Welcome to Jurassic World and welcome to my park my way!
- Developer: Frontier games
- Publisher: Frontier games
- Genre: Economic Simulation/Park builder
- Release Date: 12th June 2018
- Platforms: Xbox One, PS4, PC
- Reviewed on: PC & Xbox One X
- Game Supplied by: Frontier Games/ Little Big PR
Frontier games are at it again, pulling at our heart’s deepest desires and allowing us freedom to play and build the world’s only we can imagine, only this time it’s different, there are only dinosaurs involved!
Yes that’s right not just a park builder or economic simulation as it’s slated but a platform to build our own park and modify dinosaur DNA to create your own breed of prehistoric animals and wow our endearing guests with mutated genes of our own creation resistance to disease aggression defensive strength to name but a few of the gene modifications and that’s without changing the dinosaurs skin colour, there’s even the odd amazing option to build the future of dinosaurs including the film famous indo breeds.
I cant deny Im a long time fan of Jurassic Park since seeing it at the cinema upon release and have followed it thereafter and even my 8 year old is fascinated by the films. And it’s that fascination that drives the game.
From the off it’s quite simple, follow the instructions whilst being mindful of the finances and complete the challenges and missions to aid unlocks and bonus rewards to boost your funding and research.
Jurassic World Evolution is very true to its title, you start with only 1 dinosaur genome and it’s not even at 100% purity you must send out dig teams to unearth dinosaur fossils containing different strengths of DNA and gradually increase the purity of your dinosaur DNA strands.
In doing this you also increase the chance of the dinosaur actually hatching rather than dying as a egg/embryo due to being too weak.
Simple as this part is and as simple as the game starts out it gradually evolves into a more complex task of running the park as well.
Build your compounds, raise or lower terrain, add plants and trees supplemented by water and large enough patches of land to ensure your new creations are happy in their enclosures but don’t forget if there not happy in their enclosure there more likely to break out so it’s as important to pay attention to their surroundings as it is to creating viable DNA genomes.
This will all be a large part of your game and on the first of the 5 islands you explore and learn on the game again evolves, your park rangers and helicopter teams will be under increasing pressure to maintain the park, be that dinosaur breakouts, medicating them, resupplying feeders or storm damage repair but it doesn’t end there, challenges set by the 3 management divisions (Science, Entertainment and Security) will all request tasks are completed some requiring you to pilot the ranger vehicles to complete photo shoots, some to medicate and heal sick dinosaurs right through to the more obvious improve your profits and ratings.
So there is plenty to keep you busy and when it all happens at once due to your poor planning or even experimental planning as I found then it can really keep you on your toes.
However if you have things running smooth and laid out well, following challenges and developing your park then actually you’ll be screaming out for a game speed button, something I feel is definitely missing.
Apart from that there is obvious room for improvement, as previously mentioned you can cross breed dinosaurs but not to your own liking, ie a raptor and triceratops, perhaps as we found shortly after release more dinosaurs will be added and that’s the reason but also lacking aquatic dinosaurs and an aviary there are definitely going to be areas that either DLC or future games will be able to develop into.
Visually as you can see from my screenshots the game is beautiful and having played it on both my Xbox One X and my PC running maxed out settings visually there is little to differentiate them, the PC loaded much faster and was easily more responsive but at nearly 4 times the cost of the Xbox One X there is little to be surprised about.
I would happily recommend either platform but generally id say stick to what your comfortable playing simulation games on the most as you’ll find it more familiar.
Sounds can be extremely boring in games like this but with all the dinosaurs and im not going to say authentic there for obvious reasons however I can say that about actors, the likes of Ian Malcolm is back and adds a greater feel of authenticity to the game having additional quotes and segments from the films stars is a brilliant touch.
Buildings are very bland though both visually and with their customisation, every park looked pretty much the same just laid out differently, I would have liked to see more planet coaster style options for customisation entrances and looks of the sections of the park like dining and operations vs animal pens and power grids but it doesn’t break the game without it just limits my options to personalise the experience that bit further and have greater enjoyment and pride in my parks
SUMMARY
Overall this will satisfy the average gamer but i felt it wasn’t challenging enough for the more experienced sim player and more of a game that would just appeal to fans wanting to create their own park. A few annoying issues with no initial sandbox but i am actually in favour of this as it encourages you to learn and play the game and then go apply those skills.
What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments!