Jack is also pitted against larger threats that cannot be killed. While facing vastatosaurus rex, the King Kong version of a T-Rex, you must use the environment to stay out of its reach and avoid a quick death.
Another sequence takes place in a valley full of migrating brontosauruses (not apatosauruses) that don’t even notice Jack, much less care if they trample him. As they thunder past on all sides, dust is thrown up and other critters scatter from under foot and the effect is exhilarating because your only hope is to run.
Another laudable element of the combat is a food chain that has the creatures eating others that fall. Thus, well-placed kills can distract other threats and allow you to slip by and conserve both ammunition and time. All together, Jack’s combat varies between fighting small critters that want to eat you and fleeing from big critters that want to eat you. It is often repetitive but does have some set pieces that are both challenging and fun.
The other basic obstacles on the island include grassy, unmovable weeds that are knee high and completely impenetrable for no apparent reason. Jack must find a torch to wage total war against the stubborn flora. Often intertwined with the weedy conundrums are searches for sticks that can be used to turn levers and open primitive gates.
While it appears that any stick would do the job, you must search for a specific one that is often strategically strewn behind a patch of those resilient weeds, such as in the brontosaurus episode. At least these contrived quests take you off the main and extremely linear path of the game’s levels. I thought the jungle would be a little more open to exploration, but this is not your Farcry’s island.
