Good old Liliensternus here is just one of the many wonderful and exotic critters waiting to pick your bones clean.
A freeware, stand-alone mod for the 1998 Carnivores series created by Dory Holtzman (creator of Poharex), Triassic expands upon the canon established by the original trilogy and adds an entirely new region to the alien planet of FMM UV-32 with its own unique animals and challenges. If you're a fan of the series or just looking for a hunting simulator with a twist, it's well worth your time.
This game provides examples of:
- Acrofatic: Placerias turns out to be quite a fast runner despite its portly figure.
- Adaptational Badass: The real Gojirasaurus was a most-likely dubious, big-sized but still slender and fast coelophysoid dinosaur. This one is a straight-up Godzilla expy.
- All Deserts Have Cacti: Most maps in the game contain some variation of the cacti from Carnivores 2, though they are not very common. Justified in this being an alien planet and not the actual Triassic period of Earth.
- Anachronism Stew: The game roster contains animals from both the Permian and Triassic periods, as well as Megalosaurus from the Jurassic period. This continues the tradition of Carnivores games where a specific game's setting houses species mainly from two of Earth's geological periods: the first two games focusing on Jurassic and Cretaceous dinosaurs, and Ice Age—on Tertiary and Quaternary fauna. As in the official Carnivores series, this is handwaved in the game being set on a foreign planet rather than prehistoric Earth.
- Beware of Vicious Dog: The Feral Hounds, brought to the Triassic Sector by poachers and then left to their own devices, will not only attack the hunter on sight but also, according to the game's lore, are slowly killing off some of the local species. They have been discontinued in most recent builds of the mod, however.
- Bouncing Battler: Coelophysis, Herrerasaurus and Postosuchus always leap at their prey.
- Build Like an Egyptian: Several pyramids, similar in design to those from the first Carnivores game, can be found in Greenshire.
- Continuity Nod: The eighth map alludes directly to Carnivores 2, taking place in close proximity to Manya Jungle, where apparently something -or someone- breached the border between the settings of the two games. Carnivores Triassic also nods toward other, unrelated game franchises, such as Command & Conquer and Half-Life.
- Early Game Hell: As of Beta 7, played straight with Coelophysis being one of the hardest-to-kill carnivores, and with the top-tier predators being less aggressive due to relying on AI logic routines from Ice Age. According to the developers, this will be rectified in future versions.
- Eldritch Location: Greenshire, the penultimate map. It's a hellish wasteland with a perpetually stormy sky, dark ground, unusual plants and has several craters oozing with deadly radiation.
- Everything Trying to Kill You: Even more so than in the official games. All huntable animals are perfectly capable, and willing, of killing the hunter, and future releases will even have aggressive ambients. There is also more lava and other hazards in Triassic maps than any of the official Carnivores maps.
- Evil Poacher: The poachers left out of Carnivores Ice Age have been introduced into Triassic.
- Excuse Plot: Adhering to the spirit of the original Carnivores games, the plot is the same, only with the additional part of DinoHunt discovering and opening the Triassic Sector to its clients about a decade after opening additional areas for Carnivores 2 and Ice Age.
- Final Boss: The Gojirasaurus, which is unlocked after the player gathers 1000 points.
- Game Mod: Carnivores Triassic was built on the Carnivores Ice Age engine. Fortunately, you don't need the original game to play!
- Green Hill Zone: The map menu claims Greenshire to be a peaceful, lush area reserved exclusively for top clients.
- Hailfire Peaks: Vertigo Range is this to an extent. Being set in closer proximity to the Antarctic than most other areas, it features snowy forested mountains on one half of the map and a more lush desert area on the other.
- Hell Is That Noise: the Megalosaurus' call is considered this. Many beginning players would say the same for Coelophysis.
- And don't get us started on Gojirasaurus...
- Jungle Japes: Subverted. Unlike the first two Carnivores games, Triassic features mostly deserts and other arid biomes. The eighth map is an exception, though it doesn't, technically, take place in the Triassic Sector.
- Killer Rabbit: The Edaphosaurus, which bears strong resemblance to the harmless Dimetrodon from Carnivores 2, will trample the hunter if driven into a corner.
- Lethal Lava Land: The aptly named Hell Island is, quite literally, an island comprising several volcanoes, all within the lava-filled cauldron of a giant supervolcano.
- Lightning Bruiser: Coelophysis is notorious for this.
- MegaCorp/Private Military Contractor: The eighth map provides a deeper glimpse into DinoHunt's military prowess, featuring an abandoned artillery base containing a rather large number of tanks.
- Platform Hell: Hell Island contains a series of rather sparsely-placed rock platforms over a lava chasm. Depending on which section of the island the hunter is dropped on, he may be forced to jump across the chasm on said platforms to reach a game animal. It's very easy to fall off.
- Precursors: Carnivores Triassic expands further on the ancient civilization introduced in the first Carnivores game (and abandoned almost entirely in subsequent titles). Several maps contain ancient monuments, often with a story behind them.
- Raptor Attack: Averted. As the game's roster borrows from the Permian and Triassic periods, no Dromaeosaurids are present in the Triassic Sector. Coelophysis and Herrerasaurus are the closest animals in-game to fill the raptor niche.
- Retcon: In the first Beta versions, Coelophysis had a color scheme closely resembling its counterpart from Walking with Dinosaurs. During development it was considered to change its color scheme to match its equivalent from
Carnivores Cityscape. However, Tatem's decision to release Coelophysis as an additional animal for Carnivores Dinosaur Hunter led the developers of Triassic to recolor their Coelophysis after the Tatem version.- With the ousting of Dinosaur Hunter from the fan canon, Coelophysis will be getting a total remake to fit in better with the original came's Burian-styled dinosaurs.
- Scenery Porn: All of the maps in Carnivores Triassic are highly-acclaimed in the Carnivores modding community. Each map is unique and stands out from the rest, especially when compared to the relatively monotonous maps of Carnivores 2 and Ice Age.
- Shoot the Dog: When a Feral Hound is on your trail, you'll pretty much have to.
- Strong Flesh, Weak Steel: All of the top-tier predators, and Postosuchus in particular, can take quite a bit of punishment before they die.
- Scenery Gorn: Greenshire, as well as the eighth map—and each for different reasons entirely.
- Shifting Sand Land: Panerimos, Tatem Wastes and to an extent, Vertigo Range.
- Standard FPS Guns: Averted. While the official trilogy gave its weapons generic names, all weapons in Triassic are named after specific models such as the Remington SP 10 and the FN-FAL.
- Temple of Doom: The temple in the middle of the volcano in Dory Oasis is essentially a bigger, meaner, green version of the temple from the first Carnivores game. Unlike its predecessor, it's also booby-trapped.
