Primal Carnage is an asymmetrical online first-person shooter developed by Lukewarm Media. The game pits a team of mercenaries against a variety of dinosaurs, with players able to join either side of the fight.
Primal Carnage was released October 30th 2012, and was followed by a sequel- Primal Carnage: Extinction in 2015.
Story[]
Dispatched to reclaim a remote island from a dinosaur outbreak, a team of battle-hardened mercenaries fight to take control of its abandoned facilities and secure classified objectives. They must try to contain the threat and make it out with their lives intact.
Phoenix International is the shadowy comapny responsible for resurrecting the dinosaurs, and they are the reason the cleanup crew is on its way. They own the island chain where the game series takes place- a tropical locale sheltered from the rest of the world, where genetic reasearch was conducted in utmost secrecy.
Gameplay[]
The core design of Primal Carnage revolves around asymmetrical battles, with bullets and knives against claws and teeth. Each side has various abilities or tools at their disposal, but victory often depends on teamwork. You may be able to survive on your own out in the jungle, but it won't be for long.
Humans[]
The mercenaries are limited to their first-person perspective, relying on their weaponry and allies to survive against the dinosaur threat. All human team members have both primary and secondary weapons to use, alongside a tertiary item such as grenades or the cattle prod.
In addition to their main weaponry, each member of the human faction has their own unique quick melee attack they can use in close quarters combat, ranging from knife slashes as Trapper to a hefty punch as Pyro. Though this amounts to little more than a light pistolwhip in practice, they can sometimes be useful.
Dinosaurs[]
Conversely, the dinosaurs play from a third-person perspective and are much more aware of their surroundings. They are naturally melee-focused to the extreme, needing to fight up-close unlike the humans who can attack at range with confidence.
Each dinosaur class hunts differently, some by sheer size and strength and others by relentless speed. Stalking through the jungles, fields, and skies to hunt their mercenary prey. Five unique species make up the dinosaur team, each one wielding a deadly set of skills and strengths to outsmart and overcome the human Mercenaries. Teamwork is vital as a dinosaur, as the classes have synergy, but they can do just fine when separated from the pack.
Game Modes[]
Although many more were planned or considered during early development, there are only two game modes available in the original Primal Carnage:
There are five playable maps for Team Deathmatch mode:
•Utility Base • Airbase •Docks • Forest Chasm •The Falls • Snowbound •
Four additional maps were added with Get to the Chopper mode:
• Docks GTTC • The Falls GTTC • Ruthless • Downpour •
A third game mode, Capture the Egg, was released in beta form on a single map (Forgotten Outpost).
In this mode, humans must steal a single dinosaur egg and return it to their base on the other side of the level, similar to classic Capture the Flag gametype in other First Person Shooters. Unfortunately, this game mode was never finished for Primal Carnage, but a different version of it appears in Primal Carnage: Extinction.
Classes[]
Players can take control of 5 different classes for mercenaries and dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs[]
- Tyrannosaurus (T-Rex) — The largest of the dinosaurs, and arguably the most powerful. It's attacks are a One-Hit-Kill. Best to avoid this one.
- Novaraptor (Raptor) — This crafty devil will surprise you and your group as it slowly picks you off one by one until you're all that's left. Then that's when the fun begins.
- Dilophosaurus — The ambush class. This dinosaur hacks up venom to blind it's enemies. A bite from this nasty will leave you taking damage the more you move.
- Pteranodon — The scout of the Archosaurs. While not technically a dinosaur, it still has a place on the team of showing the position of the humans to it's more toothy-teammates.
- Carnotaurus — The Charger. This carnivore rams through humans like a truck through a wooden fence. It is used to break up the group and send people flying away.
- Spinosaurus — The longest of the dinosaurs. Like T-rex, it can kill players by running them over or eating them. However, it can also use its arms to attack.
Cancelled playable dinosaurs:
- Compsognathus
- Therizinosaurus
- Megalosaurus
Mercenaries[]
- Commando - Carries an assault rifle armed with a grenade launcher.
- Scientist - Uses tranquilizer darts and a sniper rifle.
- Pathfinder - Wields flares that blind the dinosaurs, and a powerful shotgun.
- Trapper - Dual wields pistols and is able to trap dinosaurs in a net. A melee on most netted dinosaurs is an instant kill.
- Pyromaniac - Only a maniac would carry the weapon this man does, wielding the "Flame-Saw" he faces off against the dinosaurs with a chainsaw-flamethrower hybrid, chucking grenades into the shadows as he faces off against them.
Development[]
Primal Carnage - GDC 2010 Tech Demo
Above: a "vision demo" from before the engine switch.
Primal Carnage was originally being made on the Unigine framework, with additional engine features such as the EkiONE AI solution.
A brief tech demo was made early on to show off some of the game's proposed NPCs. Video of the demo was first shown during GDC 2010. It started with a Pterandon's eye view of the world, before following a group of Stegosaurus through a lush grassy meadow to a lake where a herd of Parasaurolophus drinks. A pair of massive Brachiosaurus also wander through the valley.
This piece served as an early benchmark when the game was initially planned to have much more open levels. However, after being in development for some time, Lukewarm Media decided to move Primal Carnage to the Unreal Development Kit due to it being much easier to work with.
Original logo used close to launch in 2012
When the game was still going to use Unigine, it was going to have support for 64-bit systems and Linux, however with switch to UDK meant that this was no longer possible. As the game progressed, its scope narrowed to a more focused shooter experience with tighter levels for players to fight inside of.
The first footage of Primal Carnage powered by Unreal Engine 3 was released in 2011 with a cinematic trailer showing T-Rex versus Spinosaurus, similar to the battle in Jurassic Park 3. However this time, the Tyrannosaurus was the victor in the struggle.
Short animation demos were released on the IndieDB website as the game was under development, these provided the first look at the characters on the human team. Some of the character names have changed over the course of development, however some sources still refer to characters by their old names, which may lead to confusion. The following characters are the ones that have changed: the Heavy is now the Commando, the Native is now the Pathfinder, and the Firestarter is now the Pyromaniac.
The game was originally intended to feature Compsognathus as a playable Dinosaur class. The player would have controlled a horde of the small dinosaurs at once. However, this idea was eventually abandoned, with the Charger class Carnotaurus replacing the Horde class shortly before release. A video which showcased DirectX 11 features such as tessellation was demonstrated before the game was released, but the game does not support DirectX 11.
Downloadable Content[]
The game was supported with both paid and free DLC for about a year after launch. Several paid skin pack DLCs were released, some of which changed the dinosaurs to look like other species (Tapejara, Cryolophosaurus). Perhaps the biggest update for Primal Carnage was the release of Get to the Chopper mode post-launch. This new mode also introduced the GTTC-exclusive Spinosaurus class. A number of other different expansion ideas were put forth while the game was still being actively worked on. These incuded Non-Playable Characters to populate the map, Triceratops as a new playable dinosaur. Compsognathus as a playable horde class, and a dog for the Pathfinder to help assist him in finding dinosaurs hiding in the undergrowth. However, these ideas would not be fleshed out beyond a few concepts and models. Lukewarm Media switched to working on another project (Primal Carnage Genesis), whose unsuccessful development ultimately led to the original team disbanding.