What happened to Jurassic World Evolution? (Trailer Analysis)

Good afternoon all,

After playing, beating, and replaying Jurassic World Evolution multiple times; I've come to the conclusion that it was not the game we were all hoping for. As a matter of fact, I am under the impression it did the bare minimum to be a launchable title to earn money off the back of Fallen Kingdom's release date.

However, we have to ask ourselves, was it always this way? Many of the trailers that were posted in its development cycle indicated otherwise. This is why I broke my "Never Pre-order" policy with myself this one time, because I've been an avid fan of JPOG since I was in my youth and from what was shown to me in the initial gameplay trailer, it was the sequel I always wanted.

Take a look here:


The foliage is much more gorgeous than the finished title. Tall grass, differentiated trees, even patches where it was just dirt. Packs/herds are indicated to have been in the game in a beautiful way. There even appears to have been sleeping behavior as indicated by a couple dinosaurs (and yes, I know when dinosaurs get too sick, this animation still exists, but that's something you'll likely never see as long as you care for your dinosaurs). This was a game I was excited for.

Now for Exhibit B:


This is the PS4 launch trailer for the game and it looks... strikingly different. The grass is much less detailed and the trees are now uniformly designed. The graphics seem to be much more toned down. The lighting, both in this version and in the final version, are really mute compared to that initial trailer. This begs the question: Did they remove all of these features in order for consoles to be able to handle the game? Up until this point, there was no degradation of quality until the console specific trailer. We may never know unless prompted to a developer of the game.

To summarize these thoughts succinctly, we may have had a bit of false advertisement happen with the promotional material. The game in the first trailer looked like a fantastic game, but by the PS4 trailer, looked like they had stripped away most of the content from the game to be as basic as possible. Coming from the creators of Planet Coaster, the greatest park builder in recent times, bare basics is simply not acceptable and I'm wondering what exactly happened. What are your thoughts?

Ultimately it is due to PC being able to handle more in a game than consoles, which are usually at a fixed resolution, and medium or high quality.

Also, 3D renders for creatures, characters, weapons, etc, are of a much higher quality than the in-game assets. Also seen with video games that have menus with 3D objects (inventory items, weapons, etc.) which are usually the original renders, or a somewhat toned-down version of them.

Also it is more than likely some features were cut due to time constraints. Universal wanted the game to be ready for Fallen Kingdom's release.

And it is not really false-advertisement. That's why game trailer's usually have for their teasers or reveals trailers, a disclaimer that says, "Footage not representative of final product." or something similar.

Also, Frontier is not going to cut and run and leave this game on a deathbed. They're already working on a roadmap for continued support.

This is not towards anyone in particular, but we can't expect developers to just churn out huge amount of content at our every whim.

I don't think the inclusion of console releases was a contributing factor to the poor quality of the game (unlike JPOG where things were scrapped to have time for console coding). The only logical explanation I have is that the game was rushed. Frontier didn't have enough time to release everything they wanted in time for FK so they gave us a bare bones game marketed at full price. The sleeping behavior isn't the only indicator; Pena's perpetual night is odd because no where else is it used. Before you get to the island the game stresses that it operating only at night is going to add some kind of extra challenge, but it doesn't, it's cosmetic. This leads me to believe that a day/night cycle was a thing and it was scrapped last minute before they could iron out the files. Plus, in "Sandbox" mode they time of day is marked and can be chosen (another subtle indicator a day night cycle was planned).

The state the game is in is not acceptable; there's 30 hours of playtime here at the most and with almost no real challenge or freedom the game falls into an awkward state of just looking good but not functioning as it should (like Sea of Thieves). I honestly hope Frontier is working on fixing it since I too shelled out $60 on pre order to buy it, but their lack of saying anything concrete about the future plans is worrying. Frontier had the chance to make one of the best Sim building games of all time and they screwed it up. I honestly believe we should look into modding this game because even if they do give us DLC it'll likely be much less than what we expect.

I am of the opinion that as an industry where the product is 'entertainment' a failure to entertain is a failure on the part of the company. We are ushered into an age that now believes we should 'respect their efforts' and 'not be so hard on them'. However, when someone slacks off at a normal job, they get reprimanded. This should be no different. I don't understand why people in the film, television, or gaming industry get a free pass because their product is atypical.

There was a definite slacking had here. Whether it was rushed for the release date or never planned to be as grand as other park management titles, it is 100% lackluster beyond a shadow of a doubt. I, as a consumer, have already placed a bad review on the game and encouraged my friends to stay away from it (at least at its current state and price).

I think the main glaring issue that the original builds of this game had that should of stayed was the focus on the dinosaurs. When you're building your park, or waiting for new dinos to be born, what do I do? I try to watch the dinosaurs. However, they are roaming 98% of the time, hunting 1% or socializing for the other 1%. This is unbelievably boring. I think herding, pack hunting behavior, etc would have really spiced up the game.

To summarize my thoughts here, I am not hopeful for their vague and undefined commitment to supporting the title. A lot of the issues we are discussing require a lot of effort and time, and honestly, should have been done pre-release. I feel it is unlikely that they would go back to fix things that should have been done pre-release and instead focus on add-ons, cosmetics, (and DLCs because milk this franchise til it dies). I am sorrowfully disappointed.

Bo from Frontier claims a lot of things are being looked at for future content updates, but for now, the game is staying about the same. There will be tweaks and fixes to a few things in the next patch coming soon, but a lot of the issues players are having are still being worked on or even just being considered to be worked on.