Dino fighting!

You may not be keen on Ubisoft's Combat of Giants franchise, the three DSiWare incarnations of which – Mutant Insects - Revenge, Dinosaurs - Fight for Survival and Dragons - Bronze Edition – each scored a 5/10 in our reviews, but hopefully things will improve with Ubisoft's next entry in the series, the 3DS title Combat of Giants: Dinosaurs 3D.

The game is targeted toward seven to ten year olds and allows players to roam "breathtaking" environments and customise, control and battle giant dinosaurs in real-time combat sessions. It's actually got a pretty epic storyline as well, especially for a game about big angry reptiles; from the press release:

Over 150 million years ago, the dinosaurs shared the ancient land with wisdom. Four great dinosaur chiefs protected the land against the fury of Arkosaurus, the malevolent and most ferocious dinosaur.

One day, incredible cataclysms did befall on the land, wiping out the four great chiefs. The evil Arkosaurus seized this opportunity to rally tribes of malicious henchmen to protect all vital resources, pushing the ancient land on the brink of extinction.

Go Albertosaurus!

His anger is impossible to control by one single dinosaur. The only way to stop the catastrophe is to raise four champions among the dinosaurs’ species and embrace the values of the former chiefs. Only then you will be able to join forces and fight Arkosaurus to free vital resources, restore peace and avoid extinction.

The game will feature over 500 collectible items that strengthen your dinosaur, teach you cool facts and that you can trade between your friends (including a passive trading feature that sounds like it uses StreetPass), an array of combat features, four different fighting styles and 46 different creatures with which to play.

You can read the press release below for more detail.

After the great success of the previous Combat of Giants™ titles, Dinosaurs 3D pushes the thrill to bigger heights by immersing the player in an immersive 3D cataclysmic Jurassic world!
Players will discover new exclusive combat features and impressive environments. They will enjoy roaming breathtaking environments and have a great time customising, controlling, and battling giant dinosaurs!
Show your mastery in defeating your enemies during real-time combat sessions and unite forces to restore peace on the ancient land.

EXPLORATION – IMMERSE IN THE CATACLYSMIC JURASSIC WORLD

  • Roam the Jurassic world in full 3D and feel the depth of the breathtaking landscapes
  • Get special rewards by interacting with other living creatures and by crushing trees and rocks
  • Collect bones to unlock new special characters
  • Collect items to strengthen your dinosaur and learn cool facts
  • Strong storytelling supported by 3D scenes between exploration and combat.

COMBAT - REAL TIME ATTACKS / DEFENSES AT THEIR BEST

  • 6 real-time actions: Fencing, blocking, evading, hitting, pushing, and combo;
  • New “Ring Out” tactical combat feature to push your opponent out of the ring;
  • New combat system based on attack / counterattack actions where you have to learn your opponents’ fight patterns to defeat them;
  • New Dinosaur Strike super attack active reward (execute successful moves through the fights to obtain a super attack option then decide when to launch it);
  • New Personalised fighting style for each family*;
  • Cataclysms impacting gameplay by altering the combat arenas;
  • Defeat all enemies in 5 consecutive maps with a same dinosaur to reach the Champion status. Once you have raised 4 champions, you can confront the evil Arkosaurus.
  • Each family (4) has its unique fighting skills with different attack strategies, fencing abilities, and favourite defensive moves. Each family also has a different speed, different power, quantity of health and ability to ring out opponents or to resist a ring out.

CONTROL UNIQUE DINOSAURS

Choose your favourite Dinosaur among 18 breeds (such as T-Rex, Stegosaurus, Velociraptor, Triceratops, Ankylosaurus, and Baryonyx) grouped into 4 families:

  • The Predators: Their physical power allows them to push their enemies to their doom;
  • The Horned: Stubborn fighters that stand their ground against all assaults;
  • The Tanks & Stegosaurus: Their spiked and armoured hide protect them against injuries;
  • The Small Smarts: Lightning fast fighters that rend their enemies before they even know what’s going on.

Customise your Dinosaur with 30 colour options and 6 different stripe patterns

Use special marketing unlock codes to:

  • Unlock 28 additional creatures to reach a total of 46 different creatures to play with!
  • Unlock 2 additional stripe patterns for a total of 8 patterns.

Player can change the look of 3 different body attributes after fighting (3 levels of per attribute).

Collect series of bones and then unlock 4 new playable skeleton characters (one per family)!

All dinosaurs can reach the Champion status but only 4 will then be selected to fight the evil Arkosaurus at the end.

This provides a good replayability since all 18 dinosaurs can be customised and raised to the Champion status and all 4 families have a different fighting style for a different experience each time.

NEW THEMES / NEW ENVIRONMENTS

Discover the world of Dinosaurs with 3 different themes

  • Jungle (tropical forest)
  • Desert
  • Volcano mountain

Dive into a cataclysmic Jurassic world and face 3 different disasters:

  • Earthquakes (land collapsing where you can blast your opponent out of the ring)
  • Volcano eruptions (lava rising around the combat arena)
  • Meteor rain

The cataclysm intensifies after time and really impacts gameplay.

NEW FEATURES! COLLECT AND TRADE ITEMS

Collect and trade over 500 items to build an impressive collection for a gameplay advantage:

  • Collect bones to unlock 3D skeletons in your museum and also unlock 4 new creepy playable characters;
  • Collect combat items to strengthen your dinosaur and unlock 24 cool facts about dinosaurs (to access into your personal museum)
  • Trade in multiplayer mode to obtain the rarest items (4 levels of rarity):
    o Identify the items you are willing to trade;
    o Active trading: Trade items live with your friends;
    o Passive trading: Continue trading items by carrying your game everywhere using the Chance Encounter feature.
  • Strong game immersion with great 3D graphics
  • Feel the depth of breathtaking 3D environments;
  • Awesome graphics with more visual effects;
  • Live cataclysms with a direct impact on the combat arenas.
  • Appealing new combat system
  • Learn your opponents’ fight patterns to adapt your attack and defeat them;
  • Personalised fighting style for all 4 dinosaur families;
  • New active reward allowing you to chose when to launch your Dinosaur Strike super attack;
  • New “Ring Out” tactic to push your opponent out of the ring.
  • New viral Collect and Trade system:
  • Thousands of items to collect with 4 levels of rarity;
  • Active and passive trading systems for a different game experience each time.
  • Improved replay-ability
  • Continuous item trading for a different gameplay impact each time;
  • 18 dinosaurs to raise to the Champion status, then 4 to confront the evil boss;
  • 4 different fighting styles to try.
  • Engaging ultimate objective and storytelling
  • Raise a minimum 4 dinosaurs to the Champion status to backfill the great chiefs and confront the fierce evil dinosaur threatening survival of the dinosaurs’ species;
  • Engage in the game with 3D scenes added at key moments between exploration and fights to support the storytelling.