Dinosaur Planet N64 Restoration - Part 2 DarkIce Mines

My playthrough of the Dinosaur Planet N64 Restoration (Dinomod Enhanced).

00:00:00 Intro
00:01:22 Cave of Treasures
00:18:08 Feeding Garunda Te
00:27:52 DarkIce Mines
00:52:40 DarkIce Mines Bottom
01:01:12 Ice Waterfall Cave
01:07:36 DarkIce Mines Lava
01:15:38 Boss Galadon

Visit the Dinosaur Planet Community on Discord:
  / discord  

Stay up to date on the newest DP patches with DinoLauncher:
https://github.com/sabre230/DinoLauncher

Alternatively I made a patch that contains all of the improvements/bugfixes along with more detailed player models.

Regular Patch:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UfXA...
HQ Player Models Patch:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1txvD...
Readme:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yZs-...

These higher quality models were left unused in the game. They use the same textures as the cutscene models but were meant for gameplay. You'll see them in action in my playthrough.

For more info check out the Cutting Room Floor page:
https://tcrf.net/Proto:Star_Fox_Adven...

Dinosaur Planet was an ambitious Nintendo 64 title developed by Rare near the end of the console's lifespan. An action adventure featuring two playable characters, breathtaking graphics and fully voice acted cutscenes.

Regrettably it ended up being cancelled in early 2001. Development moved to the Gamecube along with a rebranding into Star Fox Adventures. The build I'm playing here is dated December 1st, 2000, likely one of the last N64 versions compiled before development restarted.

By November 2000 Dinosaur Planet was already in the process of being turned into Star Fox Adventures with Sabre, the male protagonist, replaced by Fox McCloud and dialogue lines rewritten to fit into the Star Fox canon.

Dinosaur Planet as we got it was in a sorry state and barely playable. The most likely explanation for this is that some rather drastic under the hood changes happened shortly before the December build was created. It would crash frequently and various gameplay elements and graphical effects seen working in footage of the June 2000 E3 demo were broken.

The Dinosaur Planet Community did outstanding work fixing bugs and bringing the game to a level of stability where it can be played and enjoyed. It may never be perfect, but the restoration has made considerable progress since 2021 and by now you should be able to have a good time playing Dinosaur Planet if you can look past a couple of rough edges. Sabre's character model and dialogue lines referring to him have been fully recreated while Fox McCloud was kept as an optional costume that can be toggled at any time.

I'm recording a complete playthrough to give an overview over all the improvements made so far. I haven't seen the game since September 2022. I was unable to keep up with the restoration project for a year, much of what has changed since then I'll be seeing for the first time, too.

I'm excited to find out how far we can get. Dinosaur Planet had me captivated ever since I first read about it with its beautiful soundtrack, nostalgic and for their time outstanding graphics, a surprisingly deep plot and charming character designs. There's plenty to like here. It's not often that we get to explore a previously unseen title by a beloved development studio.

And Star Fox Adventures?

The problem with Star Fox Adventures was the move to Gamecube. It caused the developers unexpected headaches because the seamless level loading system used on the cartridge based N64 did not transfer well to the disc based Gamecube at all. Debugging Tricky, the AI controlled dinosaur sidekick, was also a nightmare from what I read.

Resolving these issues took up a lot of the dev time. This, along with the upcoming Microsoft acquisition, meant that development had to be rushed near the end to get the game working and out the door in time.

That's the reason several areas, key plot points and gameplay elements from Dinosaur Planet didn't make the cut. And why we see so many explosive barrel puzzles as filler material to pad out the game's length. Krystal was written out of the story at first. She was brought back later at Nintendo's suggestion.

It's an enjoyable game with beautiful graphics and a smooth 60fps framerate, but it could've been more if development hadn't run into these issues. Dinosaur Planet's whimsical charme and the brilliant soundtrack by David Wise remain intact. If ever a title deserved a director's cut or a remastering effort it is Star Fox Adventures.

I think much of the criticism regarding SFA came from Star Fox fans who expected a space shooter, a direct sequel to Star Fox 64, and got something very different instead. The game would've been received more warmly for what it is had it stayed as its own IP. It might've gotten less attention without the Star Fox brand, though.