed formation, and you return to the same place later on, it will not be exactly how it was before. Throughout the game you will come across the need to change formation but sometimes you may need to re-root power, find power links, etc. There is quite a bit of back-tracking because with the ship's formation changing, things may not be as they were before, and new doors and access ways that would not open before could well do this time round.

The game does refer to the older Dino Crisis games in the 3rd energy research and Dr Kirk who discovered the energy and it's time travelling ability. The ship does have its own 3rd energy generator. But that is the only reference to the earlier games.

Just as you thought the ship was deserted of human life you pick up readings that there is some sort of human life on board. You have to try and find them to try and unravel this mystery.
But even when you find the survivor all is not what it seems which will lead to even greater confusion.

Still unsure who or what is behind these dinosaur mutations the ships computer seems to be trying to slow you down and stop you getting to the main computer room where even more human life signs are ammoniating.

Now with the Ozymandias approaching Earth's orbit it becomes a race against time to find the truth and stop the ship before it reaches Earth. On top of this, you need to keep the mutated dinosaurs and anything else that could pose a threat to mankind's survival on the ship. Here are the names of mutated Dinosaurs in the game and their DNA prime source.

Rigel. DNA Prime. Giganotosaurus
Algol. DNA Prime. Velociraptor
Austalis DNA Prime. Tyrannosaurus Rex
Regulus. DNA Prime. Ankylosaurus
Kornephoros DNA Prime Velociraptor
Miaplacidus DNA Prime Spinosaurus
Cebalrai DNA Prime Giganotosaurus

Ratings

Graphics	The best I have seen on the Xbox	10/10
Gameplay	Not easy and not help at times with the camera angles at times	8/10
Value	At the time of writing, we did not have a value for money ranking.	0/10
Lifespan	With two secret games to unlock it does add to the length of the game and may persuade you to return to the game to try the secret games.	8/10
Audio	Very dramatic at times and can keep you on the edge of you seat at times and help with the Dolby 5.1	9/10
Overall	Putting the camera angles a side it is a very good game with a great story line and is well worth to have in your game collection	9/10

Click here to buy Dino Crisis 3 from Amazon.co.uk.

Copyright Information

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License, except where otherwise noted.

Some screen captures on the site were made with HyperSnap-DX by Hyperionics.

Smileys taken from Crack's Smilies.