In Dinosaur Island, players will have to collect DNA, research the DNA sequences of extinct dinosaur species, and then combine the ancient DNA in the correct sequence to bring these prehistoric creatures back to life. Dino cooking! All players will compete to build the most thrilling park each season, and then work to attract (and keep alive!) the most visitors each season that the park opens.
BoardGameGeek Rating: 8.1
MSRP: $
Players: 2–4
Ages: 8+
Playtime: 90–120 Min
Publishers: Pandasaurus Games
Designers: Jonathon Gilmour
Year: 2017
Concept
Were you a fan of Jurassic Park and/or the 90’s? Then this is the game for you. Each player take on the role of company competing to build the best dinosaur park in the world! First, your scientist research Dino DNA. Then, you buy stuff to improve your park a like attractions or researchers. Next, your workers your improve your park and create dinosaurs from the DNA you researched. But be careful, the more dinosaurs you have in your park the higher the threat is to your visitors. Then, the gates are opened and your visitors start rolling in. Just remember you were warned, if your security isn’t high enough dinosaurs will escape and eat your visitors.
Quality
This game has it all, double thick boards with places for cubes, tons of plastic meeples, nice cards, an embroidered bag, and even plastic dinosaurs meeples. It’s worth every penny.
Artwork
Again, were you a fan of Jurassic Park and/or the 90’s? This game captured it all beautifully. They even included extra punch outs with 90’s catch phrases on them.
Difficulty
There is A LOT to this game. Like, A LOT. It fills our whole table for a two player game.
Replayability
— Moderate High
Our Reviews
My rating: 9.5
by Aaron KlaserI don’t say this lightly, this is the best game I have played since Catan. This is now my second favorite game of all time. From the theme, to the art, to the variety, I love everything about this game.
This game might come off a little intimidating at first and fair warning, it takes up almost an entire table. But don’t be scared off, just take the game on one Phase at a time. It’s actually not very difficult, there is just a lot of stuff. We pretty much had it down by the end of the second round. I LOVE the plot twists and objectives, they make the game completely different every time.
The game includes objectives for different lengths of games. Short games are too quick — really only meant for the first game. Medium length game still short side. Hack — 2 player with 5 objective cards first to 3 or 4 objectives completed.
I would only change two things. I wish there was more dinosaurs types (this wish has been granted today via kickstarter) and second, I want to see how Pandasaurus Games packs their game in the box. Seriously, you must be a Tetris expert to get all the items back in the box.
Now, go find this game and buy it!
My rating: 9
by Beth KlaserThis game has met my expectations and exceeded them all at the same time. WOW! Props to Pandasaurus Games! The only way they could have made this game more awesome would be if they took a real mosquito and put it in the in a player dice to make it appear as if it was in amber for the first player token.
In the game Dinosaur Island — you manage your own Dinosaur theme park, collect DNA, create dinosaurs, and hope your park is thrilling enough. At first it seemed rather complicated. But, after watching a break down — super simple. We have played a short game and a medium game. Our medium game ended up being shorter than our short game. Someone — I won’t name names — had to get nine dinosaurs before me.
The rules are well layed out and easy to understand. All of the pieces seem very well made. Aside from the dinosaurs, my favorite piece is the felted dinosaur island bag that holds the visitors and hooligans. I would highly recommend Dinosaur Island.
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