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After a few ups and downs in the Micro RPG series, this book really surprised me at how satisfied I was both with the amount of content provided and how well it worked. Alongside Micro Sci-Fi RPG this is definitely one of the best books I've seen in the series so far. It adds a lot of systems and those systems work really well. I also really appreciate a specific line in the book I'm going to repeat here: "The method for determining when the boss can appear is slightly different than previous core rulebooks. As such, choose the method you enjoy most. " I love this attitude and it's one of the reasons why I keep digging further into the Micro RPG library because even books I haven't been overly thrilled with still usually manage to have value in the options they provide for play.
Of note, the crafting system in the game is fairly well thought out and provides a good system of sinking resources into getting items that otherwise a player can't get access to when they're stranded on the island. The dinosaur companion rules are interesting and expand on combat. Really fantastic is how each enemy you encounter has special rules unique to it. This is something I thought went really well in Micro Sci-Fi RPG that I felt was missing in other titles. Each dungeon-like area has special rules too which also felt really fantastic. The seaside cave has the tides roll in, you search for clues in ancient ruins to reveal more about the island-- the finale might even include an exploding volcano that you have to outrun the flowing lava as it pours down the mountain ascent. The exit tables not following the idea that rolling low on dice is better for the player in general (outside of rolling for damage) was a bit strange, but was a minor nitpick. I also really liked how the core gameplay was kept to using d6s. One thing I've far preferred in the Micro RPG series is using other size dice as little as possible. (d3 and d2 count as d6s for this particular prefernce)
The only big issue I had with the book I encounted at the very end and comes from the confusing way that filling in the map hexes are explained. From the language used, I was expecting "Dinosaur Valley" to be the final location in the center of the isle and finishing reading the final hard location and not seeing this tables for the Dinosaur Valley location confused me. After a lot of ctrl+F and re-reading, I think the intention is that you only ever place one Hard area, that it goes in the center hex, and that whichever one it is, THAT is Dinosaur Valley in addition to the name it already has. There are seven non-Hard areas which exactly match the number of hexes around the island, though with the way rolling for them is described, I'm not sure they will all fill in unless you tweak the rules a bit. It's a bit overly confusing and I feel like it's the sort of thing an editor or playtester would catch.
Otherwise the same minor nitpicks I've had with the series mostly apply here as well. There's mispellings or wrong words used occasionally, and there can be issues with using the same terminology throughout the book to refer to the same thing and issues with the language being unclear if certain things happen regardless of if you pass or fail or if only on a fail, because it's included in a new sentence after previous instructions. Still these don't severely impact this book and if what you're looking for is more mechanics and ideas to expand your options then this is a fantastic choice. Even if the specific genre of surviving on a dinosaur-filled island isn't your specific cup of tea this is a very beefy book with not only a whole lot of material, but a lot of GOOD material and if you're like me and don't mind rolling up your sleeves for a bit of DIY in your solo gaming I think book is a stellar example of the reason I've fallen in love with the Micro RPG system.
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