The Mascots of My Internal Toils

Before I delve too deeply into the fat of the debate, I’d like to discuss what brought me to this age old question. I was going through some of my old games recently, when I happened upon my copy of Bust a Move 2 for the Sega Saturn.  I grimaced, remembering the stupid amount of time I put into the game, but I was a mere pawn to its forces, and had to boot it up yet again. As I was playing level after level, I began overthinking the origins of the characters Bubble and Bobble, and just what it is they are. They’re undeniably adorable, but they’re also very dino-like in appearance. Their Wikipedia page refers to them as dragons, but I’m not sure I’m ready to concur. If I did go along with this notion, though, would that mean they weren’t dinosaurs? Or would it mean that they’re mythical offshoots of the dino lore?

It started off as an innocent internal debate, as these things often do, but I quickly noticed an escalation of it in the priorities of my mind. I thrive on seemingly unimportant questions like this, and derive possibly far too much entertainment from them. As it stands I’m still unsure of what to truly think, hence the writing of this article. Do you have an opinion on this subject? Do you think dragons can exist in the same realm as dinosaurs?

Stoneage Blast is, as is seemingly the trend with flash games that have dino-related contents, a horizontal shooter where you and your “prehistoric beast” must safe Earth from alien attack.

You ride your flying, fire breathing fantasy dino through an assumed 5 levels (sadly, due to my poor shmup skills, I only reached the end of level 2. Though I will be finishing it off later in the week when I have more time) gaining points and weapon powerups. Each level follows the standard shmup format of patterned waves of enemies followed by an end boss. Some enemies when killed drop power ups for your weapon/dino, which increases the spread and damage of your shots. Every time you take damage a powerup is lost.

This leaves a very interesting dynamic where by you actively try to kill enemies (as oppose to avoid them), all the while trying to take no damage. Hopefully resulting in having an awesomely suped-up flying dino to battle the stage’s end boss.

Oh, and the music and art style are surprisingly awesome. I would give this game a “RAWR” out of ten, even though the dino isn’t specifically a dino. But I’m willing to let that slide. Go play it!

Because of the simplistic gameplay, a lot of details tend to go unnoticed or tossed to the wayside. Everybody knows they’re saving the princess from Bowser, but the massive dinosaur motif is often missed.

The actual story of Super Mario World is that Mario, Luigi, and Peach go on vacation in Dinosaur Land. As is the norm in the Mario realm, Peach is quickly kidnapped by Bowser. Mario, being the heroic boyfriend he is, takes it upon himself to cut his vacation short and traverse Dinosaur Land to save her. I’ll be the first to admit that this is a simple and tired plot, but when you add a dinosaur-centric world into the mix it becomes fresh and new. Just go down the list of your favorite games, and imagine them in the world of dinosaurs.  Silent Hill with dinosaurs? I’m in.

According to the Super Mario lore, Dinosaur Land isn’t in the Mushroom World at all. Instead, it’s  a place in the pacific ocean. Being that I’ve been on the hunt for a new vacation spot, I am particularly excited about this news.  If you’d like a postcard, please let me know in a comment!

As a child, cinema revolving around dinosaurs was the pinnacle of cool. Jurassic Park, terrifying as it was to me at that age, never ceased to wow me with the amazing effects and beautiful dinos. At such an age, I was thoroughly convinced that dinosaurs were real. How else would they be able to create a movie such as that?

Not too long after, my parents introduced me to a charming animated film called We’re Back! A Dinosaur’s Story. I grew obsessed with it, and what do you do when you’re obsessed with something as a child? You fawn for every single piece of merchandise under the sun. I didn’t get everything I wanted, but I did get the game based on the movie. Nowadays, this might sound like a not-so-exciting prospect, but this was at a time where games adapted from movies were often good.

We’re Back! tells the story of dinosaurs who were fed “Brain Grain” cereal, causing them to grow docile and intelligent. As smart dinosaurs are prone to do, they leapt through time and landed in our era, where they traversed New York City and granted wishes for children. There is, of course, plenty of conflict and romance, but I will withhold from spoiling any of that, and it’s all kind of moot anyways given how poorly it translates to the game.

In terms of gameplay, We’re Back! is a platformer of the most straightforward variety. You jump over gaps, you fight enemies, you collect things, you travel right the entire time. In no way is this a bad thing, though. Simplicity tends to lend itself well to games that are adapted from a film, and that is certainly the case here. 

The media wants you to think that dinosaurs are heartless creatures who have it out for you. This is pure slander, though, and We’re Back! A Dinosaur’s Story wants you to know that. Should you ever see a dinosaur, run to it. When you’re face to face with it, close your eyes and make a wish. I’m not a believer in magic, but dinosaurs have an untapped element of divination within them that is begging to be used.

If I had to choose THE best dinosaur related flash game to EVER be made (trust me, I haven’t played many), I would probably have to go with PixelJam’s Dino Run. This cute little side-scrolling platformer has an extremely simple gameplay concept - all you have to do is run away from the giant fiery tornado wall, in turn saving your species from extinction. Your little yellow velociraptor only neeeds your arrow keys to control him, up is jump, and left/right are to run in each direction.

One of the best parts of the game is the art style. It seems like every game these days has a pixelated look (which is not a bad thing, at all), but I feel like PixelJam pulls it off especially well with Dino Run. You really get a sense of speed and urgency with the quickly moving graphics. I don’t think that this game could have been pulled off if a different game company developed the game.

If you’re in the mood for some fast paced, indy dino running action, check out Dino Run, like now. You really won’t regret it.

‘Go Diego Go! - Great Dinosaur Rescue’ is, as I’m sure you can guess, a game based around Diego (beloved cousin of Dora the Explorer) embarking on adventure to rescue a dinosaur.

The dinosaur in question is a Maiasaurus named Maia, she has been separated from her family and is lost on an island. Diego does the heroic thing and helps her traverse land and sea to get her back to her family.

Completion of the game took me about half an hour, and then a subsequent five minutes to look at the extra things in the ‘Museum’. The game itself is made up of 23 mini games based on seven core games, each of which are shown in the video:

• Taking a photo of a dinosaur (use D-Pad to look around, tap the screen when you see a dinosaur)
• Following footprints (tapping the correct footprints to follow the trail)
• Making a noise/saying a phrase in Spanish (easily achieved by blowing into the mic)
• Dragging objects to or from an area on the bottom screen (classic stylus dragging action)
• Jigsaw (Jigsaw)
• Guiding Mya up or down to avoid obstacles (Like a shmup, but without weapons, speed, death, enemies)
• Tapping certain colours/footprints (Just tapping what you see on the top screen)

Looking at the game from a strictly dinosaur viewpoint, it is very impressive. There are lots of dinosaurs (albeit in cartoon format only), and they are all named appropriately.
You can control dinosaurs occasionally in the minigames, but only to a point. There is sadly no free-roaming control that enables you to eat Diego, the terrible little boy that he is.

Don’t even get me started on Diego! Just because he saves animals he thinks he’s entitled to force children to learn his language. Throughout the game he will talk to you(r child) in Spanish and get them to repeat phrases into the mic. Now these phrases aren’t even explained, you are just told to blindly repeat them. They could mean anything at all! This is the worst kind of education, the forced kind.

Looking at the game from a strictly non-dinosaur viewpoint, I can assure you that it is rubbish.
As I previously mentioned, I finished it within half an hour. This coming from a game that costs twelve of England’s finest from Amazon! It makes me sick.

Here is a video to give you a sample of the glorious gameplay that you experience with this game:

Now I’m fully aware of the fact that the game is aimed for young children, and not at my age range, and so I would have likely finished it quicker than the target audience…HOWEVER! - The young children that this game is aimed at are at such a young age that they should not be using a Nintendo DS, they should be
spending time with…heaven forbid….their parents!

The cartoon show it’s based on, the puzzles themselves, the attitude of the game, it’s all aimed at children that should be learning with their parents, building a bond together. Not spending time sat with a gaming system with a fiddly stylus that they can choke on.

The only way that this game would be acceptable would be if the parents sat with the child and helped them play it.

Long story short, if you’re not a child, or a massive fan or Diego, then you’ve got to really -and I mean REALLY- like dinosaurs to enjoy this game.

Dino-Score:

8/10 - Very good at teaching young children the greatness of dinosaurs

Game Score:

2/10 - Too much of an obvious money-making device. Get the Wii version instead, you get more for your money.

The survival horror genre is not exactly renowned for being realistic. For years scary games revolved around people getting trapped in a mansion and being pursued by something frightening. Finally, though, the genre was blessed with the key ingredient needed to invigorate anything growing stale: dinosaurs.

Any survival horror fans out there are probably screaming “Dino Crisis! Dino Crisis!” and roaring a deep-pitched roar of bliss. I wouldn’t blame them, either. The Dino Crisis games are excellent for their portrayal of the hatred dinosaurs have for humans, and they serve as an excellent reminder for how much work we have left until humans and dinosaurs can finally coexist peacefully.

Dino Crisis tells the story of a Raid team visiting Ibis island to look into the intel they’ve received about a man called Doctor Edward Kirk developing heinous weapons.  When they arrive, they learn that a serious accident has occurred; causing a time rift that enables dinosaurs to travel to the present. This concept of time-traveling may remind some of you of Back to the Future, but you’ll be happy to know that the dinosaurs lack hover boards. 

The game relies on surprises as a scare mechanic, and it works incredibly well. Opening a door to find a raptor poised to attack is nothing short of terrifying, and the amount of times this happens never reduces the fear factor of it. Having entered many a room only to find a raptor ready and able to kill me, I can tell you with certainty that it never fails to send a chill down your spine. 

Interestingly enough, Dino Crisis, now ten years old, is meant to take place in the year 2009.  What better way to celebrate than by procuring a copy and playing through the game yourself? The graphics may be outdated, but there are few better ways to fill your urge for pixelated dinosaurs.

I what I think is likely to become a regular part of DinoPad, I found another flash game I think you will… enjoy? Perhaps “enjoy” is a bit of a strong word, but it’s definitely a game and it definitely has dinosaurs in. Ok, it has dinosaurs in. And that’s good enough by my standards.

Play it here on NewGrounds, then let us know what you think.

We all know that Yoshi is a dinosaur, right? I mean, even his Wikipedia article states he is a “fictional Dinosaur”, but when I think of Yoshi, I don’t think of dinosaur, I think of just - Yoshi. It’s like over time, Yoshi has lost his Dinosaur image.

No, I retract that last statement. I don’t think that he was EVER a dinosaur to me. When I was a kid playing Super Mario World, I never said in my head, “I wish that I had a Yoshi Dinosaur to ride,” I always just said “I wish I had a real life Yoshi”. Like every other being in the Super Mario universe, he is his own thing.

You don’t call a Goomba a dog, or a Shy-Guy a hamster (save the Koopas, they’re turtles), you would call Yoshi a Yoshi.

Does this shortblog really make that much sense to you guys? Is Yoshi a dinosaur in your eyes, or will he alway be considered a part of the Yoshi species?

If there is one thing the world is crying out for more of it’s flash games with dinosaurs in. Thankfully, that call has been answered this morning with my discovery of Robot Dinosaurs That Shoot Beams When They Roar ™.

The mouse controlled Shmup puts you in control of one of two available jet pack wearing dinos; Tyrannosaurus X or Dinomite. These extra-terrestrial dinos have the ability to shoot beams when they roar, as one might expect from the title.

Your objective is to avoid obstacles, pick up a power-up or two, shoot down your enemies and reach the end of the level to gain some much needed dinoforce.

Your main attack is your rawr, which shoots a beam of dino-destruction on any foes ahead. This uses up your rechargeable dino-beam power. The lower your power, the less damage your beam does and the less rawr you do.

Although depressingly short and only one level long, the game really is awesome. From the cheesy guitar shreads to the over the top dialogue, everything about this game requires some ill-fitting word to have the phrase “some”, “tastic” or “adical” attached to the end of it and used as an adjective.