I remember how I found Area D—not in a thrift store, not in some forgotten bargain bin, but online. I was deep in one of those FMV rabbit holes, hunting for the weirdest, most obscure relics from the CD-ROM boom. That’s when I unearthed it. A German-made dinosaur adventure game with pre-rendered jungle scenes, questionable acting, and a name so vague it might as well have been a redacted government file. Naturally, I had to play it. Mistakes were made.
Area D is a 1997 German FMV game made by Dosch Design, and calling it a game is generous. It’s more like a digital coaster for Windows 95 users who hate themselves. What it does have is dinosaurs, hammy acting, and the kind of budget that makes you go, “Wait, is this a student film?” Spoiler: no, but it wishes it was.
The Setup: Jurassic Bargain Bin
So here’s the deal: you’re an adventurer sent to the Amazon to rescue a bunch of missing scientists. Because nothing says “rescue op” like one dude in khakis with no backup and the survival skills of a slightly damp rag.
The game plays out like a Myst knockoff that got lost on the way to Blockbuster, then got mugged behind the dumpster. You click through static jungle scenes, interact with objects, and watch blurry FMV clips of dinosaurs attacking—well, flailing in your general direction.
If you’re expecting interactivity, puzzles, or tension—don’t. You’ll finish it in under an hour. And that’s if you stop to laugh, cry, or scream “WHY?” into your monitor.
In some regions, they called it Danger Island, which is like slapping a new label on expired milk and hoping no one notices the smell. Pro tip: they noticed.
Who Made This and Why?
Dosch Design, a German multimedia firm that usually made 3D models and stock assets, decided they were also a game studio. Along with publisher ARI Data CD GmbH, they cobbled together Area D using their in-house Gadget Player engine. Think of it like PowerPoint for FMV games, but if PowerPoint gave you malware.
They also released Mystic House and Titanic: A Mysterious Undersea Adventure—a haunted house snooze-fest and a Titanic game that somehow forgot to include the actual Titanic. If you’re sensing a theme, congratulations—you’re more coherent than any of their narratives.
It was all built by three guys: Jochen Krapf, Ewald Haas, and Ralph Eirich. Just them. No animation studio. No QA team. Just three dudes and a folder of 3D dinosaur renders. One of them probably did the voices, too.
Dev Note: Rumour has it they recycled their commercial asset packs to build the dinosaurs. If true, this might be the only game where the main character fights a product sample from a modelling CD-ROM.
What Actually Happens in this German FMV Game
You wander. You collect things. You watch videos. And sometimes, dinosaurs show up and roar at you like they’re in a sci-fi channel movie that was banned for being too low-effort.
The game wants to be scary. It tries so hard. But it’s mostly just confusing. There’s no real tension, no logic to the puzzles, and half the gameplay is just you clicking and praying something doesn’t crash.
According to MobyGames, it’s an adventure game. According to anyone who’s played it, it’s more of a dare. I’ve played bad games before, but this one felt like it was actively trying to escape its own programming.
One German magazine review said the game was so bad it “wiped out the dinosaurs again.” source. Honestly, I think it wiped out part of my will to live.
The Engine That Barely Could
The Gadget Player engine was a clunky FMV tool that stitched together scenes like a budget movie editor with commitment issues. It worked—technically. Players had to navigate static nodes while video clips loaded between them like a buffering YouTube video from 2003.
The 256-colour graphics looked rough even in 1997. You’d click on a bush, and suddenly—bam!—a CG raptor lunges at you from a 12 fps video clip that looked like it was rendered on a pocket calculator.
Absolute Games gave it a 10/100 and called the writing second-grade level. That feels generous. I’ve read more compelling scripts written using AI.
What’s Left of It Now
You can still find Area D on abandonware sites, and honestly, that’s where it belongs—wedged between a bootleg Mahjong game and a cursed Garfield screensaver. It’s a fossil from an era when everyone thought CD-ROMs were the future—and apparently no one had the heart to say, “Please stop.”
It barely runs on modern systems. Some poor soul tried it on a Steam Deck and said it crashed during a scene change. Oh shucks, that tracks. If your game destroys a modern handheld, you’ve truly left a mark.
Still, there’s something lovable about how wrong this game is. It’s earnest. It tried. You get explosions. Dinosaurs. Jungle maps. FMV sequences that probably took an afternoon to shoot with a camcorder and someone’s cousin in a lab coat.
It’s also a strange little time capsule. Dosch Design never really pursued game development after these experiments. They went back to doing what they did best: selling 3D models to people who didn’t know better. But for a hot minute in the late ’90s, someone at that studio looked around and said, “Let’s make a dinosaur game with our existing assets and the barest thread of a plot.” And you know what? They did. And then they ran.
Why Even Play It?
Because it’s weird. Because you need to see it to believe it. Because if you’re the type of person who reads Dank Zine, you live for this kind of digital trash archaeology.
Area D is a reminder of what happens when enthusiasm outruns skill. When someone says, “Let’s make a game!” without asking, “Should we?” It’s bad, sure—but in a way that makes it historic.
I don’t love it. But I respect it. And if you’re lucky enough to stumble across the German version with that glorious T-Rex cover, you’ll know you’re holding something truly bizarre.
Not rare. Not valuable. Just bizarre. And sometimes, that’s enough. Other times, it’s just enough to make you shut down your PC and question your life choices.
Sources:
Area D – MobyGames
PC Player (DE) – Review scan via Kultboy
Absolute Games Danger Island Review (RU)
Dosch Design company profile
MyAbandonware – Area D