Prehistoric Kingdom
EARLY ACCESS PREVIEW
Upon entering my park, The Before Times,
you’re immediately greeted with the toilets
and a place to get a quick snack, before
moving on to an exhibition and your first
look at a big ol’ dino: Camarasaurus. This
long-necked fella likes a warm climate, a
good amount of foliage nearby, and,
apparently, spinning wildly on the
spot. Richard, my new giant pal, got
stuck on various trees, bushes, and
shelters and began revolving. Maybe
dinosaurs like chasing their own tails as
much as dogs do?
Prehistoric Kingdom is still in Early
Access, so bugs are to be expected.
Likewise the tutorial is currently limited,
though it does enough to get you started
with the help of a Nige Thornberry-like
instructor. I wasn’t able to make Richard
and his wife, Ina, completely happy in their
enclosure, as I couldn’t access more
detailed exhibit information, but as
development continues more features like
this will appear.
Alongside researching species and
bringing creatures to life, you’ll need to
consider energy management and visitor
happiness. You can create modulargroups of solar panels and wind turbines
to cover an area, generating power for
lights, stores and more. Don’t be like me
and choose a map that has fewer hours of
sunlight, because those solar panels won’t
charge and everything becomes
expensive and chaotic real fast.A SIGHT FOR SAUR EYES
Where Prehistoric Kingdom really shines
is the range of little details you can add to
your park. Want to place every plant and
bush along your paths? No problem! Keen
to create a lake with little floating flowers?
Go ahead. Do you fancy lining the way to
your exhibits with average looking
streetlights or eye-catching floor orbs?
You can even add letters to exhibit floors
and walls if you want to spell out
subliminal messages for your guests.
When placing park facilities, you have
the option to place prefabs or modular
units then customise their look and,
eventually, what they sell. You can also
rename them – alongside your dinosaur
pals – to make your playthrough a bit
more personal. You could name your park
‘We Spared No Expense!’ and design
visitor areas furnished with stylish
dark woods, or make everything look
like a giant bathroom by having tiles
everywhere. But just because you
could, doesn’t mean mean you
shouldn’t stop to think if you should...
In the build I played, the animal escape
mechanics weren’t finished yet. I stopped
Richard mid-spin session and dropped
him next to the path and instead of going
on a rampage, he had a wee lie down, like
a cat. I then placed him on the path,
secretly hoping he would crush a visitor or
at the very least make them run off
screaming, but they just walked under
him, seemingly unperturbed by a giant
reptile. In this universe, humans and
dinosaurs can coexist, it seems.
When more features are added, such
as adjusting pricing for tickets and other
customer amenities or enclosure
management. The game has the potential
to offer real competition to games like Zoo
Tycoon and Jurassic World Evolution- especially the latter which, though slick,
failed to make dinosaur keeping as
exciting as it should be. Here’s hoping
Prehistoric Kingdom’s devs find a way.
Lauren Aitken
W
hat’s better than running your own zoo?
Running a dinosaur zoo, of course.
Prehistoric Kingdom tasks you with
researching fossils that you can then use
to resurrect extinct creatures. You’ll need to
manage their enclosures, making sure they have
enough food, entertainment, and foliage, and then
there are those demanding guests to think about.Spare no expense on your zoo
for the extinctPREHISTORIC
KINGDOM
YOU’LL NEED TO CONSIDER
ENERGY MANAGEMENT AND
VISITOR HAPPINESSEXPET TO PAY
£23.80DEVELOPER
Blue MeridianPUBLISHER
CrytivoLINK
prehistorickingdom.comNEED TO KNOWPLAYED
IT