Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube Twitch
    Game on Aus
    • News

      Jagged Alliance 3 new details from GamesCom 2022

      August 13, 2022

      ONE of my very favourite games of all time is Jagged Alliance 2, a combination turn-based/real-time tactical game which put…

      Hogwarts Legacy Delay – Surprising?

      August 13, 2022

      This morning, on their official Twitter, developers of Hogwarts Legacy has announced a delay its release. Originally set for a…

      Twitch Streamers Payout Threshold Lowered

      August 12, 2022

      Good news for Australian streamers today, as Twitch has announced they have lowered the payout threshold for Creators to AUD$50…

      What’s New to Xbox Game Pass for August 2022

      August 12, 2022

      Welcome to August Xbox players! Xbox Game Pass is set to bring you a whole stack of fun this month.…

      New First Look Jordan Challenge trailer drops for NBA 2K23

      August 11, 2022

      IF you mastered the Jordan Challenge in NBA 2K11, you’re going to be up for even more of a challenge…

      View All
    • Reviews

      Way of the Hunter – Review

      August 15, 2022

      WAY OF THE HUNTER is a hunting simulation game developed by None Rocks Games, published by THQ Nordic and set…

      Turtle Beach Scout Air Wireless Earbuds Review

      August 12, 2022

      WHEN I sit down to play some games, the first thing I tend to reach for after the controller or…

      Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered on PC: Pretty But Expensive

      August 11, 2022

      MARVEL’S Spider-Man was rightly a huge success when it came out on PlayStation 4, being praised by pretty much everyone…

      Cult of the Lamb review – Accidents wool happen

      August 11, 2022

      I WAS admittedly a little bit skeptical about the entire premise Cult of the Lamb before I got my hands…

      Lost In Play Key Art

      Lost In Play: A World Of Pure Imagination

      August 10, 2022

      Lost In Play is a charming game from developer Happy Juice Games. Toto and Gal must work together, solving puzzles to find their way home.

      View All
    • Podcasts
      Nuts & Bolts Hero Card 53

      Nuts & Bolts Episode 53: Why You Sleep Through Playoffs?

      August 13, 2022

      LCO playoffs are now settled! Who’s going to Dreamhack? Results for Commonwealth Esports Series, Rainbow 6 OCS, TFT Dragonlands Challenger Series and more!

      There Is No Cow Level

      August 11, 2022

      Stormie and Jim chat about Screenwest grants for Perth game devs and ask why Sony are charging so much for…

      Nuts & Bolts Hero Card 52

      Nuts & Bolts Episode 52: Come On Kanga!

      July 30, 2022

      With only two weeks left in the LCO things are heating up! Who will make the playoffs? Can anybody beat the Chiefs? Plus just what’s going on with the Valorant scene? We’ve got bans, teams dropping Valorant, and more!

      No NFTs For Minecraft

      July 28, 2022

      On this episode Minecraft says no to NFTs and a clever marketing campaign dares you to refund a game. Plus…

      Streamaholics Hero Card 35

      Streamaholics Ep 35: Twitch Hates Small Streamers…Or Do They?

      July 24, 2022

      On this week’s episode the boys discuss whether Twitch actually cares about Small Streamers, Shippy gets excited about Instagram Live Streaing and Lukey has a blunt message for new creators. All that and much more!

      View All
    • Categories
      • BY PLATFORM
        • Playstation
        • Xbox
        • Nintendo
        • PC
        • Mobile
        • VR
        • Retro
      • BY GENRE
        • Action
        • Action-Adventure
        • Adventure
        • Battle Royale
        • Fighting
        • FPS
        • Horror Games
        • RPG
        • Simulation
        • Sports
        • MMORPG
        • MOBA
        • Party Game
        • Platformer
        • Puzzle
        • Strategy
        • Survival
        • Indie
      • GOA ESSENTIALS
        • Esports
        • Conventions
        • Tabletop
        • Hardware
        • Furniture
        • Funny
        • Streaming
        • Win
        • Podcast
        • Video
    • More
      • About Us
      • Contact Us
    Game on Aus
    Home » Everybody walk the dinosaur: Jurassic World Evolution 2
    REVIEW

    Everybody walk the dinosaur: Jurassic World Evolution 2

    Royce WilsonBy Royce WilsonNovember 21, 2021
    Share
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

    THE only thing better than running your very own theme park is running your very own theme park full of dinosaurs.

    Jurassic World Evolution 2, developed and published by Frontier Developments, is here to let you do exactly that on PC, PlayStation and Xbox

    Frontier are well known for their pretty detailed park management games, particularly Planet Coaster and Zoo Tycoon, the star of the show in Jurassic World Evolution 2 is the dinosaurs rather than the actual rides or operational aspect of the park. It’s definitely present, but not to the level of deciding how much ice goes in the drinks or how much to charge for a medium hamburger and fries meal (you want Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 for that).

    Ever wanted to build and run a zoo full of dinosaurs? Jurassic World Evolution 2 is the perfect opportunity.

    There are 70 species of dinosaur in the game, including flying and aquatic ones, they are definitely the main feature of the game, however, and most of your efforts will be directed towards breeding/engineering them (for example, to make them more docile for tourists, or need less water, or even have different colour schemes).

    The main campaign is very short and focuses on a scenario where dinosaurs have escaped into mainland USA (per the events of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) and you (along with some of the characters from the movies) are now part of the US Department of Fish & Wildlife (Feat. The CIA, because why not?) trying to round up some of these wild dinosaurs and put them in some kind of dinosaur park, and charge scientists to come and look at them to justify the enormous expense involved in the whole undertaking, because charging obscenely rich trophy hunters to shoot a few of them for biosecurity and population management or getting the military to neutralise any that are threatening populated areas isn’t politically correct, apparently.

    There are something like 70 different dinosaur species in the game, ranging some small herbivores to Tyrannosaurus Rexes to Pterodactyls and ocean dwelling leviathans.

    Voice-wise, Jeff Goldblum, Bryce Dallas Howard and BD Wong reprise their roles from the film, although the character of Owen Grady is voiced by a (good) soundalike since Chris Pratt appears to have been otherwise engaged.

    In addition to the campaign, there are several “Chaos Theory” missions that allow to you essentially replay elements from the movies – such as establishing the first Jurassic Park in the 1990s – where the “theme park” aspect of things comes slightly more to the fore; I particularly enjoyed the Jurassic World setting which had a good mission structure, range of attractions, and dinosaurs to work with.

    The review code I received was for PlayStation 5 and I was initially a bit disappointed since I’ve traditionally considered the idea of playing a building/management game on a console as one of the lighter blasphemies. However, Frontier have done an outstanding job of making the game feel intuitively playable using a controller and I didn’t have any issues with moving the camera, building the park, or controlling the hands-on units.

    Managing and caring for the dinosaurs is quite an involved process – but a rewarding one.

    On a next-gen console and an 8K TV, the dinosaurs look absolutely amazing and there is a surprisingly relaxing time to be had watching them going about their dinosaur lives, eating and drinking and wandering around. At least, that’s how it always starts. Then later there’s running and screaming – especially if you don’t keep your dinosaurs content or the power grid fails and the bigger, nastier, more carnivorous ones get out of their enclosures and decide to snack on some guests instead of the goats you’ve so generously been providing them.

    The ability to experience the park from the driver’s seat of ranger jeeps and rides is a really nice touch that really adds to the game experience (no, you can’t deliberately run over Velociraptors with a 4WD) and trying to tranquilise dinosaurs from a helicopter is a lot more challenging than it first appears, too.

    The issue is that the “watch the dinosaurs be dinosaurs” novelty starts to wear off after a while, unless you’re going for a big sandbox type thing. Having to research everything from scratch each time you start a new playthrough isn’t an ideal state of affairs either, especially once you start wondering how come people who can genetically engineer smegging dinosaurs back from extinction still have to do some expensive R&D to work out how to build fairly straightforward stuff like a staffroom or a basic power plant.

    Fairly minor annoyances aside, Jurassic World Evolution 2 manages to improve on its predecessor in a significant number of ways, and while it might be worth waiting for the price to drop a bit – it doesn’t quite feel like an AUD$80 game – if you’re a fan of the movies or want to run a theme park full of dinosaurs, you’ll very likely want to open the door, get on the floor (or couch) and play this game.

    Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email
    Previous ArticleSouls-Like Tails of Iron Action RPG Review
    Next Article B-17 Flying Fortress: Flying straight in from the early ’90s

    Related Posts

    PC August 15, 2022

    Way of the Hunter – Review

    WAY OF THE HUNTER is a hunting simulation game developed by None Rocks Games, published by THQ Nordic and set…

    REVIEW August 12, 2022

    Turtle Beach Scout Air Wireless Earbuds Review

    WHEN I sit down to play some games, the first thing I tend to reach for after the controller or…

    Subscribe

    Get the latest creative news from FooBar about art, design and business.

    Ads

    Categories
    • ACTION
    • ACTION-ADVENTURE
    • ADVENTURE
    • BATTLE ROYALE
    • CLOUD GAMING
    • CONVENTIONS
    • ESPORTS
    • FEATURE
    • FIGHTING
    • FPS
    • FUNNY
    • FURNITURE
    • GOA
    • HARDWARE
    • HORROR GAMES
    • INDIE
    • Industry
    • LEGO
    • MMORPG
    • MOBA
    • MOBILE
    • NEWS
    • NINTENDO
    • Open-World
    • OPINION
    • PARTY GAME
    • PC
    • PLATFORMER
    • PLAYSTATION
    • PODCAST
    • PREVIEW
    • PUZZLE
    • RACING
    • RETRO
    • REVIEW
    • RPG
    • SIMULATION
    • SPORTS
    • STRATEGY
    • STREAMING
    • SURVIVAL
    • TABLETOP GAMING
    • TECH
    • VIDEO
    • VR
    • XBOX
    Related Article
    PC

    Way of the Hunter – Review

    August 15, 2022Mikeey BarrowBy Mikeey Barrow

    WAY OF THE HUNTER is a hunting simulation game developed by None Rocks Games, published by THQ Nordic and set in the Pacific Northwest,…

    LEGO

    The GOA team’s favourite childhood Lego kits

    August 13, 2022Royce WilsonBy Royce Wilson

    LEGO is celebrating its 90th Anniversary this year, with the “Modern” iteration of Lego building sets essentially dating from the early 1980s – in…

    ACTION

    Jagged Alliance 3 new details from GamesCom 2022

    August 13, 2022Royce WilsonBy Royce Wilson

    ONE of my very favourite games of all time is Jagged Alliance 2, a combination turn-based/real-time tactical game which put you in charge of…

    Game on Australia Logo

    Game On Aus is an Australian games publication working across written, video and podcast, and supported by an ever-growing community of content creators and fans!

    Copyright GameOnAus 2022. Privacy Policy

    CONTENT
    • News
    • Gaming Reviews
    • Podcast
    • Tech
    • Indie
    ABOUT GOA
    • About Us
    • Contact

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.