PC & console game reviews
A sight for dinosaur eyes THE TECHLIFE TEAM REVIEWS THE LATEST GAMES FOR PC & CONSOLES, BEGINNING WITH THIS THEME PARK BUILDER.
Jurassic World Evolution
PRETTY DINOSAUR THEME PARK BUILDER HAS PLENTY OF REX APPEAL. $99.95 | PC, PS4, XO | www.jurassicworldevolution.com AS YOU MAY have guessed, your main goal is to run a dinosaur theme park. Actually, that’s a fib: you have to run several. As you progress through the campaign, you unlock all five islands in the cheery-sounding Las Cinco Muertes, the ‘Islands Of Death’, which act as a freeform sandbox. The permanently sunkissed Isla Matanceros provides a reasonably gentle introduction to Evolution’s somewhat fussy systems, and it’s not until you move over to the rain-lashed Isla Muerta that you have to start worrying about investing in storm protection systems and shelters for your soaking guests.
Speaking of the squishy humans who visit your parks, your priority is to entertain them, and ensure they don’t end up as lunch for a rampaging T. Rex. To prevent the worst case scenario of one of your formerly extinct attractions breaking out of an enclosure, you must invest in developing electric fences. Keeping these barriers full of juice brings you face to face with Evolution’s most confusing mechanic: its power system. Every building needs electricity to run. You must ensure there’s a nearby power station, substation and a criss-crossing network of pylons to keep everything running. Trouble is, connecting them is finicky.
You must also contend with three vying factions: a science division, entertainment sector and security team. Juggling your loyalties between these is akin to juggling raptor eggs... while their mum tries to tear out your larynx. Frontier actively punishes you for overly prioritising one team over the other.
Even when Evolution frustrates with its cluttered menus and poorly thought-out faction system, one feature pulls you back in: the dinos. Each of the game’s 40 species looks unerringly faithful to its movie equivalent.
While it’s clearly a conscious design decision, the fact it takes 15–20 hours to unlock Evolution’s most exciting species sucks some of the fun out of the game’s opening hours. You must first unlock the relevant dig sites to harvest their fossils, which can only be done after you get your first couple of islands up to a certain star rating. While the long-term goal of unlocking the franchise’s most iconic predators is motivating, it’s still a brontosaurus bummer when your first park is filled with boring, obscure herbivores.
If you love prehistoric critters, or simply want a game where you can watch an allosaur gobble humans whole (accidentally, of course), Evolution is a dino delight.
SPEAKING OF THE SQUISHY HUMANS WHO VISIT YOUR PARKS, YOUR PRIORITY IS TO ENTERTAIN THEM, AND ENSURE THEY DON’T END UP AS LUNCH FOR A RAMPAGING T. REX.