I had the chance to join Conorontology and a bunch of other creators and Jurassic friends at a Dinosaur Integration Network facility in London this weekend, courtesy of an invite by the awesome folks over at Frontier Developments.
Before we got hands-on with the new game, we were treated to an immersive experience crafted in partnership with Secret Cinema – and I have to admit this was phenomenal. The team chose a great building which matched the vibes of a scientific facility perfectly, and had a variety of fun and interactive activities which were a great warm-up to the experience of playing the game.
I have to pay particular credit to the actors who brought this experience to life. They all remained in character throughout the experience, and we encountered a fantastic assortment of scientists, field operatives and senior executives from the DIN throughout the walkthrough experience. It’s clear a lot of effort went into the attention-to-detail and quality of this experience, and it really paid off.
When we got hands-on with the game itself, we got to play through the initial thirty – forty-five minutes of the campaign mode, before we transitioned into sandbox mode. For people who have played the Evolution games before this feels fundamentally familiar, but with a healthy sprinkling of newness which really sets this game apart from the previous two entries in the franchise.
The biggest stand-out for me without a doubt was the terrain tools which have been added to the toolbox for the third entry. The verticality in the pre-built sandbox I loaded made it feel like a developer made map – but it was something which had been constructed entirely with the tools available to us in game. These tools are going to add so much replay-ability to this game, and really will add to the longevity of the game.
The inclusion of baby dinosaurs was adorable – and I have to shout out Cabott Junior, who you’ll meet when you play the campaign for yourself this October. Additions like the maintenance teams also worked well and added to the overall management feel without feeling too cumbersome. Overall if you’ve played the Evolution franchise in the past then you know what you’re getting in to here – a lot feels familiar, but there are some great and enriching upgrades which make this feel worthy of a sequel in my opinion.
I have to admit before I got hands on, I was a little apprehensive about the parallels between this game and the Jurassic World Evolution 2, but playing the game hands-on for a couple of hours has got me really excited to sink more time into it. This game really does add so much in the way of sandbox tools to really allow us to make the parks we have dreamed off building. I can’t wait to see what else is in store when the game releases!
You can check out over an hour of gameplay on The Jurassic Park Podcast YouTube channel, embedded below, and can also find more content on Conor’s Instagram Page and my own Instagram Page.
Huge thanks to the team at Frontier Developments and Yrs Truly for inviting us to this event. Jurassic World Evolution 3 releases on consoles and PC on October 21st.
Written by: Tom Jurassic