If the Jurassic Park films have taught me anything, it’s that managing a dinosaur theme park isn’t simple. Maintaining employee satisfaction, turning a profit, and attending to the demands of your visitors—whether that means having enough restrooms or simply avoiding being eaten by a velociraptor—require a constant balancing act. Once more, Jurassic World Evolution 3 places you in the position of park manager, allowing you to do what the world’s John Hammonds and Simon Masranis were unable to do: operate a successful, profitable theme park with eye-catching dinosaur attractions and few terrible deaths. You now have more control over your park than ever before thanks to Evolution 3’s sophisticated suite of management and customization features.
The outcome is a highly captivating management simulation that is the pinnacle of an already fulfilling series. Jurassic World Evolution 3 has a lot in common with other theme park simulations, much like the prior two. You are in charge of installing pathways and electrical systems, constructing client-friendly amenities, and designing experiences that draw more visitors to your gates. However, the dinosaurs are the main attraction instead of roller coasters and haunted homes. Almost any species will attract customers, but the secret to long-term success is variety, and fortunately, there are many different kinds of dinosaurs to pick from. Seeing these mythical animals come to life is always a little exciting.
Naturally, there is very little possibility that Mickey and the princesses will break out of their cages and attack park visitors when you visit Disneyland. That makes Evolution 3 even riskier, and park management will need to keep up a high safety rating to keep making money. Imagine it as a calm, comfortable management simulation interspersed with scary and panicky times. Meeting your dinosaurs’ demands for food, habitat, and cohabitation will be necessary to keep them happy. While some can survive in cramped spaces with little pasture to graze, others require space to wander or prefer to live in packs. Herbivores need foliage, fruit, and nuts, whereas carnivores need either live prey or fresh flesh.
Because fencing in a pteranodon is about as helpful as hiding from a T-Rex in a bathroom stall, flying and swimming dinosaurs require unique enclosures. Researching dig sites, sending expeditions there, extracting DNA, and then figuring out the ideal location to incubate your newly discovered species is a wonderfully fulfilling cycle.
The campaign does a fantastic job of guiding you through the more intricate mechanics, even though it may seem like a lot to handle. Cabot Finch, the head of public relations, who you may recall from the earlier Jurassic World Evolution games, is back to serve as your guide as you tour parks that are now under construction worldwide and bring them back to their former glory.
The campaign, which pays homage to the original Jurassic Park, starts in the Montana badlands and eventually transports you to Las Vegas, Hawaii, and various locations across Europe and Asia, giving a great deal of variation to the local landscape. A group of scientists and dinosaur specialists accompany Finch, but the true star is Jeff Goldblum’s Ian Malcolm, who occasionally appears to remind everyone that attempting to manipulate nature will always end badly.
Imagine it as a comfortable management simulation with scary interludes.
The campaign mode is a good way to get acquainted with Evolution 3’s new features, even if you’ve already played the series. The adoption of in-park breeding is the most significant addition. In the past, the amount of dinosaur DNA that could be synthesized depended on how much was taken from fossils discovered during expeditions. You can now create a comfortable nesting space and watch for them to become active after you’ve created compatible men and females of the same species. This feature gives the well-established Jurassic World Evolution formula a few intriguing new twists.
The best course of action is to wait and see whether nature works itself out, or you can collaborate with your scientists to develop a breeding strategy. Who would have thought that matching up with a group of ancient animals would be so much fun? Juveniles may have distinct needs from their parents after the following generation hatches. For instance, infant raptors and T-rexes require stocks of prepared meat in their enclosures, although adult carnivores prefer to hunt their own food. On treetops, the tallest dinosaurs can reach the foliage, but their progeny will require food that is closer to the ground. Unchecked breeding can result in overcrowded pens, which can cause breakouts and general anxiety in your visitors.
Managing these dinosaur family units will also require you to win over the conservation, security, and entertainment factions—an additional new element. By fulfilling specific contracts—basically, lucrative side jobs—and raising the caliber of your parks, you can build your reputation. Although they don’t necessarily share the same goals, building good relations with all three factions becomes crucial in the story’s final chapters. A further balancing act that deepens the gameplay is to appease them.
This time, you have more leeway to discover your own management style, although the campaign in Jurassic World Evolution 2 seemed more like a lengthy tutorial. Extinction Now! is an activist group that frequently sabotages your parks and hacks into your communications. Its goals form the core of the story. You will also need to stop the histrionics of Extinction Now! as you travel the world. The first several parks are quite highly guided, but as soon as the map opens up and you venture outside, you have a great deal of freedom to accomplish your goals anyway you see fit.
Another delicate balancing act that gives dimension is appeasing the new groups.
The ability to develop something completely from scratch, which is possible in sandbox mode, is one of the enjoyable aspects of the management simulation genre. The Jurassic World Evolution games have always included this mode, and Evolution 3 provides considerably more personalization choices. You can begin by selecting any of the campaign’s locations, creating an island with a distinct topology, or using the square maps to create a perfectly level, obstacle-free area of land.
Almost everything in the sandbox is under your control, including your initial investment, certain dinosaur habits, and more. Depending on your mood, you may either make it more difficult for yourself by working on a shoestring budget or you can opt for unlimited funding to eliminate all financial constraints and build the dinosaur theme park of your dreams. Sandbox mode is largely an unguided adventure, though you can take on contracts to earn extra money. When you’re making sure your tracks are precisely lined up or organizing a memorable park trip with the best chance of seeing dinosaurs, it’s easy to lose sight of time.
Additionally, the sandbox is peaceful and serene, in contrast to the campaign, where Cabot, Malcolm, and the rest of the characters are always chatting at you. Until the indoraptors are free, anyway. Out of the three, situations, the third gameplay mode, was my least favorite. These timed challenges have set goals and limitations and can last anything from 12 minutes to many hours.
In one, you may be prohibited from altering the current dinosaur pens, regardless of the health of the animals within; in another, you may be required to manually take control of one of your ranger teams and snap pictures of wild dinosaurs. This time-trial approach to park management didn’t appeal to me; it wasn’t in line with the zen-like sensation I’m seeking in a simulation, and the goals weren’t compelling enough to justify the effort. Unfortunately, it seems that the Chaos Theory option in Jurassic World Evolution 2 is no longer available.
Despite my own distaste for the scenarios, Evolution 3’s selection of possibilities for nearly all types of management sim fans is astounding. The campaign provides a narrative to help you navigate the gameplay. The sandbox is a place where you can create something wholly original. Additionally, you’ll likely find Scenario mode more fulfilling than I did if you truly enjoy time trials under pressure.
The improvements to the series’ quality of life that Evolution 3 offers have even more pleased me. You can eliminate the need to manually locate those units each time a crisis arises by automating medical care and maintenance with the correct infrastructure. Things like making park tours, which were complicated or unclear in the earlier games, are much simpler now. Beyond the typical Jeep rides and movie gyroscopes, there are other tour options available. For example, you may create a Cretaceous Cruise that lets visitors canoe through rivers and lakes or arrange a hot air balloon tour.
This time, it feels much more natural to increase your transportation score by installing monorail lines and stations across the park. You may easily modify the current tracks to reach a wider audience as you grow, or you can just install an underground hyperloop to make getting around the park even easier. Many of the sharp edges have been softened.
Verdict
In the first Jurassic Park movie, there’s a moment when the main characters see dinosaurs in the wild for the first time and they’re virtually paralyzed in wonder. Since its debut, the Jurassic World Evolution series has done a fantastic job at emulating that sensation. It’s always amazing to see your first dinosaurs emerge from their incubation center, but it’s much more thrilling when your park is overrun by pteranodons, megalodons, ferocious predators, towering long-necked herbivores, and hybrid species that defy both nature and man.
Jurassic World Evolution 3 gives prospective dinosaur theme park operators more authority than ever before by building on an already outstanding base. Even if the Scenario mode isn’t quite as good as the Chaos Theory mode in the first game, the third iteration is the best in the series because to new features and improvements to quality of life. Evolution 3 has a lot to offer if creating and running a dinosaur theme park is your idea of fun.
