- "Lost in a brutal age of dinosaurs!"
- —Tagline
Jurassic: The Hunted (previously known as Jurassic Hunter and Jurassic: The Hunter) is a first-person shooter video game developed by Cauldron HQ and published by Activision.
The game was announced on October 16, 2009[1], and was released on November 3, 2009 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and the Nintendo Wii. Jurassic: The Hunted received mixed reviews from critics.
A playable demo for Jurassic: The Hunted was released on November 27th, 2009, providing players a small taste of the game.
On December 5th, 2010, a re-release named Top Shot Dinosaur Hunter launched for the wii as a bundle that included a variant of the Cabela top shot peripheral for the wiimote .
A port for the PSVita was scheduled in 2011 to go along aside the PSVita's launch but was ultimately cancelled at some point.
Plot[]
The player controls former Navy Seal Craig Dylan as he accompanies his war buddy Armando "Rock" Depiedra, and scientist Sabrina Sayrus to the Bermuda Triangle searching for Sabrina's father, Dr. James Sayrus.
As they fly over, a temporal storm occurs, causing the plane to start going down. Rock jumps off immediately, while Sabrina is sucked into a temporal bubble, much to Craig's shock, however, he jumps anyway, trying to dodge time bubbles, until one sucks him in and takes him onto the island.
Dylan lands, face-first, on the island. He wakes up, his parachute in a tree and is weapon missing, before looking forward to three Velociraptor, who eye him until and unknown carnivore roars at them, making them scramble for cover. He makes his way forward, and finds the dead body of the pilot. Surprisingly, the pilot looks like he has been dead for years, due to the time bubble's effects. Dylan then finds a swamp, recovering a .45 Caliber pistol. A Velociraptor jumps on him, though he fights it off. He later battles more Velociraptor, and soon makes contact with Rock, though the vortexes interfere with the signal and he is cut off. Dylan is then attacked by more Velociraptor, though he manages to defeat them. He later encounters the larger raptor known as Deinonychus, and kills them with a boost of adrenaline. He then comes across a large plain, along with pterosaurs and a group Brachiosaurus, before the first level ends.
Later, Dylan battles more Deinonychus, and finds a 30-6 Assault Rifle during battle. He soon encounters a mounted machine gun and a beached cargo ship nearby. He is then attacked by dozens of Velociraptor as well as pterosaurs, before fighting them off with the gun. He then gets into contact again with Rock on the ship, but is yet again cut off by the vortexes, and continues his journey to find him. He then encounters groups of Dilophosaurus that spit venom near some cliffs. He fights them off while carefully crossing logs at the same time. He then comes across a gentle Brachiosaurus, and continues on his way. Finally, he encounters a massive Utahraptor, and kills it with the help of the explosive eggs lying around. He then finds a fresh campsite that he thinks to belong to Rock, and the level ends.
Throughout the next couple of days, the navy seal travels through a swamp, a forest, and even through the caldera of a volcano, before finally reuniting with both Dr. James Sayrus, and Rock, whom has aged 30 years due to the time bubble's rather rogue effects.
Dr. Sayrus tells Dylan of an impending disaster and tells him to find a Temporal Vortex Engine that will allow them to return to their own time, located in a German submarine in a cave. Dylan finds the TVE and tries to return to camp, running into Sabrina again, who is being chased by a Spinosaurus, who she calls "Spike". They manage to escape and return to the fort, only to learn that the uranium battery that powers the TVE no longer works.
Dylan recovers another battery from a drone that apparently arrived on the island via a temporal vortex from the future and returns to camp again, but Spike apparently followed him and tries to kill them. Dylan fights off Spike while Dr. Sayrus fixes the TVE and allows Dylan and Sabrina to escape just as Spike breaks in while he and Rock stay behind to hold him off.
Dylan and Sabrina emerge on a sandy beach and wonder what to do just before another portal opens up, and Dr. Sayrus and Rock emerge on the repaired submarine one year after Dylan and Sabrina returned, with an apparently dead Spike tied to the hull. As the game ends, Spike's eye opens up, leaving the story unresolved.
Gameplay[]
The game functions much like Activision's Call of Duty series, with the control scheme being the same, and the general idea remaining essentially unchanged. The control scheme is easy to follow, with the average sprint feature present, along with the ability to aim down the ironsights or scope of your weapon.
However, the game prides itself on including things like "Fortification Sieges", which act much like Call of Duty: World at War's "Zombies" mode, with the dinosaurs attempting to break down windows and doors to enter the main base the player's stationed in. These happen periodically throughout the campaign and they usually last for 5-10 minutes before the final dinosaur drops.
Another gametype presented in Jurassic: The Hunted, are the boss fights encountered in certain levels. They are usually very difficult, and usually contain one, or multiple large carnivores to fight. Undoubtedly, the most intense boss fights are the ones containing the dreaded Spinosaurus, or Tyrannosaurus rex.
Lastly, the game features an entirely different gametype called "Survival Mode". The main objective is for the player to survive for as long as they can, while obtaining weapons and upgrades throughout the game. The gametype is tier-based, with weapons unlocking as the player reaches certain levels, rather than via purchases or other instances.
The game mode is infinite, however, the waves take a sudden spike in difficulty after Wave 15, due to fog entering the map, which covers the area that the dinosaurs come from, giving the player less time to react, and due to the presence of higher level dinosaurs, such as the Utahraptor.
Levels[]
- Code: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
- Far From Shore, Far From Home
- Sinking Feeling
- Vortex Zero
- Out of the Frying Pan
- The Lost Castaways
- Rise Above
- The Tyrant King
- U-1226
- Special Delivery
- Enter: Spike
- Escaping Extinction
- The Final Piece
- No Time Like the Present
Characters[]
The game features a small cast of characters, each having seperate short story arcs in the game.
Main Cast[]
Minor Characters[]
Featured creatures[]
Jurassic: The Hunted features a myriad of creatures to fight against. Most, if not all are carnivorous, and will not hesitate to try and tear the player's throat out. The list below details the creatures encountered.
Hostile creatures[]
- Velociraptor
- Deinonychus
- Utahraptor
- Dilophosaurus
- Giant Scorpions
- Ornithocheirus
- Cearadactylus
Non-hostile creatures[]
Boss creatures[]
Cut creatures[]
- Pteranodon
- Trilobites
Featured weapons[]
Firearms[]
- .45 Caliber Pistol
- .44 Magnum
- 9mm Automatic
- 30-06 Assault Rifle
- 5.56 Assault Rifle
- Shotgun
- ESD-P206
- Crossbow
- Model 1885 Rifle
- Black Powder Rifle
- Light Machine Gun
- RPG
- Grenades
Abilities[]
- Adrenaline Burst
Upgrades[]
- Ammunition upgrade
- .50 gun part
Development[]
Not much is known about the game's development cycle. It can easily be assumed however, that the game started development shortly after Touchstone's "Turok" reboot entered the gaming world in 2008, just over a year before.
Reception[]
The game received very little in the way of reviewing, however, any reviews it did get were usually average to negative in terms of scoring.
IGN gave the Xbox 360 version of the game a 6.5, praising the defense portions of the game, saying they're "Really fun to play", along with a strong praise for the dinosaurs, character models and the plant life, but calling the particle effects and most other things bland, while also mentioning the game's pop-in effect as strong and prevalent. Sound effects, like weapon discharge and dialogue were given moderate praise.
User ratings on Gametrailers were more lenient, with a solid 8.5 out of 10 for the game out of 50 votes, however, user judgment has not been stated as to why the score is higher in comparison to the former.
Possible sequel[]
The ending of the game was left open, with the ending stinger revealing Spike, the game's antagonistic Spinosaurus, as alive. As of 2021, over ten years after Jurassic's launch, there is no news of a possible sequel.