Dino Crisis 2 (2000)

This Capcom entry is a fast-paced, action-heavy sequel that shifts away from the survival horror tone of the original game in favor of arcade-style gameplay. It puts you against relentless waves of dinosaurs in a time-warped jungle environment. You control Regina, from the first game, and also a newcomer Dylan, switching between them across varied missions with upgraded weapons and an in-game point system for purchases. Unlike its predecessor, Dino Crisis 2 emphasizes combat over tension, offering thrilling set pieces, large-scale dinosaur battles, and smooth controls. The graphics and pre-rendered backgrounds are impressive for the time, and the game maintains a solid pace throughout.

While fans of the original’s suspenseful atmosphere might miss the horror elements, the sequel delivers a fun, adrenaline-fueled experience that stands out as one of the more unique action titles on the PlayStation. This title had peak replay value at the time, since there was a very high number of things you could unlock, ways you could play, and also the upgrades you could choose from, depending on the weapons and equipment you liked the most to play with. This is definitely one of the best PlayStation titles, and a must-play for this platform.

Another standout is how confidently it embraces its arcade identity, the combo-based scoring system rewards aggressive play, encouraging you to chain kills, manage positioning, and keep the action flowing instead of cautiously creeping through environments. This design choice gives the game a surprisingly modern feel, and makes the gameplay consistently engaging. Boss encounters and larger dinosaur set pieces further reinforce this approach, delivering memorable action sequences that feel cinematic without sacrificing player control.

As for its presentation, the OST complements the faster pace with energetic, with music that contrasts sharply with the eerie sound design of the first game. The story, while not particularly deep, is serviceable and moves quickly enough to support the gameplay rather than interrupt it. This title may not satisfy people looking for pure survival horror, but as an action-focused evolution of the series, it succeeds remarkably well. Its confident design choices and high replay value have helped it age quite well, cementing its reputation as a bold and enjoyable sequel that still holds up today.

Apparently I’m in the minority here, but I wayyy prefer DC1 to this. Dino Crisis 2 in no way feels like a survival horror game; but instead plays like a PS1 Resident Evil 6. It’s basically a call of duty action game, and there’s no puzzles, resource management, or any necessity to think further than you can throw a rock.

Ya the combat is better than 1, but it’s also completely brain dead. It’s not the type of game I would ever go for, and I’m surprised anyone prefers this over the first.

It’s definitely visually better than 1 with real pre-rendered backgrounds. No plain boring grey geometry like the first… but it still doesn’t make up for the mindless combat and how on-rails the entire thing is. I don’t think action games from this era have aged well, and trying to combine tank controls with a fast-paced thriller action game is just a pointless exercise.

So ya, gets points for the combat being smoother and better, more detailed art. But this is not a game I will ever revisit, and it is not a survival horror game in any sense.

Beat on Normal with rank D and 1.3 million points. Missed 1 file. I started on Hard and was expecting a Resident Evil survival horror. I was immediately disappointed at how the raptors kept respawning, while my health and ammo were going down quickly. I had to run away and spend what few points I had on med kits and ammo. I made it to the military base and was hoping the traditional gameplay would begin, but then the indoor raptors were respawning too. At least in the jungle they came in from the trees, but indoors they popped in out of thin air. I started over on Normal to see if there was respawning, and then looked online to see that they were not actually infinite. I liked Normal better because getting hit did not take off a massive chunk of health.

I methodically exterminated every enemy from each zone, except for a couple that were actually infinite. I very quickly realized that they spawned when the camera shifted, and by the time I was playing as Regina figured out how to get the no damage bonus. So it was camp near an entrance, kill 5, then leave for the bonus. Repeat until no more enemies. Prior to this the gameplay was growing on me as a fun shooter with Resident Evil controls, but the very formulaic way of enemy spawning and the no damage bonus made the game tedious. I bought each primary weapon and gave them all a max size ammo capacity boost (not the pistol). I found Dylan's shotgun to be better for general use than the solid cannon, because of range. The solid cannon wrecked Allosaurus but took more effort to wait until the raptors were close enough. The anti tank gun was the best overall weapon and I used it to wreck everything. In the fire cave I tried out the rocket launcher and it 1 shot the armored enemies while the rifle took 3 shots; not really much of a difference to the point where the rocket launcher was skippable. Regina was more fun to play. I used the flamethrower for the first Allosaurus and the pistol for everything else; it did not work well vs Pteranadons and I ran from them. Then I got the dual smgs, which was the most fun weapon in the game. I loved how each hand could shoot at separate targets, and how fluidly it controlled. It was almost like an aimbot. The heavy machine gun was good too, but better suited to single targets. The missile pod was much better than the rocket launcher, and was my go to for the more powerful enemies but it went through ammo quickly. The only subweapon I bought was the mine gun because it was mandatory. I bought everything else except the melee upgrades, and kept my health up by purchasing small med kits. Later on I found more med kits than I could carry.

The puzzles and rail shooting sequences were good. The only puzzle I did not like was hitting the power switches with the shock baton. I killed all of the Allosaurus during their nest boss fight using normal guns rather than the signal flare; they were way tougher than other solo Allosaurus but went down easily enough with the anti tank rifle and missile pod. Regina had to kill a few with the machine gun and smgs, which took forever. Should have used the flare gun. The tank mini game was fun, but the camera zoom and boss made it very difficult to tell what way the turret was facing. I wish there were more proper boss fights rather than the gimmicky battles that required fooling around with environmental stuff, though the side colloseum mode was like a boss fight. I started as the T rex but did not know what I was doing and died to the raptors. Regina got to the Allosaurus, but she did not have powerful weapons. I neglected to use any healing and probably would have won if I had healed. It would be all about running around flanking with the smgs. Dylan did about as well but his weapons were even worse. Really had to use the mine and shotgun to kill the armored, and save the piddly 5 rockets for the Allosaurus. Rick also lost at the Allosaurus because the solid cannon was awkward to use against 2 at once. I most likely could win with all 3 characters with more attempts. Gail wrecked the entire arena with A rank, mainly because the anti rank rifle owned the Allosaurus and T rex. The tank was just like the tank mini game only zoomed in enough to actually see the turret. I found it better to not move around much and won A rank despite taking a lot of hits and a long time. Then I did each dino. The oviraptor won with A rank using mostly the jump kick; it was fairly easy to get behind the enemies to avoid damage. The mid ranged spit was only useful against the armored guys when they were on their backs. The velociraptor barely won with B rank and a sliver of health. I found it to be too slow and unhandy, making it difficult to avoid damage. The jump attack was not nearly as good as the ovi's, and sometimes it would do a tail swipe instead. I think it needed faster movement and response. The armored lizard did quite well winning with B but not close to death. I found its basic bite to be savagely effective, and the 2 legged dash was helpful for getting and staying behind the bigger dinos. The Allosaurus was my favorite dino because of the fast handling and variety of attacks. It could sprint to get behind the big dinos, wrecked with the basic bite and had a handy area effect tail lash to deal with raptors. Got A rank. Then I got S rank somehow as the T rex despite it completely lacking the finesse of the Allosaurus. It was a struggle to keep up with both raptor types, with the key being to run away to keep them at bite distance; could not hit them when they were too close. It was not fast enough to get behind the Allosaurus and T rex so I just traded blows from the front. That did not seem worthy of S.

The main game felt more like a bonus mode, like it should have played like an actual survival horror with much fewer enemies and supplies. Instead it was pretty much the opposite, with nearly infinite enemies and supplies. The gameplay was fun but the nature of farming enemies for money brings the game down a but. Still it was nice to experience an action packed shooter using the Resident Evil interface. Makes me imagine how cool such an action packed bonus mode would be for mowing down hordes of zombies and lickers. The story went too far with the time travel, putting in things like paradox and causality. The concept of bringing dinosaurs forward to the present is cool, but once you add the ability to go to the past and future it makes little sense. Might play again on Hard, but not looking forward to the tedium of extermination again.

7.5/10