Introduction: The last serving we received from TDK Mediactive was the not so great Aquaman. I’m glad to say that Dinotopia doesn’t follow suit. Dinotopia is an adventure action game where you as Drake Genmini help save a race of dinosaurs as their sworn protector.

The Game: It was unknown to me but I have come to learn that Dinotopia has been around on TV and Print. I’m assuming the gameplay does tie in with the novels and TV series somehow. If you’re a fan of those publications then I’m sure you would find something more in Dinotopia then me. The general concept seems like a good idea, and the game tried it best to capture the feeling of a land ruled by Dinosaurs threatened by the likes of man **always the man. The atmosphere is triumph but the gameplay can’t hold the game together.

Dinotropia starts out with a bit of drama, and a lot of boring dialog. The story goes something like: Father was killed by a dinosaur, brother #1 goes his separate way and venges to destroy the dinosaur race, and brother #2 (Your character) keeps his fathers oath to be the protector of the dinosaur species. This story might be a little to predictable, but at least the game has a story… which is one point in my view.

Dinotopia is a basic game which offers nothing new its genre. However it’s quite good at re-hashing some good old quest guided missions, making you jump from pointless objective to another pointless objective. There are just way too many missions that have you running around finding useless items for some poor creature. Needless to say the game can become very repetitive and boring.

As Drake you will be trained in the skills of combat with a big stick with a rock at the end. This stick or mallet can be upgraded by changing the striking rocks with different items. Drake has a few attacks in his arsenal, nothing you haven’t seen since 1988. The combat is strait forward and usually involves your character in battles being out numbered. No need to worry Drake can handle himself, and you will be baffled on how simple the combat in the game actually is.

Graphics & Sound: The graphics in Dinotopia….ummm, well it would be easy to say that they are below par. It’s true they are, but although being below par of your average next-gen console they seem to have their own thing going on. They are very pastel like, with a small amount of colours and textures implemented in the characters and environments. They would be best described as a washed up cartoon trying to be a normal picture. In the end you have a nice ambiance in the low-tech graphics that helps keep in line with the rest of the low-tech.

The sound, well there are a lot of voice-over work in Dinotopia, which tries to keep you awake through the long, drawn out cut scenes sequences. But fails missilery, I ended up just skipping through the mellow-drama of these oppressed dinosaurs. The background music sets a good mood for the atmosphere, which would be the best part of the sound in Dinotopia. Other than that it’s running with the graphics, low-tech.