Dino Crisis needs a remake, and here’s how Capcom can make it roar

Fresh off the success of Resident Evil, Capcom wasn’t content to rest on its laurels. Just a year after Resident Evil 2 hit shelves, Shinji Mikami and his team delivered a different breed of survival horror, trading zombies for dinosaurs in 1999’s Dino Crisis.

If you’ve never heard of it, don’t feel too bad. It never quite reached the sales heights of Resident Evil’s nearly 170 million units sold. Still, with over 4.5 million units sold across its three titles, Capcom itself declared Dino Crisis an “enormous hit”, and it has developed a pretty substantial cult following, who are all hoping for a modern update to the franchise.

And there’s certainly potential for it.

The game follows protagonist Regina, a red-haired tactical queen sent to the remote Ibis Island, where science has, you’ll be stunned to learn, gone way too far. Dinosaurs are loose, everyone’s dead, and you’re stuck playing hide-and-seek with a T-Rex that keeps smashing through walls like it’s the Kool-Aid bloke. Ammo’s scarce, doors are locked with enough security to make MI6 blush, and if that’s not mad enough, there’s also some time travel thrown in for good measure.

It’s classic Capcom B-movie chaos.

And if you’re a fan of keycards, you’re in for a treat. The game had you constantly running between security doors, terminals, and panel slots, often in the most inconvenient order possible. It was part of that classic “survival horror puzzle box” design, but red keycards in particular became a bit of a running joke in the fandom because they always seemed to gate the most critical progression moments.

Bizarrely, the sequels didn’t live up to the original, given the vastly different directions Capcom chose to take with them. Dino Crisis 2 took on more of an arcade shooter route, throwing aside the survival horror and all of the tension along with it. And despite 2’s cliffhanger ending, Dino Crisis 3 just decided to forget all of that and set it in the future. In space. And exclusively on Xbox. It’s fair to say, it didn’t go down well.

Since then, the series has been on hiatus for over twenty years, with only recent re-releases of original titles on GOG and the PlayStation store (and PS Plus Premium for those who have it).

Surely then, now in this age of remasters, remakes, and reboots, it’s the perfect time for a new Dino Crisis.

A new Crisis

Beyond the expected graphical overhaul and rendition to modern standards, turning raptors from polygonal pests into genuinely frightening predators, how can Capcom take the best lessons from recent games to really do a Dino Crisis remake justice?

First, it’s worth noting what made the original unique: survival horror with a sci-fi twist, the faster, more aggressive enemies than zombies; puzzles and backtracking through a high-tech facility, and the overarching sense of creeping paranoia about when a raptor would pounce. This is what Dino Crisis was at its core, for better or worse. And there’s a solid enough foundation here to be built upon into something to revive the franchise without losing its identity.

Thinking bigger

Just like the Resident Evil remakes, once again, the fixed camera needs to go. Swapped out for an over-the-shoulder viewpoint, it can make for a much more immersive experience with Regina. Keep movement smooth but not too quick, and make the gunplay weighty but deliberate. You’ll be up against fast and relentless predators here, so every shot is going to have to count. A remake could also make use of limb hit boxes from Dead Space, targeting legs to slow the dinos for some vital borrowed time to make an escape.

As for the tranquiliser system, that could get a 2.0 overhaul as well. They were handy — arguably too handy — in the original. A remake could rebalance them with a few smart tweaks: delayed effects unless you nail a headshot, tolerance buildup for reused areas, and even craftable sedative traps or grenades.

With the need for backtracking in the game being inevitable, and the temporary nature of the shots, dinos could also build up a tolerance to it, making returns to certain areas riskier and adding an extra element for players to think about as they navigate the facility on Ibis Island. This mechanic could be built on further and bring in inventory and management into play as well, depending on enemy types. Players could tweak dosage levels for different-sized enemies, or even craft sedative traps or stun grenades for large groups.

And why not take the environment into account? The original had laser grids that could be switched on and off to give players a bit of safety, but there’s an opportunity here to get creative. These grids and security doors could be used for offence, while a fire suppression system could be triggered for a swift escape when things get dicey. These environmental options could come in handy and help balance the game without the need to pepper the player with resources and get them to think pragmatically when playing.

Throw in some audio cues (claws on metal, a distant hiss) for the oncoming threat to instil that same dread as hearing Mr. X’s footsteps, and make things even more palm-sweating by letting Regina’s wrist communicator act like Isaac’s rig — your menu, comms, map, and health display. Check your inventory or read logs in real time while a raptor’s maybe two feet away. That’ll do wonders for the heart rate.

Clever girl(s)

The thing about dinosaurs is that they’re more intelligent than your average zombie by a fair wedge. While the latter will shamble willingly into your line of fire, the former are much less likely to do so. Raptors in particular are very clever. They’ll hunt in packs and herd their prey into a killing box. Who wouldn’t want to pit their wits against something like that?

With a stalker like system here at play, not too dissimilar from Resident Evil 2’s Tyrant, a chance encounter with one raptor could lead to a cascading series of deadlier encounters should the player fail to deal with it. If it has friends, they could form a pack and stalk you around the environment. They might flank, or make a pincer move, and the player will need to respond either with stealth, distraction, or by laying a trap. And if the player lingers too long in an area, or is injured or bleeding? Well, that just means they can pick up your scent and pinpoint your location, forcing the need to deal with that issue before they come in force.

The big lad

But what about the T-Rex? The easiest and least imaginative way to deal with big Rex would be the bane of a bygone gaming era: quick time events. A well-timed button press or flurry of button mashes here or there just to remind us that he’s about. But seeing as we’re talking about a wishlist of sorts here, we want the best.

Resident Evil 3 had a lovely idea with its use of the Nemesis, but sadly didn’t quite make the most of it. Boss fights with an evolving monster that grows more dangerous each time, culminating in a final, all-or-nothing showdown. It was just a bit too scripted.

With Rex, it could be so much better. With a first encounter steeped in helplessness, as you do whatever you can to survive, possibly even affecting future encounters, depending on your means of escape. In the mid-game, it may pop up a few times and you can choose to engage or evade, utilising traps, distractions, or a bit of musical statues — after all, its vision is based on movement. And in the final encounter, with no means of escape but the entire arsenal of weapons, traps, and tricks you’ve picked up along the way, you can finally bring the fight to Rex (without a ginormous rail gun with a ludicrously designed battery system). 

With so much for players to think about in this potential masterpiece, it raises the question: how does a player not get overwhelmed? Capcom has already answered this problem with its adaptive difficulty. While never officially confirmed by them, it’s been pointed out by many in the past. Simply put, if you’re doing too well, ammo gets scarce and enemies become more adept at killing you. There’s no better fit than in a game like this, as it would fit the narrative of the dinos ‘learning’ how to best the player.

Location and puzzles

If Resident Evil 2 had the RPD and Dead Space had the Ishimura, then Dino Crisis needs its own unforgettable hellhole. A modern remake should lean into a semi-open structure with interconnected facility wings, sealed-off labs, and dense jungle outposts.

These zones shouldn’t just be visually distinct, they should feel alive (and not just because something with claws is lurking in the dark). Give us dynamic weather, day-night cycles tied to story beats, and secrets hidden behind locked-down sectors or environmental hazards. Ibis Island needs to feel real enough so that the original’s infamous backtracking feels a lot less tedious and a lot more like tactical retreating.

The puzzles could do with a rethink too — bin off those red keycards for a start. Make puzzles part of the environment and not just speed bumps between gunfights. We’re not asking for full Sudoku with a T-Rex breathing down our necks, but let’s evolve things beyond fetch quests for colour-coded keycards. Integrate logic puzzles into the world: rerouting power through sparking junction boxes, decrypting corrupted DNA logs, or overriding security systems that were designed to keep things in, not us out. Making them fit in the game’s context just gives it that little bit more authenticity. And a little bit can go a long way.

Optional puzzles could offer juicy rewards: better weapons, secret lore drops, maybe even alternate escape routes. And speaking of juice, lighting and sound should be storytelling tools in their own right. Picture this: a flickering lab light strobing over a raptor’s silhouette, a burst of static from the PA, then silence. Or worse — a distant hiss through the vents. Done right, the facility becomes a character in its own right. One that’s cold, hostile, and definitely not built with human survival in mind.

Narrative and worldbuilding

Let’s not forget that there’s more to Dino Crisis than dinosaurs. It was about the hubris of science, even if it was about as thin and convincing as Trump’s hairline. A remake has the perfect chance to dive headfirst into that lore and blow the world wide open, and perform some major surgery to turn it into something much more compelling.

It could lean into the absurdity and go full conspiracy thriller. Expand on the Third Energy project, tease out the implications of time displacement, and maybe suggest that dinosaurs weren’t the only things dragged into our timeline. All of it doesn’t have to be spoon-fed exposition either, there’s plenty of scope for environmental storytelling through scattered survivor logs, garbled intercom broadcasts, and audio tapes buried in forgotten labs. Players could piece together a disturbing tapestry of scientific ambition gone nuclear in a much more immersive and rewarding manner.

But great worldbuilding means nothing if we don’t care who’s stuck in it. So let’s flesh out Regina beyond her red hair and sardonic quips. Give her some history, vulnerability, maybe even regrets about past missions to go along with that sass. Let her teammates be more than just dino-fodder: build in tension, camaraderie, even betrayal. Flashbacks, personal logs, or live radio chatter could be used to humanise the team before tearing them apart. If you’re going to feed them to raptors, at least make us feel something first. Resident Evil 2’s Marvin was a great example of that done well.

Not only that, but put a bit more time, effort and money into the writing and voice actors. There’s no kidding anyone that there was plenty of room for improvement in the original.

These are just a few ways in which the original could be made relevant in the modern age of gaming. Of course, we’re barely scratching the surface here, but enough to make a case for the remake to be a worthwhile endeavour for Capcom. Who knows, they might well be already underway with such a thing, deep in a secret location of their own, tinkering away with things they shouldn’t, just like John Hammond.

Sadly, I wouldn’t get your hopes up.

It’s all Monster Hunter’s fault

As things stand, a remake of the cult classic may be little more than a pipe dream, even as some fans may well be clinging to a false sense of hope of Regina’s return after Capcom recently filed a renewal of the Dino Crisis trademark. They’ve done this before, renewing the trademark in 2019 as they did this spring. Nothing came of it then, and that’s likely the same case now.

To further pour cold water over said hopes, Mikami has expected the IP to remain untouched for so long and expects it to remain gathering dust for the foreseeable future, too. He’s been on record to Eurogamer saying that he was “very surprised” to hear that fans wanted more Dino Crisis, and said that there wasn’t really any need for it in the current gaming landscape. “The stuff you can do with dinosaurs – that’s been kind of really nailed down by Monster Hunter in recent years… even if I were to decide to make a remake or a new version… I don’t feel there’s a whole lot of space for that kind of game right now.”

Although Mikami doesn’t seem very interested in bringing it back, he might be surprised to learn that it may well survive such a saturated market. We have Call of Duty alongside Battlefield; Fortnite alongside Warzone, PUBG, Apex Legends; Marvel Rivals alongside Overwatch — there are plenty of gamers to go around.

If anything, there’s plenty of room for another dinosaur game to break up Monster Hunter’s monopoly, but perhaps because it belongs to Capcom, they likely see no need to bring Dino Crisis back from extinction.

Though who knows, to paraphrase Jeff Goldblum, maybe life will find a way.