Dino D-Day is an FPS game that is set in an alternate world where Hitler had dinosaurs under his command and was using them to great effect to fight off the Allies. That’s essentially all there is to the story, not that anyone would be asking for explanations when you could play as a T-Rex with guns strapped to it. It is a multiplayer only title, featuring no campaign though it does contain bots that you can play against if you do not feel like going online. Hopping into a match, you will either have the choice of joining the dinosaur having Axis or the Allies that have mostly human soldiers to choose from.
The humans are not as weak as you may imagine against those giant carnivorous lizards, they all pack more than enough firepower to stop them before they manage to take a chomp out of you. Each human has specific weapons attached to them be they snipers, carbines or rocket launchers to name a few and all have their own unique look to easily be able to tell what you are facing from a glance. All weapons will have a limited amount of ammo, but you possess such a large amount that you typically don’t have to worry about it. If you do live long enough to run out, there are ammo stashes scattered around the map to get you back in the fight.
Some dinosaurs also have guns strapped to them with limited ammo while others have nothing but their claws or acid spit. There is quite a significance between each of them from size, method of attacking and movement. Most will lose out to humans due to the gun advantage, but a skilled player can really cause havoc with them. They are particularly useful in modes such as King of the Hill where the smaller dinos can sprint right toward it and is a challenge to shoot down when moving. It is not necessarily the most balanced game, but it is a ton of fun to play as anyone or anything.
You have a few modes to choose from aside from your typical deathmatch and king of the hill such as Capture the Point, Objective and T-Rex Deathmatch. Capture the point has you fighting over control of multiple areas of a map and the one to capture them all wins. Objective will give out tasks to each team like giving the Allies orders to blow something up and the Axis to defend it. T-Rex deathmatch is exactly what it sounds like, it gives a T-Rex to the Axis side and while fun is pretty unbalanced. If you are using bots, there are multiple difficulty settings for them though even putting them on hard they are not that big of a threat.
Dino D-Day originally came out in 2011 and still has a small user base of people playing online. You’ll be able to usually get a match going at the time of this review. There are a decent amount of maps to choose from and all feature goats. Why goats? Who knows but as a certain dino you can pick them up and throw them at a foe. Humans have no real benefits for terrorizing them though it is pretty hard to resist karate chopping a goat even in the midst of combat. The entire game is aware of how ridiculous its premise is and rolls with it, creating a fun, tongue in cheek feel.
It is running on Valve’s Source Engine, and while obviously not impressive anymore, it does hold up rather well. Unlike many of the games that use that engine, there are iron sights in this. The gunplay is pretty solid, and you’ll have no issues pulling off headshots. If you are injured, you will not regenerate health. Instead, you must hope you have a healer on your team and that it is another player because the AI refuses to do so. You can also risk searching the area for a health kit if the battle isn’t too hectic to run out in the open. All in all, there is not all that much to say about Dino D-Day. It is an interesting title that only has multiplayer to offer while fighting the AI is not all too entertaining which in turn lays the responsibility on its small community. That is a risky gamble though with how often it goes on sale for a dollar, it may be worth checking out then.
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