My disappointment is IMMEASURABLE. I was so heartbroken upon finishing my first day with this game, genuinely crushed with tears of stress coming down my face. It’s inferior in nearly every way to the original, something I’ve seen thrown around in the reviews for this game is the exact opposite so allow me to explain. Positives first; the graphics are still lovely! The dinosaurs & reptilesMy disappointment is IMMEASURABLE. I was so heartbroken upon finishing my first day with this game, genuinely crushed with tears of stress coming down my face. It’s inferior in nearly every way to the original, something I’ve seen thrown around in the reviews for this game is the exact opposite so allow me to explain. Positives first; the graphics are still lovely! The dinosaurs & reptiles still feel alive & do more in their pens now than just walk in circles. I also appreciate Frontier bringing back almost every species from the first game. The new dinosaurs & aquatic/aerial reptiles are all great! That’s where the positives end. In JWE1, you could unlock all the dinosaurs if you took your time in the campaign, but you only unlock a handful of the 84 species in the campaign this time around. Why change a perfect system, aside from padding out the game for dozens of hours? It took me 48 HOURS to unlock every species. That’s INSANE. Your playtime can obviously vary, but it’ll still take DOZENS of hours to get every species, most of them locked behind arbitrary goals in the research tab. The easiest way is to grind them out in Challenge mode, but it’s one of the most GRINDY experiences you can have in modern gaming & some dinosaurs are exclusive to certain maps! WHY? Not to mention you don’t actually unlock the dinos for Sandbox until you HATCH THEM. Why isn’t the genome enough? Setting the game to 3x speed only helps so much with the tedium. The campaign is so barebones that I’m shocked it’s even here in the first place, finished it in 4 hours. Can’t forget the 2nd mission which usually glitches & causes you to restart the mission! JWE1’s campaign barely had a story, but had engaging gameplay for a 20ish hour campaign. I also DESPISE the new scientist system. You need them for literally EVERYTHING. In JWE1 none of this complicated-for-no-reason crap existed, you had research/expedition teams do multiple tasks at once for you, so this is one of the most massive steps back I’ve ever seen. Your scientists only do one expedition at a time, with no way to expand it & you’re limited for some reason on extracting DNA from fossils. It’s beyond tedious & BORING relying on these drones to do everything for you instead of taking some initiative like in JWE1. Instead of carefully multitasking everything, your mind never has a chance to rest with JWE2, there’s always a problem going on & it’s really not my fault! I put 100’s of hours in JWE1, I know how to build a Jurassic Park by now! What also hurt is that releasing a new dino felt like a moment of accomplishment in the first game, here it feels like just another box to check with no fanfare & immediately worrying about their unforgiving environment needs instead, which makes putting 2 different species in the same enclosure a headache I never felt like dealing with. The new paleo healing mechanic is GRATING as hell too. Every time a dinosaur has a tiny fight or gets sick you have to send a separate team to scan them & their AI is HORRIBLE. Expect to transport your dinos for a small boo-boo every 5 minutes if you have 1 slightly unfriendly member of a species! Why’s the transport button now it’s own option at the bottom of the control panel instead of a shortcut on the R1 button like in the first? WHY THE STUPID CHANGES? The new hatchery mechanic with the dinosaur genes is frustrating too, so many negative genes too often even w gene editing. Chaos Theory was too annoying to get any enjoyment out of & throttled by insane expenses of the dinosaurs. Despite the scenarios being interesting, I’d just catch them on YouTube if I was you. The new systems added in are terrible & add so much aggravation that was never there to begin with! That’s what frustrates me so much about JWE2, all this to make the park management more “complex” but only added an unnecessary hassle to nearly every moment you’re playing it. What made me give up on JWE2 is the Sandbox mode, they BUTCHERED it. You can’t turn off the ridiculous scientist mechanic in Sandbox & you can’t turn off Dino fights either so if you want a T. Rex with a Spinosaurus you’ll have to wait until they hopefully fix their stupid mistake WHICH WAS ALREADY FIXED IN THE FIRST GAME. To get a good amount of dinos for Sandbox you’ll have to grind for DOZENS of hours in other modes for them, no jumping right in! Dear God game is a colossal disappointment. Say whatever about JWE1, at least it was put together competently & with respect for the person playing it! This is BAD. Play the first & leave JWE2 to rot. I don’t think the same post-launch roadmap can save this one. You have no idea how much it pained me to say all of this, my heart hurts. I won’t be touching this game again until it’s fixed, maybe. Moral of the story; next time you’re thinking of fixing something that isn’t broken, DON’T.… Expand
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