On the whole, Dinotopia: The Sunstone Odyssey looks pretty good. Most of the characters look great, especially that of the dinosaurs you'll both fight and help. The environments vary a bit more in quality, as you'll see great elements (like the water, and miscellaneous objects lying around), as well as more stylized things, like the rock faces that are omnipresent throughout the game.

And then there is sound. Let's just say that the voice acting is the first thing that jumps out at me; and not because it's good. In fact, even though this game is contrived from a movie license, the characters speak nothing like those in the film... at least their accents aren't. Most of those characters within have a heavy Scottish tone. However, some of the sound FX in Dinotopia are actually pretty well done... most notably those of the enemy dinos.

Based (loosely) on the movie of the same name, Dinotopia gives a back story of twin boys who were shipwrecked on a strange island where humans and dinosaurs coexist peacefully... for the most part. A group of evildoers named the Outsiders are out to wreak havoc on the island of Dinotopia. Worse yet, the twins part ways, one going to side with the Outsiders, and their leader, Zane. The other (whom you control throughout the game) works his way toward becoming the Guardian of Dinotopia.

Your typical 3rd-Person Action/ Adventure game, Dinotopia: The Sunstone Odyssey puts you on the side of peace, and it is your goal to take down the evil within. Along the way you will have to take down Outsiders and scalies (dinosaurs) alike, as well as solve many, many puzzles... if that's what you call them. Unfortunately, the game is very, very linear.

You will be told what needs to be done next in your quest by the characters you interact with, but will more or less be guided the entire way. The puzzles end up usually being solved simply along your path, and don't take much to figure out in the way of brain power. But any way you look at it, the basic premise of Dinotopia is that you need to collect the very powerful Sunstones that have helped protect Dinotopia before time existed, and use them to bring peace to Dinotopia.

What can I say? I'm really not sure what the target audience of Dinotopia is, so it's hard to say just how difficult it is to play. Basically, I flew through the game fairly easily, and without much standing in my way. To a younger player, however, Dinotopia may be the perfect difficulty. It really isn't that hard to defeat enemies once you learn their patterns. But the key is to upgrade your fighting mallets with colored Sunstones, making them much more powerful to use. Also, as you progress, you'll learn different fighting techniques that will help you perform combination attacks.

Dinotopia is very easy to pick up and play. The button layout for fighting actions is near-perfect, however, could use some slight tweaking. For example, it would have been nice to be able to use your throwing weapons with the Z button instead of the D-pad, but that's minor. What I did have a hard time with is the use of the R button. The actions of the button are great... you'll use it to dodge as you fight. However, the sure mechanics of the Nintendo's analog button make this dodging not respond to your presses very well.

Dinotopia: The Sunstone Odyssey is a fairly decent game overall, but don't expect anything epic here. And unlike the movie's extended length, Dinotopia the game won't last very long at all. I would strongly suggest a rental or two, because in reality it took less than 7 hours of actual gameplay to complete Dinotopia .

'Breathe deep. Seek peace.'