The Jurassic Park franchise is finally going back to its horror roots

The classic Jurassic franchise will return to its darker roots with a new video game titled Jurassic Park: Survival and fans are thrilled. 

The Jurassic franchise is among cinema’s greatest movie sagas. Based on the Michael Crichton novel, it began all the way back in 1993 with Jurassic Park and has since spawned five sequels, multiple video games, comic books, and toy lines. It’s still a favorite to this day among families and dinosaur enthusiasts, and that doesn’t appear to be changing any time soon.

What does appear to be changing, however, is that the franchise is going back to its darker roots, as it was just confirmed at The Game Awards that a new video game entry in the saga will bring back the thrills and chills that the first movie is known for.

Jurassic Park: Survival is coming to a video game console near you in the future and it’s title might just be a clue to the type of game that it is: A survival game. In fact, the first trailer would suggest as much, with fans making comparisons between it and Alien: Isolation.

Jurassic Park: Survival brings the horror in announcement trailer

As the trailer reveals, Jurassic Park: Survival centers on Dr. Maya Joshi, a survivor from the park breakout of ’93 who has been left behind. Yes, it appears that the game will take place directly after the events of the first Jurassic Park movie, as it features many of the same locations in the exact same state they were the last time we left them. That includes the messy kitchen with that velociraptor trapped in the freezer.

The trailer has been met with a positive reception from fans as it takes the franchise back to its more thrilling days (rather ironically by setting itself during them). With the saga’s popularity making it appeal to a wider audience, including families, it has adopted something of a family-friendly approach, especially in the more recent Jurassic World movies. This has resulted in the franchise moving more towards fantasy adventure, which means that those recent installments haven’t employed the same chills and thrills as the original.

Remember, the 1993 original was really quite scary, and that terror that it inspires still holds up today. In fact, fans have been calling for any future movies to go back to this darker tone, as it would gift the franchise with a sense of awe and wonder that it hasn’t had in some time.

Whether or not potential future installments on the silver screen opt for that remains to be seen, but to see it happen in the video game world is equally as exciting. Jurassic Park: Survival is teased as an action-adventure game from Saber Interactive planned for release on PS5, Xbox Series X and S, and PC. A release date has yet to be confirmed, but we will be there regardless of the date!