Having to deal with an island full of carnivorous Dinosaurs would be enough for one man, don’t you think? Not according to this game. The very first level see’s you fighting Tornados and Lightning Storms, as well as the a glut of incredibly annoying jumpy lizards.

There are four areas to pick from, each with it’s own theme (Lava, Jungle, Yawn, etc.). Before entering the level, you get this bizarre mini-game where you have to shoot as dinosaurs that are trying to jump on your car, then when you kill enough, a boss comes along for you to shoot. It’s weird because, if you fail, it doesn’t actually matter, you just go to the level anyway. So that’s pointless. They’re not even that fun really, a sub-par lightgun game where every bump in the road sends your aim flying.

The levels are standard platform fare and you have to shoot Dinosaurs in order to progress anywhere because they’re constantly jumping out at you. If it’s your first time playing the game, prepare to die, then go back and try again, then die again. There’s pretty much no way to complete this game without knowing what the Hell is coming next because everything just jumps out at you.

The guns are weird too, and difficult to use. The first gun shoots some sort of sound wave, which pisses the Dinosaurs off, making them drop tokens for some reason. The second weapon only fires diagonally up and forward, which is pointless as the only way to swap weapons is to go into the Pause menu (You know, the one on the console) select it, then go back to the game by pressing Pause again. That’s no way to swap weapons, though I guess with the Master System’s button limitations this is all they could do. So that weapons pointless anyway. The third is a stick of Dynamite, which you throw about 5 paces in front of you and it explodes upwards. This is equally as useless because, unless you get the aim right, it’ll just miss all the time.

I don’t know what it was about the Master System... Either it was owned by the best games players in the world, or the games they brought out for the damn thing just weren’t thought out very well. You’ve got to think to yourself when making a Jurassic Park game - "Kids are gonna love this" - Why, then, make it infuriatingly difficult?

Take the Velociraptor level, for instance. I can’t get further than the first screen. Much like the Terminor 2: Judgement Day review, you might start thinking that I’m an absolute phallus when it comes to playing games, but I’m actually quite good. What I’m not quite good at is jumping over a gap that’s wider than my actual jump. Am I missing something here?

Despite all these ridiculous and game breaking flaws, I actually had a decent bit of fun with this. I don’t really know why, perhaps it’s because, by play these terrible Master System games, I’m realising that the games we have today really aren’t quite so bad. Besides which, the graphics are actually pretty decent for the game’s age, and you do get the feeling that the developers but a bit of effort into the whole Jurassic Park setting. It’s just a shame that it’s boring as Hell, frustrating and impossible. I guess I’m just picky though.