Trespasser: The Lost World - Jurassic Park

Moby ID: 1048

Description official descriptions

Trespasser uses the Jurassic Park license and takes place on "Site B", the Costa Rican Island from the Lost World where Jurassic Park's dinosaurs were originally created and, following the island's abandonment, allowed to breed out of control.

Players take the role of Anne, the sole survivor of an airplane crash who finds herself stranded in the Lost World, and who needs to find a way off the island (or at least avoid becoming a dinosaur meal). Throughout the journey, Anne will be accompanied by the disembodied voice of John Hammond, the founder of Jurassic Park.

Trespasser does not feature some of the typical first-person shooter interface elements. There are no health bars, ammo displays, or power-ups, and players can't pick things up just by walking over them. Instead, interaction with the environment is done using Anne's arm, which can be moved around using the mouse and which can be used to pick up items, throw rocks, push down crates or wield weapons. Anne's voice gives a rough estimate of the amount of ammo left whenever she wield a gun, and Anne has a heart-tattoo that fills with red as she becomes more damaged.

The game also features a 'realistic' physics model where every movable object can be knocked over, roll around, or thrown in a manner related to their size and weight. This also means players can crush some of the smaller dinosaurs with heavy crates, and can even use a rock to bash their heads in. The dinosaurs in the game are only trying to survive instead of existing solely for the purpose of killing Anne in wave after wave. Thus they run away when injured and will often attack other dinosaurs rather than the player.

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Credits (Windows version)

134 People (78 developers, 56 thanks) · View all

Voice Talent
Associate Producer
Executive Producer
Product Marketing Manager
Production Coordinatior
Lead Porgrammers
Designer
Programmers
Shell & Setup Programming
Special Thanks To
Additional Programming
[ full credits ]

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 59% (based on 32 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.2 out of 5 (based on 45 ratings with 10 reviews)

Much Underrated Game, a real sense of fear

The Good
This game was ambitious, very ambitious, and that shows through. The concept of controlling an arm and picking objects up really does add to a sense of presence in the world. One that counts. The physics, when they work properly, add a great deal to the gameplay, after all there's nothing like pushing a car onto a dinosaur to kill it. The stereo sound is fantasic, sometimes the first hint you have of the dinosaur, is the sound of its breathing. Then you run, and without health packs to run to, it can get hairy, which is fantastic. Later games have ignored this, that in real life you don't get health packs, and this game reminds you.

This is backed upby the dinosaur AI, yes it has problems. However when it works, it really does, giving the feeling that the dinosaurs are indeed after your blood.

The Bad
Of course there are many faults with the game. I could list them, the funny AI (nothing like seeing a dinosaur run off a cliff in an act of sheer stupidity), the poor level design (really poor). These all add to create the effect of a game that began with high concepts, but did not get the time to realise them. Which is a shame, as the public looks at the game for the aesthetics first of all, which is where the game falls down on. Once you get past the poor elements, that game does have some magical moments, which cannot be recreated, due to the emergent nature of the dinosuars.

The most telling fault is the level design, really. There are sections are fiendishly complex, and the town level left me wandering backwards and forwards, only to be confronted with buildings which were out of scale with themselves and me. All problems which stem from an apparent rush job, which with more time the solid engine could overcome.

The most obvious flaw is the manipulation system, guns that can't reload, and which drop from the hand at the slightest touch, but hey, the game is an experiment in my view.

The Bottom Line
This game has to be used as a design example for the future. Only now (2003) are we seeing games truely looking to real physics engines again, this game was five years ahead of the pack. The sheer reality which the game gives is warrant of play, and many people gripe about it, but the game is an experiment in my view, and one that partially worked. It's a shame the engine was never used again (to my knowledge). So much work let down by last minute rushes, possibly due to the franchise nature of it being a Jurassic Park game. Which, it has almost nothing to do with, but never mind.

Play this game, for the experience, you may not be dissapointed. A classic game in my view for the sheer attempt of what it was trying to achieve.

Windows · by RussS (807) · 2003

There's no other game like this.

The Good
Imagine a virtual game-world where you can explore kilometer-sized levels where every stone, every crate, every piece of wood lying around has a detailed physics model applied to it. Imagine dinosaurs that try to attack you as a group, sneak up behind you and bite the gun out of your hand before you even get to shoot.

You play Anne, a woman stranded on a mysterious island after a terrible plane accident. Soon you find out that this island is "Site B" where InGen built their dinosaur-breeding facilities. Your only mission is to get away from this raptor-contaminated island as soon as possible.

Trespasser was the only game ever created that features exploration gameplay in a detailed, physically correct environment. No HUD, no stats only your right arm which you have to use to pick up, throw and push things. And, well, your left breast with a little heart-shaped tattoo on it that acts as a "health-indicator". Because everything in Trespasser is part of the game-world you can even see your own body in first person view.

Trespassers graphics were quite remarkable by the time it was released. Huge outdoor environments, unusual special effects like bump-mapping, real-time shadows and realistic water created an incredibly realistic-looking world.

But the most interesting part of course was the physics-engine. I first realized how powerful it was when I came to a small cliff with a pack of velociraptors approaching me. I only had a few shots in my gun and there were at least two of them left. I thought I'm already as good as dead when I looked up and saw the rusted wreck of a jeep lying on the edge of the cliff just above the raptors. So I aimed high and shot the wreck. Slowly it started moving, then it rolled down the cliff hitting both of the raptors with full speed and just smashed them. It looked just amazing like a scene from a movie. Later on I read that this particular scene in the game was the idea of Steven Spielberg himself, who visited the Dreamworks Interactive studios from time to time. Well it looks like making movies isn't his only talent. :)

It's quite surprising that an official movie-licensed game has such an unique gameplay concept. Trespasser features the voices of Minnie Driver (Anne) and Richard Attenbourgh (John Hammond) who is reading from a fictitious book he wrote which Anne seemed to have read and remembers during her trip. The game however doesn't have many connections with the story of The Lost World which is probably a good thing. The Music is very good, it sounds like a real movie score and adds a lot to the feeling of playing an interactive movie.

The Bad
There is a reason why big gaming companies avoid making original games. It's much easier to make a game that just copies the gameplay of an existing genere than inventing and balancing a totally new gaming concept. Few things in Trespasser have ever been there before. Even the first person shooter elements are different as your gun is just a physical object like any other. This brings a lot of problems.

First controlling your virtual hand using your mouse is a nearly impossible task for someone who never played the game before and a lot of gamers already give up at this point, calling the game unplayable. The next thing is the physics-engine itself. Though its very impressive and well-working most times it has dozens of annoying bugs, like objects falling through walls, raptors falling through walls and you getting stuck IN a wall.

The system requirements are a bit extreme too. I have an Athlon XP 1800 with 512MB ram and a geforce2MX and the game still runs quite slowly at some spots for a six-years old game! I remember not being able to play it by the time it came out although I had a pretty high-end system then.

The Bottom Line
Maybe this game could have been a big hit if the developers had the time to actually finish it... Many people see it as a good example for "unused potentials". The physics engine, the huge outdoor environments, the incredible atmosphere, Trespasser has many elements of a gaming masterpiece but lacks of true perfection. Despite all it's flaws Trespasser is an incredible game and one of my all-time favorites because there's simply no other game like this. Once you've mastered the funny controls (which requires you to play it through at least once) Trespasser is a truly wonderful game with an awesome atmosphere.

Windows · by Lumpi (189) · 2004

Clumsy lady simulator

The Good
Lots of weapons, cool locations.

The Bad
You ALWAYS drop things. Very bad physics cause some wacky stuff to happen- such as boxes rolling into each other then blasting out into the air. Or trying to pick up a rifle from under a truck only to be thrust several miles up and left to fall to your doom!!! Also you move VERY slow and you can hardly navigate through most areas. Mindless keycard-hunting and really long load times even on newer computers!!

The Bottom Line
A good idea poorly executed... VERY poorly executed. The idea was to give the player total interaction with the environment- allowing them to pick up, move and manipulate almost any object in the game world, from weapons to rocks, 2x4's, sticks, crates, etc. However, your character seems to have a butter finger grip and, therefore, she constantly drops things forcing you to pick them up repeatedly. Combine this with annoying Minnie Driver voice overs and some of the worst physics ever and you have Trespasser. Avoid this game.

Windows · by Ben Fahy (92) · 2001

[ View all 10 player reviews ]

Discussion

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Check out this excellent Let's Play! Mobygamesisreanimated (11069) Sep 17, 2009

Trivia

Basketball

Project leader Seamus Blackley and designers Austin Grossman, Andrew Haydn Grant and Richard Wyckoff had previously worked for Looking Glass studios. Trespasser has an early incarnation of Looking Glass' traditional basketball court, at the beginning of the 'town' level, complete with a ball you can dunk into one of the nets.

Development

A few months after release, Wyckoff gave a revealing interview to Gamasutra, in which he admitted that the game's production had been beset by problems. In particular, flaws in the physics engine made it almost impossible for the player to stack objects without them sliding off each other. As a consequence, although Trespasser was often stereotyped as a game consisting of crate-stacking puzzles, the final product features no crate-stacking at all; you only have to knock crates over, or climb crates which have, conveniently, already been stacked. The complex, processor-heavy mathematics ensured that the physics-based dinosaurs - which had strictly limited AI, and were added only a few months before release - could only be used sparingly, hence the lack of packs.

The game was designed entirely using 3D Studio Max as a level editor. It was designed before 3D graphics cards were ubiquitous, and has some clever tricks to speed up software rendering; specifically, distance objects (and not-so-distant objects!) are rendered as 2D bitmaps, which flick into 3D when you approach.

Probably because they wanted to ship the game together with The Lost World movie many features had to be cut and the game was released unfinished in 1998. This is the reason why it often feels more like a gaming experiment than a finished release. Close to Trespasser's release, some sources said computer technology wasn't advanced enough to run it decently.

Music

The music had to be written from scratch, as the licence only allowed use of the 'Jurassic Park' name and a few story and character elements; no sound effects or music. It remains the only part of the game to be universally admired. Dreamworks Interactive used several music scores from Trespasser in their next game, Undying. This explains the odd fact that Undying's boss battle music is so heavy on jungle drums and elephant trumbones.

Physics

This game proved that technology didn't cause gameplay. The engine had very difficult and never-seen-before features. like every object had its own material and weight and on this way collisions could be calculated very realistic. Also the sounds in this game aren't pre-programmed as some sources say, but they are real-time-calculated based on the speed of collision and the materials of the objects.

You were carrying a body with the camera all the time time which you could see when you looked down, but then you could also see you're actually too close to the ground which means this woman doesn't have legs below her breasts.

User interface

The game has no in-game user interface. But it still uses a traditional health system and presents Anne's health in form of a tattoo on her breasts.

Awards

  • Computer Gaming World
    • April 1999 (Issue #177) – Coaster of the Year

Information also contributed by Alan Chan, Ashley Pomeroy, Erwin Bergevoet, Lumpi and Zack Green

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Alan Chan.

Additional contributors: Kasey Chang, AdminBB, Lumpi, Patrick Bregger, Sun King.

Game added March 15, 2000. Last modified March 3, 2024.