Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

LEGO Jurassic World is an action adventure platform game available from retail stores and for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS4, PS3 and PS Vita.

Jurassic Park originated as a novel by Michael Crichton in 1990 about how genetic research was not an urgent matter and was therefore utilised for the purpose of entertainment by preserving extinct animals in a wildlife park. Steven Spielberg adapted the book into the popular film Jurassic Park in 1993 followed by an adaptation of the novel’s sequel The Lost World in 1997, while Joe Johnston directed a third film in 2001 with Colin Trevorrow directing a fourth film in the series 14 years later called Jurassic World which shares the name of the 1997 re-publishing of Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park and The Lost World novels into a single book.

Jurassic Park games have been released to coincide with the release of each film as well as spin-offs covering more of the story and being presented across numerous genres including a light gun arcade game, first-person shooter, side scrolling platformer, fighting, isometric, third-person adventure and a park building game. Jurassic Park launched on a variety of platforms in 1993 followed by Jurassic Park Interactive on 3DO in 1994 and Jurassic Park 2: The Chaos Continues in 1994, while The Lost World launched for PS1 and Sega Saturn in 1997 with a first-person shooter on PC sub-titled Trespasser following in 1998 and a dinosaur fighting game called Warpath: Jurassic Park for PS1 in 1999, alongside Jurassic Park III which saw a multitude of games spanning from 2001 to 2003 with just as many spin-offs as any other film in the series.

More recently, Telltale Games released their four part episodic Jurassic Park game in November 2011 with a number of mobile games and apps have also been released, while an arcade game called Jurassic Park Arcade released in March 2015, but will LEGO Jurassic World surpass the plethora of previous games to set the standard for the best Jurassic Park game to date?

The story revolves around the core plot of genetic research to create a theme park in which families could visit to be able to gaze upon species that have remained long extinct with key moments from all 4 Jurassic Park films spanning from 1993 through 2015, although there are certainly some changes made in comparison to scenes from the films to make it more child friendly by putting a humorous spin on some of the more violent scenes from the films.

The game includes 20 levels comprising of 5 based around each film with classic LEGO gameplay such as deconstructing particular obstacles or machinery and constructing a ladder or something that is capable of being utilised to reach the next area, while there are also 6 bonus chase levels, alongside building activities which requires the player to dig up materials contained within dirt or to follow a trail of tracks from beginning to end in order to be rewarded with the appropriate bricks.

The free play mode allows the player to revisit each completed level in any order in an attempt to utilise the skills of each unlocked character by switching to characters that cannot be used during story mode, therefore attempting to find which character’s abilities hold the key to progressing beyond a tricky puzzle and finding out what is hidden beyond it.

There are lots of additional activities beyond completing the levels comprising of 20 races available in free play mode with participation available via a vehicle or dinosaur, 20 workers in peril to be saved across the various locations, 10 dinosaurs which require healing, 20 photography locations, collecting 200 minikits, collecting 275 gold bricks, collecting 20 red bricks to unlock the ability to purchase a variety of extras such as red, gold and amber brick detectors; x2, x4, x6, x8 and x10 red bricks; 8 bit music and much more besides for a varying amount of LEGO studs.

Collecting the 20 amber fossils are of particular importance as they enable players to experiment with D.N.A. at the Jurassic Park or Jurassic World research facilities in order to create entirely unique dinosaur species by changing individual components such as the head, colour and more besides or by alternatively randomising an entirely new dinosaur. Elsewhere, characters can also be customised on Main Street in Jurassic World in which characters can be changed just as much and in the same ways that dinosaurs can.

The character design is excellent as it is very faithful to not only what you would anticipate from a LEGO game, but also a Jurassic Park game as there are numerous unlockable playable characters which can be unlocked as you play and purchased using LEGO studs that are collected throughout the game including 20 dinosaurs and dozens of characters with every character having multiple costumes which are authentic to what they wore in the films, their own unique personality in regards to how they approach situations, alongside their own abilities. For instance, Alan Grant who has a Velociraptor claw as his signature weapon which can be used to cut through vines blocking the path ahead as well as further abilities including reassembling dinosaur bones to be able to reach higher areas and digging in certain areas, while Ian Malcolm has a flare to light dark areas and can solve equations. There are also characters such as Robert Muldoon and Gerry Harding who carry guns which means they can defend themselves against anything that attacks them as well as being able to shoot LEGO targets, tracking to find objects and can use InGen access panels, while Jophery Brown carries a tazer which can jump start LEGO generators. Female characters such as Ellie Sattler and Ellie Degler are able to use agility LEGO objects to reach higher areas, can rummage through dinosaur droppings to gather required resources from within and can grow LEGO plants to also allow progression to higher areas.

The environment design reflects that of each of the four Jurassic Park films with such locations including the iconic habitats of the dinosaurs, outrunning a giant T-Rex in a jeep, Jurassic Park, Isla Sorna, Jurassic World and much more besides which are all as faithfully recreated as the characters, while there are even areas which can be explored with vehicles or as a dinosaur.

There are multiple downloadable content packs available such as Jurassic Park Trilogy Pack 1 including the Animal Control Vehicle and the ability to play as Eric and Paul Kirby for £0.79*, while the Jurassic Park Trilogy Pack 2 contains the cruise ship from The Lost World and playable characters such as Lex and Tim Murphy for £0.79*, alongside the Jurassic World Pack which features new vehicles such as the Jurassic Response Unit, a new costume for Owen Grady and the ability to explore Jurassic World from the perspectives of tourists, employees and first responders for £1.69*.

The controls are well mapped to the DualShock 4 controller with the control scheme consisting of pressing X to jump or pressing X quickly twice to roll, glide or fly; pressing O to interact with an object or to perform a special ability, build, use or activate; pressing triangle to switch from controlling one character to a nearby character or holding triangle to enter the character wheel; pressing square to perform an attack, holding square to aim or charge; pressing L1 or R1 to cycle through characters; changing the direction of the left analogue stick or alternatively pressing up, down, left or right on the d-pad to move your selected character; changing the direction of the right analogue stick to move the camera; pressing the share button takes you to the share feature menu; and pressing the options button to display the pause menu. Tapping the touch pad displays a map of JurassicPark during the hub area of the park, while the light bar only changes colour when a second player joins the game and the DualShock 4 controller vibrates when a large dinosaur has just made a heavy impact or a loud roar to shake the surrounding environment.

The graphics possess excellent character models and animations with everything in the world and the characters having a charming appeal to them; not only as they are all made entirely from LEGO but also as they are faithful recreations of the characters and the environments from each of the four films.

The presentation of the game is solid with a great user interface across various menus such as the main menu, map kiosks, extras menu, options menu and gameplay menus with support for navigation via the left analogue stick, directional pad and face buttons, although it does not include support for navigation via the right analogue stick and touch pad. The background of the menu screens consists of a panning camera which explores various areas of Jurassic World, while showing a multitude of activities from a 3D Experience Theatre to Jurassic Traders and forms of transport with some familiar characters roaming around the park, alongside some rather fun background details such as a dinosaur riding a motorbike, pulling a wheelie and chasing after a pig.

The voice-overs for all of the characters are lifted directly from the films, so when the player is hearing the dialogue of Ian Malcolm; they are actually hearing Jeff Goldblum, alongside the rest of the original actors from the films such as Chris Pratt as Owen Grady in Jurassic World, while there are world class voice-over artists such as Nolan North, Troy Baker, Ashly Burch and more besides added for any additional characters, alongside an authentic soundtrack comprising of the original orchestral score by John Williams which accompanied the films with such iconic themes as Journey to the Island, T-Rex Rescue, Finale and Malcolm’s Journey. Sound effects include a variety of characters walking, running, jumping, digging, building, climbing, throwing, punching, screaming, roaring dinosaurs, driving vehicles, the ambience of heavy rain and collecting LEGO studs. There is no DualShock 4 speaker implementation which is surprising as it could have produced the authentic voice-overs or soundtrack or possibly even sound effects.

The trophy list includes 50 trophies with 39 bronze, 8 silver, 2 gold and 1 platinum trophy. Almost half of the trophies can be earned naturally during the first playthrough as there are 21 story based trophies including a bronze trophy for completing 20 levels, 3 bronze trophies for story related activities and a gold trophy for completing the final level. There are also some trophies for collecting and building which players can work towards in the story and free play mode playthroughs such as the Don’t You Mean Extinct silver trophy for collecting all 200 minikits; the Spared No Expense silver trophy for collecting 65,000,000 studs; The Legacy of John Hammond silver trophy for collecting all 20 Amber Bricks and more besides, while the building trophies include the Went And Made A New Dinosaur bronze trophy for creating a custom dinosaur and the All I Got Was This T-Shirt bronze trophy for creating a custom character and the Building Blocks Of Life bronze trophy for building a LEGO object using Mr. DNA. The hardest trophy has to be the Next Time It’ll Be Flawless gold trophy for achieving 100% completion for everything in the game from completing the story mode and 6 bonus chase levels to collecting, healing, rescuing and purchasing everything. It is estimated that depending upon skill and a good trophy guide to provide some helpful tips that it would take between 20 to 25 hours to platinum the trophy list.

There are no difficulty levels resulting in the difficulty curve being only as hard as the player would find the puzzles, exploration and combat, therefore it is most likely that players would generally find the game relatively easy to progress through which is rather appropriate given the appeal of LEGO to a wide audience and age range from young children to adults.

Split-screen multiplayer allows a second player to join in at any given moment via drop-in and drop-out multiplayer and play co-operatively with the hub area of the park providing two completely separate areas for both players to explore, while each of the levels see both players working together within the same environment to figure out puzzles and overcome obstacles. The co-operative multiplayer works exceptionally well with the split-screen available in the form of a dynamic split which makes the split of the screen vary based upon the current action taking place or a fixed vertical split of the screen, although it would have been nice to have also seen online multiplayer and some form of competitive multiplayer such as which player could collect the most LEGO studs within the span of the level.

There are no online leaderboards which is surprising as they could have featured the quickest times from every player who had completed each level and the entire game in single player or co-operatively with further leaderboards for the amount of LEGO studs collected and the amount of objectives completed.

The replayability of LEGO Jurassic World includes replaying levels to collect amber bricks, red bricks, gold bricks and minikits which players may have been unable to do so during the first playthrough without having access to a certain character, while revisiting levels in free play mode as different characters which have unlocked with different abilities and attempting to find which character can solve a puzzle and unlock whatever may lay beyond it. There is a natural satisfaction of creating your own unique species of dinosaur and collecting LEGO studs as well as deconstructing particular objects and constructing an item that is of use to reach the next area of the level, while split-screen co-operative multiplayer is always fun to play with a friend.

Overall, LEGO Jurassic World is an excellent LEGO game and certainly achieves the quality and originality that players would anticipate from a LEGO game and the recreations of the characters and environments are charming, therefore if you are a fan of LEGO in general or of the Jurassic Park films, then this is certainly an absolute must play game, although it is accessible for players who appreciate an exceptional action, adventure or platform game with such genres combining and working in perfect synchronicity.

Jason Bonnar

Analysis

• Title: LEGO Jurassic World
• Developer: TT Fusion
• Publisher: Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment
• System: PS4
• Format: Blu-Ray Disc/PSN Download
• Cross-Buy: No
• Cross-Play: No
• Players: 1-2 (Local Co-operative Multiplayer)
• Hard Drive Space Required: 14.09GB (Version 1.01)
• *Correct at time of publishing