Nice graphics for the time, everything else is un-spectacular.

User Rating: 6 | Dinotopia: The Sunstone Odyssey XBOX
Dinotopia: The Sunstone Odyssey is an action/adventure game apparently borne from a series of books based on the fictional land of Dinotopia. Dinotopia is a land where humans and friendly dinosaurs peacefully coexist. In The Sunstone Odyssey, this peace is threatened when a group of humans called the 'outsiders' who are not trusting of dinosaurs, along with violent dinosaurs, begin attacking Dinotopia. You play Drake, a human Dinotopian who takes it upon himself to be the Guardian of Dinotopia, since the rest of the village are apparently pacifists who would rather their village burn to the ground than wield a weapon.

Your weapon of choice throughout the game is a large mallet with replaceable heads of varying strengths. The townspeople constantly spout incredibly cheesy lines, like "breathe deep, seek peace", which I've probaby heard a hundred times throughout the game. And you're constantly reminded that your weapon should never be misused, and should avoid violence at all costs. Luckily, all this hippie rhetoric doesn't carry over to gameplay, because you spend the bulk of your time smashing people, dinosaurs, and other things with your mallet. In fact, you do it so much, I was actually hoping for a little "breath deep, seek peace" time after a while.

The graphics in this game are it's saving grace. The environments and characters look pretty good. But this comes at a cost, and that cost is gameplay. The gameplay is very stiff, and you primarily attack just by mashing one button, occasionally throwing a 2nd button in. As you progress, you learn some new moves which make combat a little more enjoyable, but not much. Also, not many people play last-gen games for their graphics.

There's almost nothing to this game other than following a linear path and bashing things with a mallet. I would recommend this game to a kid who likes dinosaurs, or parents of a kid who likes dinosaurs. But I wouldn't recommend it to anybody else.