Dino Eggs: Rebirth – What We Think:

Back in good ol’ 1983, the original Dino Eggs was playable on desktop computers. Starring Time Master Tim, Dino Eggs was all about traveling back and forth through time, rescuing dinosaurs from extinction. People loved it. I mean, how could you not? Dinosaurs are delightful. Thirty years later, developers David H. Schroeder and Eric Ferrot gifted us with an outstanding expansion – Dino Eggs: Rebirth.

Dino Eggs: Rebirth begins with its backstory and what ensued in the interim. Tim now has a daughter – Tam – and they are both adventuring through time to acquire dinosaur eggs and adorable baby dinosaurs. After the tutorial, I had the choice of teaming up with a buddy or collecting the prized possessions all on my own. Considering I was all about crowning myself victorious, I alone started out as Tam in the Outlands.

Classic Jurassic

The Outlands was the first of four eras I had the luxury of exploring. Each era had a total of ten stages. As expected, the more I progressed, the more difficult and frustrating the puzzles became. I hopped around, dodging archaic snakes, whilst collecting as many dino eggs as possible. If ever I misjudged a jump across the venomous critters, the dino eggs I was so cautiously holding would fly into oblivion, my health would begin to deteriorate, and my score would subside.

Welcome to one of many bumps in the road.

Land Before Time

Luckily, the levels were not timed, so I could take as much time as I needed to attain all possible eggs and baby dinos. Naturally, my patience wore thin; some levels were randomized in a way where getting from ledge to ledge was almost impossible. I had to strategize my moves based on spiders that would frequently drop down on threads. Conveniently, the threads could be used to double-jump to a platform and drop the eight-legged freak to its ultimate demise.

Well, when the double-jump worked, anyway, which wasn’t often. The amount of times my attempt failed miserably is equivalent to how much I rage-quit.

So yeah, a lot.

Stand On Me

Additionally, Dino Mom would stomp her giant foot down periodically in attempt to squish me. Understandable, because she wanted to protect her babies, but I wasn’t about to sympathize here. It was I who was trying to rescue them from their extinction, for goodness sake. Starting a fire was the only way to rid of Dino Mom, so I grabbed two chunks of wood and carried on with my life. Though the flame eventually died out, it made clearing a level a lot less stressful.

Distributed throughout numerous stages are one of two power-ups – sometimes both. One of them generously raised my health bar. However, my preferred power-up gave me the ability to transport more than three eggs at one time. I delighted in this feature, due to the aggravating fact that the time warp would sometimes spawn at the most ridiculous spots on the screen. For example, I was transported in the midst of numerous purple critters charging at me full force. No matter what move I made, I was screwed. I threw up my hands in surrender. There was no getting out of that mess in one piece.

In addition to the puzzling story mode, Dino Eggs: Rebirth also offered several challenges unlocked with each era. These fun yet maddening tasks helped better my understanding of the game’s mechanics, which were a little off-kilter at times, but gradually became second nature to me. Practice makes perfect, folks.

Dino-myte

To say that I’ve enjoyed and will further enjoy Dino Eggs: Rebirth is a bit of an understatement. With an unlimited amount of landscapes to discover (and get frustrated with), its replay value is considerably high. Not to mention the quirky and retro atmosphere which molds this experience into an entertaining one, despite its minor gameplay flaws.

Plus, saving adorable baby dinosaurs from extinction is something to take pride in.

Dino Eggs: Rebirth is available via Steam.

[xrr rating=”4.5/5″]

Watch the trailer for Dino Eggs: Rebirth below: