As the camera pans across a seemingly empty enclosure and past the familiar high security fences, it settles on an unfamiliar sight. Amid the rocky mountainside towards the edge of the enclosure sits a small patch of bushes and trees. Look closely, and you can just about see an opening behind them.
Suddenly, the bushes part and out tumbles a tiny Triceratops. He’s a little bit wobbly on his fresh legs, has a face that oozes mischief, and might be the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen. In this third installment of the dinosaur park building series, life no longer has to find a way, it’s being handed one.
I was recently given an opportunity to watch some early alpha footage of Jurassic World Evolution 3 while throwing all sorts of questions at game director Andy Fletcher. Here’s what we know about this next evolution of dinosaurs.
Post-Dominion Dinosaur Domination
Like previous games, Jurassic World Evolution 3 tells a non-canon story line which fits snugly alongside the canon events of the movies. This time around, we’re looking at a post-Dominion world where dinosaurs and humans are working out how to survive and thrive alongside one another.
Fletcher tells me the alternate timeline has been a blessing, thanks to the narrative scope it offers the team. “This [post-Dominion world] has allowed us a lot of flexibility in terms of choosing which characters are part of this new narrative,” he says. “Particularly in being able to spread our campaign across the globe, showing how various facilities have tried to accommodate dinosaurs, and now dinosaur families, in their own way.”
Cabot Finch returns once more as the game’s campaign follows the progress of his latest initiative, DIN, which stands for Dinosaur Integration Network. Its aim is to enclose dinosaurs securely in a natural environment which allows them to interact and breed exactly how they would have millions of years ago. The organisation strives to create a secure spectacle to inspire visitors and encourage people to work with DIN to help dinosaurs thrive safely.
Jeff Goldblum once again reprises his role as Dr. Ian Malcolm, who is now an advisor to Cabot Finch’s DIN.
Life Has An Easier Path
Dinosaur breeding is looking like the largest update to this third installment. You’ll be able to breed male or female adult dinosaurs in the incubation lab in order to create a mating pair. The new nest item gives them somewhere private to go in order to lay eggs. Once these eggs hatch, you’ll see juveniles begin to populate your enclosures and interact with fellow dinos and visitors to your park.
Fletcher tells me there were a lot of challenges in creating baby dinosaurs:“Dinosaur breeding created a whole range of questions for us to answer, such as how dinosaur families would interact, what kind of dimorphism we might expect between males and females, the level of control players should have over breeding, what inheritance looks like across dinosaur generations, how players might need to manage their dinosaur populations… and that’s not to mention answering the first question of what all these juveniles would actually look like.”
All the ceratopsian juveniles are a joy, with their handsome little crests. But I also love how the Ankylosaurus juvenile is super gregarious, so I’ll say the confident juvenile Anky is my favourite.
Aside from an injured baby tyrannosaurus rex in Lost World, juvenile dinosaurs haven’t really been explored in depth when it comes to the films, meaning this is the first time dinosaur family dynamics are really being portrayed in the Jurassic universe.
This is something Frontier didn’t take lightly, with Fletcher calling it a “privilege to explore these challenges” in what he refers to as “a rich new area for the series.”
World Domination
As well as offering scope for creating dinosaur breeding programmes, the timeline also allows for an expansive campaign, something Fletcher says was a huge focus. “We knew we wanted to create a more expansive and flexible campaign. The ability to travel freely between unlocked parks makes the experience feel really epic and cohesive."
Each park is tailored to the architecture and environment of its location, and there are different goals and metrics to meet in each one. This creates a large number of unique challenges, something which the team strived to make “feel full of potential as an individual park, as well as one piece of a much larger picture.”
As part of this terrain tools have also been overhauled. “We have taken inspiration from other games that we’ve developed here at Frontier, but the fundamental rule was that this had to still feel like a Jurassic World Evolution game,” explains Fletcher.
“The key gameplay is as familiar and accessible as previous games in the series, but some additions have leveraged our experience in offering more detailed creative tools, such as dynamic terrain editing, the ability to combine and edit scenery in great depth, and best of all, the capability to download creations that other players have shared.”
Location-themed items can be used alongside those based on the Jurassic universe, allowing for extensive customisation.
You can now drag and drop to easily adjust scenery, adding waterfalls, moving mountains, and creating unique environments for your dinosaurs to thrive. There is also a variation of the high level customisation we’ve seen in the Planet series with every building having a wide range of pre-built options as well as the addition of complete customisation. Fletcher tells us that this involved a “literal rebuild of every wall, window and scenery item that you might need to build a piece-by-piece Jurassic World Evolution 3 park.”
If you find this too overwhelming and just want to enjoy the fruits of those who love to create and share, Frontier Workshop is now easier to navigate than ever before. “Rather than navigate to a separate area of the game to explore shared content that other players have created, this content is available right there in the game while you’re deciding what building or scenery item to place down.” Fletcher shares. “It’s super slick, and we can’t wait for players to get hands-on with it.”
I’ve only seen a small snippet of what’s to come, but things are looking promising. The creative tools are improved, the campaign promises to be diverse and expansive, and of course, we have baby dinos. Jurassic World Evolution 3 isn’t due to be hatched until Jun 11, 2025, and we can’t wait to experience it for ourselves closer to release. I need to breed some baby T-rexes!
