"The Cavalry" Jurassic Park: The Game (Telltale Games) Video game November 2011

An InGen rescue team arrives on the island.

Notes from the Jurassic Park chronology

This story takes place on Isla Nublar immediately after the events of the first Jurassic Park film.

Didja Know?

Jurassic Park: The Game was published by Telltale Games in November 2011. The game is broken up into four distinct episodes (each composed of multiple chapters) that make up a larger story and serves as a kind of sequel to the original Jurassic Park film. I have chosen to write a separate study for each of the four episodes.

This is the study of Episode 2 of Jurassic Park: The Game.

Didja Notice? 

Flyover

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Pteranodons are seen flying over Isla Nublar. This suggests that, like Isla Sorna, the island had an aviary which has been breached.

The helicopter used by Alpha Team appears to be a military Huey, but I can't quite identify which model. Though military-style, the yellow, zigzag strip on the side of the copter suggests it is not one in use by the military. Nima later refers to it as an HJ-121 in Chapter Seven "The Ride", though I've been unable to find references to any such model in the real world. (The crashed helicopter of Bravo Team found in Chapter Two "Bravo Team", appears to be the same.)

The pilot called D-Caf refers to Isla Nublar as Dino Island.

Yoder seems to say that InGen has specified the unit needs to make contact with the Alpha of a group of hyper-intelligent dinosaurs that were genetically engineered on the island. This never really comes up again in the course of the game. Presumably though, he was speaking of the Troodons.

Bravo Team

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The dinos that scatter as Alpha Team's helicopter lands appear to be compys.

As he and Yoder cautiously enter the bloody Visitors Center, Oscar says, "Watch your six..." This is military parlance for "watch your back."

Jungle Hike

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When Dr. Harding asks Nima where she's taking them, she tells him "north" and he responds, "To the coast?" Since they are on an island, any direction would take them to the coast before too long! And since they are leaving the Visitor Center, they should be heading west if they want to get to the closest coastline, according to most acknowledged maps of the island. Going north to get to the coast only makes sense if they are on the novel's version of Isla Nublar.

When Nima decides to rest for a while, she tells Harding, "Sientate." This is Spanish for "sit down."

Nima tells Harding, "We are not simpatico, comprende?" She is saying in partial Spanish, "We are not friendly, understand?"

The walkie-talkie that Nima carries has controls for Frequency and RF Gain. "Frequency" is pretty much what you'd expect, allowing the user to tune the radio to a desired frequency, just like an FM radio (although on lower channels for a walkie-talkie). "RF Gain" allows the user to lower the strength of overpowering signals to prevent distortion or bleeding over nearby signal sources.

After Jess steals Nima's walkie-talkie and tries to call for help, Nima calls her attempt "estupido". This is Spanish for "stupid".

Chopper Down!

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Swinging the chopper north after receiving Jess' distress call, D-Caf shouts, "Hang on to your butts!" This is the same line Arnold (actor Samuel L. Jackson) used in Jurassic Park when he powered off/on the electrical grid to the compound.

The dashboard of the helicopter has on it a small paper drawing of a skull-and-bones, an aerial photograph of an island, and a sticker or postcard labeled "Hawaii".

When Yoder tries to engage the autopilot of the helicopter, we see three switches in the down position in one shot, but a split-second later when the shot changes to another angle, the three switches are in up-down-up positions before he has done anything!

After D-Caf gets knocked out by the Pteranodon attack, Oscar asks Yoder, "Can you land this eggbeater?" "Eggbeater" is slang for "helicopter".

Dilo Fight!

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Yoder accidentally steps on and crushes an egg in a nest on the ground. Almost immediately after, he is attacked by a Dilophosaurus, so it may have been the dilophosaur's nest.

While fighting the Dilophosaurus, it sounds like Yoder drops the f-bomb. Listen: you fucker

We get some insight that Yoder may be more sensitive than he seems when he stops Oscar from killing the injured Dilophosaurus. (However, Yoder turns out to be a Grade A asshole later in the game.)

Under Construction

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Notice that Nima's comments about Isla Nublar throughout the chapters of the game seem to indicate that she was familiar with the island in the past, before InGen bought it to build their park. This becomes relevant when she tells her full story later on in the game.

This chapter reveals that Jurassic Park had a roller coaster called Bone Shaker under construction.

Notice that the height requirement sign, showing how tall one must be to ride the roller coaster, features the cartoon character of Mr. DNA, who appeared in the park's introductory film for guests as seen in Jurassic Park. Mr. DNA is also seen on the Site Safety sign at the geothermal power plant in "The Depths" ("days since the last accident on this site").
 

The Ride

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Notice that, instead of doubling up in any of the coaster cars, Nima, Harding, and Jess each ride in one of the three linked cars. Presumably, they read a sign somewhere suggesting such a seating arrangement; many amusement park rides such as roller coasters recommend a more-or-less even distribution of weight in the cars for safety purposes.

Seeing the Herrerasaurs along the coaster track, Nima exclaims, "Ay dios mio!" This is Spanish for "Oh my God!"

It goes by quickly in the video walkthrough above, but Harding manages to grab a lead pipe along the side of the track when they all see the Herrerasaurs waiting for them farther on.

Dr. Harding identifies the dinosaurs that attacked them on the coaster as Herrerasaurus, from the Triassic Era. This is a real genus of dinosaur. Harding's remark, "Now that we've bred them, we can easily classify them as early theropod," is a reference to the fact that the type of dinosaur is not currently known exactly from the limited fossil remains thus far found; modern paleontologists consider it either an early theropod or just an early saurischian (all theropods are saurischians, but not all saurischians are theropods).

After his disappearance, Oscar and Yoder refer to D-Caf as M.I.A. This, of course, means Missing in Action.

Yoder describes an incident with Oscar in Bogota. Bogota is the capital city of Columbia. 

Sorkin's Lab

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When Jess starts to complain of hunger, Yoder remarks he can probably get her some dino-burgers. This is probably a reference to the bronto-burgers seen and mentioned numerous times in episodes of The Flintstones.

The word tattooed on Oscar's throat appears to be "SUENO", Spanish for "sleep".

Dr. Sorkin remarks to Harding that she told Hammond many times that Jurassic Park should be a nature preserve, not a theme park. Possibly this was Hammond's later inspiration for making Isla Sorna a nature preserve for dinosaurs, as introduced in The Lost World.

Dr. Sorkin reveals that she's found a way to reverse the Lysine Contingency in the dinosaurs so they won't need lysine supplements in their food.

The Parasaur Enclosure

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Chopper Escape!

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Water Treatment

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Three raptors show up at the parasaur pen to menace Harding, Jess, and Sorkin (and in "The Depths" we see there are at least four raptors). But this episode seems to take place basically right after the closing minutes of Jurassic Park, so the raptors should be dead! Muldoon indicated early in the film that the park had started out with 8 raptors, but the big one killed all but two of the others, leaving 3 total. And two were seemingly killed by the T. rex at the end, with one left locked in the kitchen's walk-in freezer (so possibly dead by now as well). So where did these three come from? Well, there was an episode that was ultimately cut from the game in order to attain a "T for Teen" rating instead of "M for Mature". This missing episode would have revealed that five raptors had been brought over from Site B (Isla Sorna, as seen in The Lost World) to replace the five killed by the lead raptor as described by Muldoon in Jurassic Park.

Memorable Dialog