Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

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PsychologicalDevice
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Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by PsychologicalDevice »

This thing doesn't really have a name...and it's only been seen twice very early on in magazine blurbs about the game production. And the model...doesn't look that great. I've only seen it once and assumed it was just some stock Dinosaur model they used as a placeholder in some magazine article, it almost sort of looks like that; like some clip art someone dug of some project long forgotten that made its way into stock imagery of Dinosaur Gaming a magazine could pull out.

But, apparently I was wrong, since I looked into Tatu's pre-release image archive, and well, there it is.
jurassc2a.jpg
jurassc2a.jpg (3.59 KiB) Viewed 14125 times
It's easy to see why it was cut early early on.

I know they were playing around with different Dinosaurs...among them (possibly, again probably not actually gone beyond the concept phase) Apatosaurus, Allosaurus, Gallimimus, Pachycephalosaurus, and Compsognathus.

This is obviously none of the above. And I'm fairly certain it's not an earliest rendering of a Raptor, I'm 99% positive on that.

What could this absolute dunder looking critter have possibly been? And how was it considered for modeling over something simple like Gallimimus or Allosaurus?
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by Velociraptor Alfa »

In fact, the Albertosaurus from beta and retail versions is based on Steve Kirk's illustration of Allosaurus. It has even three fingers on it's forelimbs.

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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by PsychologicalDevice »

It always bothered me that the Tyrannosaurs have three damn fingers on their texture.
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by TheIdiot »

I bet that...uh..."dinosaur" was just a test model, or something from a completely unrelated work. It seems to completely stray from the quality and style that DWI was going for. Your guess that it was a placeholder seems likely - it could have been a simple proof of concept or something. If anything, I'd guess that it was an ancient version of the albertosaurus, though I extremely highly doubt it. Thank god we ended up with unlicensed ripoff dinosaurs instead! :D
It always bothered me that the Tyrannosaurs have three damn fingers on their texture.

Is the texture mirrored? If it is, the problem was likely that they drew on two fingers, but due to the way the applied it, it ended up mirrored and displaying the texture side-by-side, giving the illusion of three fingers.
If that isn't the cast, then, well, that's a pretty big oversight on their part! Hadn't they seen the movies at all?!
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by tatu »

If it was a planned dinosaur, it never made far, since there is no evidence that they didn't create bones for any other dinosaurs than those found in-game.
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by machf »

Not quite, there *is* evidence that there were at some point bones for at least a few other dinosaurs (Compy, Baby Triceratops, Baby T-Rex) before they dropped them for various reasons (not wanting players to go around shooting baby dinosaurs, or not being able to get the physics working right for the small size of the skeleton in the case of the Compy), and then they switched from pre-defined vertex assignments to script-specified ones.
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by tatu »

Right, I forgot about that. Trespasser does have like a child dinosaur, in the Beach level. The smaller brach could be counted as a kid.
Active project: Trespasser: Isla Sorna
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BE-PH1: Released
PH2-IT: Pre-released
PL-SUM: In production

"...there used to be more benches, but InGen's workers removed them during the evacuation in the name of framerate."
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by PsychologicalDevice »

I think all that can be said, has been said about this critter. But I've come to the conclusion (maybe hastily), that it was indeed part of production at some point early on. How early on, is anyone's guess. Probably very.

The reason being, is the way the arms are placed in relation to the body. Kind of just laying down there in a certain idle position. This same position can be seen in the old Green Rex.
trex.jpg
trex.jpg (28.36 KiB) Viewed 14019 times
And our mystery critter.
jurassc2a.jpg
jurassc2a.jpg (3.59 KiB) Viewed 14019 times
I suppose it's a bit of a jump, but going by how similar the arms are resting extended in the mesh, I think it's safe to say that it wasn't just some "stock" asset floating around, and actually part of production. What it actually was, idk.
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by machf »

Baby T-Rex, maybe? Compy?

Too bad all the pictures of it are so small...
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by tatu »

It's also possible the arms are like that because it was the same dev who did all the dinosaurs.
Active project: Trespasser: Isla Sorna
Status:
BE-PH1: Released
PH2-IT: Pre-released
PL-SUM: In production

"...there used to be more benches, but InGen's workers removed them during the evacuation in the name of framerate."
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by Nick3069 »

Herrerasaurs?
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Re: Got a question about a (maybe?) cut Dinosaur?

Post by Draconisaurus »

I have always thought, and still do think, that that guy is their earliest version of the Tres velociraptor (it is orange, after all). I imagine the dino-making dev sat down one night to make a velociraptor from memory and inspiration of the moment... got told it was horrible... and proceeded to make the awesome, high-poly raptors which populate other Trespasser pre-release material.

Nice noticing on the arm-position, btw.
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