D+ What a Disappointment

[inachos]

JWE doesn't deserve to be defended after playing it.

On the one hand, true because of the limitations. And, to be honest, I really do not understand why there´re people saying things like: "It´s all I wanted", "frontier didn´t promised us that", "It´s the best dinosaurgame since JPOG so shut up and be happy", "The lack of content is only an opinion" (it´s not), "the limitation is no neck-breaker" (acutally island size is, because you can not build much on sandbox post game =) No replay value after unlock everything) etc.
On the other hand I still have hope for improvements, because it is not impossible. And if frontier don´t want the work they could just give us finally mod support so the community can improve JWE ...

JPOG is pure garbage, utter trash.

Also true, but JPOG has got a much higher replay value and the animals behave much more like living creatures and not like robots which makes it a better game at all. JWE is "finished" after 41 hours of gameplay, failure and success ...

 

[paleostudent]

Im at 35 hours and have seen everything, Sandbox is useless as its free and no space at all and not even a point since you simply cant do anything? fences are all the same, no trees only brushes .......all parks will look the exact same . pretty pointless.

 

[PCMR4Life]

Im at 35 hours and have seen everything, Sandbox is useless as its free and no space at all and not even a point since you simply cant do anything? fences are all the same, no trees only brushes .......all parks will look the exact same . pretty pointless.

Ok then. Go take your game to Gamestop and get your $25 in cash or whatever equivalent it is in your country and go whine by yourself in a corner some where.

 

[Unebi]

Ok then. Go take your game to Gamestop and get your $25 in cash or whatever equivalent it is in your country and go whine by yourself in a corner some where.

Well this is just stupid now isn't, this person used his/her money to buy something and they aren't happy with the quality of the delivered product. Which is not as advertised, and having bad AI and animations is still quite basic in a graphic game like this, giving them all rights to complain about it. Your reaction is "get over it"? Leaving game companies to do what they want and release bad/unfinished game, because they MIGHT fix it. And even if they fix it, it might be in DLC form for which you have to pay extra. Please explain the sense in this for me, and dont compare it to some other game, I haven't played any other then this so I got a good critical view of this one.

 

[AwkwardGamer95]

Im at 35 hours and have seen everything, Sandbox is useless as its free and no space at all and not even a point since you simply cant do anything? fences are all the same, no trees only brushes .......all parks will look the exact same . pretty pointless.

JPOG was the same for this, every park I ever built had the same look, even if I drastically built them differently. I loved JPOG aswell. I'm at 33 hours and currently at Sorna however I keep returning to the earlier islands to make my perfect park and every now and again tweak them. I do agree with Nublar, space is fine with me although I'd like bigger but I do want to start from scratch.

 

[cwattyeso]

Having played a lot of JPOG over the years and having currently played 31 hours of Jurassic World Evolution both clearly have their merits and detraction. Yes Jurassic World Evolution looks great, has great graphics and all that, runs pretty well on modern hardware because of its more current engine, yes it has better and more in depth management stuff. However I would also say having more in depth management stuff can also be a detraction because it takes away fun and enjoyment and makes the game a grind and a management sim especially combined with my next point. JPOG lacked management depth but offered fun gameplay by giving you incredible large and customisable maps that you could just go wild on and create these massive parks, with loads of enclosures/attractions, that I really do miss in Jurassic World Evolution. The 5 Islands Maps are all pretty small and constraining, meaning you can only really build two or three enclosures on any of them. Even the Sandbox Island Nublar is really small for a Sandbox. The game really needs a map that is vastly larger and more comparable to the largest map size in JPOG. Obviously another big thing missing from Jurassic World Evolution is the Mod/Workshop Support. Frontier's other game Planet Coaster has such a large community and continues to receive large player counts because of the Steam Workshop Support and the fact people can make mods for it. The reason why JPOG is still being played today, 15 years after release is because it allows modding, and mods are still being made and released for it all the time.

So yes I can argue that Jurassic World Evolution launching with some of the basic elements of JPOG missing seems like quite a big oversight and flaw on the part of Frontier, however it can also be said that the current platform is a good base that hopefully over the next month of two Frontier will quickly build and expand on to bring us an even better game. Yes this does feel like a game produced to meet a very tight release deadline from the license holder, however we can move beyond that now and let Frontier really go to town on updating and expanding this game.

 

[Unebi]

Having played a lot of JPOG over the years and having currently played 31 hours of Jurassic World Evolution both clearly have their merits and detraction. Yes Jurassic World Evolution looks great, has great graphics and all that, runs pretty well on modern hardware because of its more current engine, yes it has better and more in depth management stuff. However I would also say having more in depth management stuff can also be a detraction because it takes away fun and enjoyment and makes the game a grind and a management sim especially combined with my next point. JPOG lacked management depth but offered fun gameplay by giving you incredible large and customisable maps that you could just go wild on and create these massive parks, with loads of enclosures/attractions, that I really do miss in Jurassic World Evolution. The 5 Islands Maps are all pretty small and constraining, meaning you can only really build two or three enclosures on any of them. Even the Sandbox Island Nublar is really small for a Sandbox. The game really needs a map that is vastly larger and more comparable to the largest map size in JPOG. Obviously another big thing missing from Jurassic World Evolution is the Mod/Workshop Support. Frontier's other game Planet Coaster has such a large community and continues to receive large player counts because of the Steam Workshop Support and the fact people can make mods for it. The reason why JPOG is still being played today, 15 years after release is because it allows modding, and mods are still being made and released for it all the time.

So yes I can argue that Jurassic World Evolution launching with some of the basic elements of JPOG missing seems like quite a big oversight and flaw on the part of Frontier, however it can also be said that the current platform is a good base that hopefully over the next month of two Frontier will quickly build and expand on to bring us an even better game. Yes this does feel like a game produced to meet a very tight release deadline from the license holder, however we can move beyond that now and let Frontier really go to town on updating and expanding this game.

But what if they dont? A lot of people payed for this half-game, whilst recieving lots of promises... What if they dont fix it, or they dont listen to players and just release more dinos as DLC? Can you promise that they'll do anything they can to produce the game everyone wanted instead of what they got? They allready got the money...

 

[S3B4ST13N]

But what if they dont? A lot of people payed for this half-game, whilst recieving lots of promises...

What promises were not kept?
( I'm talking actual promises, like "This WILL be in the game" "You WILL be able to do this" .. not player expectations that were not met )

Note: I'm genuinely curious.

 

[cwattyeso]

But what if they dont? A lot of people payed for this half-game, whilst recieving lots of promises... What if they dont fix it, or they dont listen to players and just release more dinos as DLC? Can you promise that they'll do anything they can to produce the game everyone wanted instead of what they got? They allready got the money...

If they don't add or expand anything to the game, then I guess once I have completed Isla Sorna and 5 Star Rated it, then the game will be complete and I'll move onto another game and something else. There are a lot of games that get released that don't receive updates or DLCs and once you've played through them you are done and move on. Yes it'd be a shame if Frontier went against their past track record and didn't continue to support, expand and improve this game, but it won't be the end of the world. I've got my hours in it and imagine by the time I finish Isla Sorna and obtain all the Achievements I'll have 50 hours or so in game. This when divided by what I paid for the game isn't a bad entertainment to money ratio. I've paid more for games in the past I've played significantly less then this game which have therefore been very bad entertainment to money ratios.

 

[inachos]

What promises were not kept?

"you can build all sort of new thing inside them (the enclosers)" (Nick Rodgers_Dev Diary: Take Control) the only thing we can build in it are the feeders ... and perhaps the gyrospheres ... thats it.

"we´re a game of choice and play decisions. And the choices you make ultimately will determine the drastic world you create." (Dan Greer_Dev Diary: Take Control) I didn´t found any choice in game. The only thing is sabotage because one of the 3 devisions is underused.

"We´re going to offer the players a sandbox mode so they´re able to take control of isla nublar. Then we shall recognize from the films. It´s a big open space and a blank canvas for them to build whatever Park they like." (Nick Rodgers_Dev Diary; Take Control) No need to comment ... Just a few examples ...

 

[Unebi]

What promises were not kept?
( I'm talking actual promises, like "This WILL be in the game" "You WILL be able to do this" .. not player expectations that were not met )

Note: I'm genuinely curious.

Dino that think, feel and react to the surrounding world (steam description), great to compare to carnivore AI that just eats everything it comes across...
Not going to comb through everything else that hyped up this game and what was promised by the company specifically...

 

[Dbrn47]

Dino that think, feel and react to the surrounding world (steam description), great to compare to carnivore AI that just eats everything it comes across...
Not going to comb through everything else that hyped up this game and what was promised by the company specifically...

Well, they kind of do, just not in the way you probably imagined. Carnivores don't eat everything either, they can coexist with specific dinos that aren't prey.

 

[Unebi]

Well, they kind of do, just not in the way you probably imagined. Carnivores don't eat everything either, they can coexist with specific dinos that aren't prey.

I expect them to behave like a decent AI that actually responds to something around, not a small detection field around the dino that only responds to other dinos and gates, and carnivores killing everything they can without any reason is not what I call decent programming. Btw fun little experiment I did when I was done with first island, I deleted some of the fences hidden by some trees on all my dinosaur pens. They didnt do anything with it , they simple didnt detect the fences not being there. Even more so, you can divide dinosaur pens with forrest, which they want but apparantly never enter...

 

[Dbrn47]

I expect them to behave like a decent AI that actually responds to something around, not a small detection field around the dino that only responds to other dinos and gates, and carnivores killing everything they can without any reason is not what I call decent programming. Btw fun little experiment I did when I was done with first island, I deleted some of the fences hidden by some trees on all my dinosaur pens. They didnt do anything with it , they simple didnt detect the fences not being there. Even more so, you can divide dinosaur pens with forrest, which they want but apparantly never enter...

It's interesting that we can be playing the same thing and experience different things. In my experience they react to everything. Bigger carnivores bully smaller carnivores, same size carnivores fight almost immediately upon release, if I release an herbivore that's always just been prey carnivores will drop everything and hunt the herbivore, dinos not caring where fences are broken other than they are broken and thus escaping the enclosure, dinos that like forests spending more time in forests. Very odd indeed that we have completely opposite experiences. Either the game is dynamic in that sense or one of us is being disingenuous.

 

[LemonyNebula]

It's interesting that we can be playing the same thing and experience different things. In my experience they react to everything. Bigger carnivores bully smaller carnivores, same size carnivores fight almost immediately upon release, if I release an herbivore that's always just been prey carnivores will drop everything and hunt the herbivore, dinos not caring where fences are broken other than they are broken and thus escaping the enclosure, dinos that like forests spending more time in forests. Very odd indeed that we have completely opposite experiences. Either the game is dynamic in that sense or one of us is being disingenuous.

Or you are just happier with what is there and we are not. (I wish I was)

The problem is they are basically a bunch of if statements on roaming AI. If food is in its area of influence when hungry, Eat food. If Prey Dinosaur is in its area of influence, fight Prey. If mood is low and a fence is in the area of influence, break fence. They are entirely predictable, and as in your examples, just do what they need to to get a pre-planned result and teach a management lesson. Did you put a prey dino in a predators pen? That was silly, now look.

But for a game that is supposed to be about "dinosaurs that think, feel and react intelligently", they really need to make it seem like the dinos have their own mind rather than a checklist for an easy to read management system. I would much rather see personality to the dinosaurs, a bit more unpredictability. Make a carnivore simply toy with its food out of boredom when full, make a timid dinosaur square up then run away even if it is the predator in the situation, get some dinosaurs interacting with each other by playing, or fighting not to the death but to be the alpha. Give a chance of an outcome, not a sure thing. None of these dinosaurs are perfect copies, let them behave in their own way. And I'm not talking about the assigning your own personality to them, I mean real differences in behavior. Not enough to break the game in a random 'why did they do that' sense, but just more checks and personality stats to give more actions.

Sure its a bit more work, but it is a Jurassic World game. The dinosaurs make the Park.

But the main thing, is let them work together. Why would a velociraptor, that needs a pack to be happy, then not hunt and communicate with the others. Sure it has a chance of playing a chatter animation where they all talk and that's fantastic. Give us more that please. The dinosaurs are the stars of the show. They need to act like it rather than be tamagotchis.

 

[djferry]

LemonyNebula thats the thing.

I love Frontier ( planet coaster prespective , never played Elite Dangerous ) But this release was like ... ? I think , and i hope was... Universal puts a heavy pressure on , to reach the release date and then Frontier released the game as it is...without bugs and functional.

What i dont get is why people ( i love Frontier ) but people, 60 bucks, for this, is like, ? No managment, AI dinousaurs is really basic... is what LemonyNebula explains.... anybody that know coding can see the dinosaurs patron behavior... even people that has no coding skills can see.... its really the same...

Every dinosaur of the same especie has no characterization. All raptors are the same...(Blue, Charlie,Echo.... where? all Blues? all Charlies?....) all t-rex are the same... and so on....

Our team, so you took a jeep, and who is the driver? all the time the same? Why dont add a mechanism where you hire someone and level up his skills? Why when i enter in the Raptors enclosure can just took photos? and raptors are dancing and singing.....? Or even entering in the Indominus enclosure...dancing and singing.... its hilarius.... This is Jurassic World??? NO. With that mechanism atleast we have some fear to loose our beloved workers.... but as is now its... .

They can do hevy work to make this game really epic... i just hope, its Universal preassure, and now Frontier will put batteries on to put this game on the place should be....

So yeah we love Frontier, atleast me, i like the game, but as it is now its like ... ?

 

[Dbrn47]

Or you are just happier with what is there and we are not. (I wish I was)

The problem is they are basically a bunch of if statements on roaming AI. If food is in its area of influence when hungry, Eat food. If Prey Dinosaur is in its area of influence, fight Prey. If mood is low and a fence is in the area of influence, break fence. They are entirely predictable, and as in your examples, just do what they need to to get a pre-planned result and teach a management lesson. Did you put a prey dino in a predators pen? That was silly, now look.

But for a game that is supposed to be about "dinosaurs that think, feel and react intelligently", they really need to make it seem like the dinos have their own mind rather than a checklist for an easy to read management system. I would much rather see personality to the dinosaurs, a bit more unpredictability. Make a carnivore simply toy with its food out of boredom when full, make a timid dinosaur square up then run away even if it is the predator in the situation, get some dinosaurs interacting with each other by playing, or fighting not to the death but to be the alpha. Give a chance of an outcome, not a sure thing. None of these dinosaurs are perfect copies, let them behave in their own way. And I'm not talking about the assigning your own personality to them, I mean real differences in behavior. Not enough to break the game in a random 'why did they do that' sense, but just more checks and personality stats to give more actions.

Sure its a bit more work, but it is a Jurassic World game. The dinosaurs make the Park.

But the main thing, is let them work together. Why would a velociraptor, that needs a pack to be happy, then not hunt and communicate with the others. Sure it has a chance of playing a chatter animation where they all talk and that's fantastic. Give us more that please. The dinosaurs are the stars of the show. They need to act like it rather than be tamagotchis.

Other than herd stuff, they do what you've said here. They do socialize, they do square up and then run away from things they aren't prepared to fight. The scripts you are looking for are mostly there, more could be added, but the biggest problem, I think, is there's too big of an expectation out of the AI. I think it more highlights how careful developers need to be when they word features. I doubt they expected that players would actually think the dinos would have such distinct individuality or maybe they did and they just didn't deliver. I don't know, but the game is mostly behaving how I was expecting it would and I think what the dinos do are already cool. I'm on board for them adding more interactions and animations, but I'm not disappointed by what is there. I've said already that I was pleasantly surprised by the game. However, I also didn't follow the pre-release development, I didn't read about what they were looking to put in the game, I didn't read into any 'promises', I didn't play Jurassic Park Genesis, all I expected was a management sim based on dinosaurs and I got what I paid for.

I really am sorry that many people did not get what they were looking for, but I don't expect them to just leave the game as is, much like Elite. I imagine it could also be a slow burn, just like their other games. I think another thread said it best that Frontier seems set on having their titles be 'games as a service', much like Ubisoft. I didn't see it before, but I see it now, whether it's intentional on their part or not. Combine that with the Universal deal in the first place, with the movie due out next week, they probably did under deliver a little, but that's how it goes I guess. In any case, I do have to argue with this idea that the game is a mess and the dinos do nothing as advertised, because it's just not how it is.

 

[Neurons]

That is the norm. The game might be lacking in a few areas but it is a dang good game.

Violation of human rights is a norm in some places of history. That doesn't make it acceptable.

If I sold a partially finished phone that was still missing its ability to dial numbers, people would throw a fit (and rightfully so!).

 

[LemonyNebula]

Other than herd stuff, they do what you've said here. They do socialize, they do square up and then run away from things they aren't prepared to fight. The scripts you are looking for are mostly there, more could be added, but the biggest problem, I think, is there's too big of an expectation out of the AI. I think it more highlights how careful developers need to be when they word features. I doubt they expected that players would actually think the dinos would have such distinct individuality or maybe they did and they just didn't deliver. I don't know, but the game is mostly behaving how I was expecting it would and I think what the dinos do are already cool. I'm on board for them adding more interactions and animations, but I'm not disappointed by what is there. I've said already that I was pleasantly surprised by the game. However, I also didn't follow the pre-release development, I didn't read about what they were looking to put in the game, I didn't read into any 'promises', I didn't play Jurassic Park Genesis, all I expected was a management sim based on dinosaurs and I got what I paid for.

I really am sorry that many people did not get what they were looking for, but I don't expect them to just leave the game as is, much like Elite. I imagine it could also be a slow burn, just like their other games. I think another thread said it best that Frontier seems set on having their titles be 'games as a service', much like Ubisoft. I didn't see it before, but I see it now, whether it's intentional on their part or not. Combine that with the Universal deal in the first place, with the movie due out next week, they probably did under deliver a little, but that's how it goes I guess. In any case, I do have to argue with this idea that the game is a mess and the dinos do nothing as advertised, because it's just not how it is.

Hey, I'm glad you like it. I don't speak to knock the game or to be unreasonable, I'm just saying the expectations that have been set by a developer who I hold a high regard for were not met. I did watch the videos and the livestreams, and as you would expect, they talked up the game. They would, its what it's for, its like any advert. But sadly that gave a bigger drop when my expectations did not manifest. There is good in this game, I even made a thread of everything I like, but unfortunately it feels too bare bones to me.

I would love nothing more than this game to be adapted and improved over time and if that is the way this game is going then I wish Frontier the best of luck in once again proving how well they make games. I don't hold high hopes though, not because of Frontier at all, but because it is a licensed product, which are notoriously hard to work around. They could pull the license at any second and may only want an advert for the new film. They have however, got a suggestions post and we have had confirmation that they are at the very least looking at them. So here is hoping they have free reign of this game and can really boost it.

The games not a mess at all but it is lacking. I mean there is enough here as a game to sell at a normal lower price, and I'm talking around the £30-£40 mark, like most games (Standard not these weird super gold edition versions that release at £80). But some things where advertised in certain ways and sadly it did not quite deliver. It sort of feels like Todd Howard calling Fallout 76 single player when he only meant you can ignore teaming up with people rather than single player servers. In some way the things that were mentioned are correct, but not how it would normally be taken.

 

[smokecombs]

I agree with you, mostly. HOwever I do disagree that developers didn't know gamers would expect this or that? The reason is the JPOG community has been moderately sized, but FIERCELY loyal for 15 years. And these discussions have been out there, for years with what fans wanted from a "Jurassic Park Operation Genesis 2". From everyone looking at private developers for games like "The Isle", "Ark", "Saurian", and the killer letdown of "Mesozoica" (sad face), and games that either didn't hit the mark at all, or flatout lied (Mesozoica), to games still being developed and worked on like The isle and Saurian. The knowledge of what fans want from these games has been out there. And individuality, even in species has been a thing (although I'm sure hard to implement), but 100% has been out there for different species. I mean it's the heart of these type of games. If someone could ever pull it off, their game becomes a legend, at least a cult legend in gaming. That is what JPOG really was. This game is light years past JPOG on graphics, but maybe just even with JPOG, or less on behaviors, combat is much cooler looking and about even as far as execution, while customizing is, I'm not sure yet, even maybe. As for terraforming and things like that, I think it could be improved as well. There are things I love about this one, and things not quite as good as I'd like. I'll end with, I know my wishes are unrealistic. But I think what would satisfy me as a gamer is very easily within the realm of possibility, even with just updates and DLC.