Jurassic World Evolution 2 Beginner's Guide

Jurassic World Evolution 2 is a business simulation game in which you're charged with building a successful dinosaur theme park. While it's not as robust as other park builders like Frontier's own Planet Zoo, it still has some intricate systems to get the hang of lest you allow a Spinosaurus to break free and snack on your paying customers. Unless, of course, your goal is utter mayhem, in which case, don't let me stop you! Here's how to get started in Jurassic World 2!

Gameplay Modes in Jurassic World Evolution 2

There are four different modes in Jurassic World Evolution 2. Each of them caters to different experience levels and playstyles.

Learning the Ropes

If you didn't play Jurassic World Evolution or this is your first park builder, you'll want to start with Campaign mode. It's short, taking up only a few hours of your time, but it will hold your hand through some of the basic mechanics like creating enclosures, catering to your dinosaurs' well-being, and tranquilizing and treating injured or escaped dinosaurs.

The second mode is Chaos Theory. This posits the question: what if you were around to help in the scenarios presented in the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World films? Your job here is to succeed where others failed. In other words, don't hire Dennis Nedry. This mode will introduce you to more advanced mechanics like managing scientists, going on fossil expeditions, and hatching and releasing dinosaurs you synthesized from genomes. Completing each Chaos Theory level will unlock a new map for Sandbox mode.

Innovating and Advancing

Sandbox is the creative free-for-all mode. You'll have access to unlimited funds and a bevy of options to facilitate creating your dream park (or running tests like how many velociraptors it takes to bring down a T. rex. Unfortunately, almost everything is locked in Sandbox, so it's beneficial to do the Campaign and Chaos Theory modes first anyway. In doing so, you'll unlock all dinosaurs for sandbox mode.

The final mode is Challenge where you'll be asked to complete specific goals within a certain time frame. Once you get five stars on a map, you'll unlock cosmetic genes for broad groups of dinosaurs depending on the difficulty level.

Operations

Any new park needs some essential buildings to get started. To see these, select the Operations tab in the menu. The first thing you'll want is an Arrival Point. This is how guests access your park. All of the paths leading to other buildings, amenities, and attractions need to link back to the arrival point.

Next, you'll want a Control Center and a Staff Center. The control center enables you to hire scientists, which are the lifeblood of your park operations. The staff center will allow you to rest your scientists after they've completed a few tasks and upgrade them, making them more efficient.

Dinosaur Creation

Once you have staff, the next logical step is to get some dinosaurs in the park. For this, you'll need an Expedition Center and a Science Center. The Expedition Center lets you send your scientists to various dig sites across the globe. You can see which types of fossils you'll collect when you select a site.

Your scientists will use the Science Center to extract DNA from fossils, contributing to the genome for each dinosaur species. A higher genome completion will increase the odds you get more viable eggs in each clutch and allow you to do more aesthetic and behavioral modifications when synthesizing your dino eggs. The science center is also used to research park upgrades and medical treatments.

Dinosaur Caretaking

Finally, now that you have dinosaurs, you'll need to be able to care for them with a Response Facility and Paleo-medical Facility. The response facility gives you two types of teams. The first is the Ranger Team, which refills feeders, checks your dinosaurs' comfort periodically, and repairs damaged or broken fences and facilities. This information will help you design more suitable habitats. The second is the Capture Team, which tranquilizes ill, injured, or escaped dinosaurs.

The Paleo-medical Team will diagnose sick or wounded dinos and administer treatment. If there's a serious affliction, you'll have to tranquilize the dinosaur, transport it to the Paleo-medical Facility, and assign scientists to perform surgery.  

Dinosaur Comfort

The most important thing, when it comes to taking care of your dinosaurs, is making sure they are provided for and have everything they need. Comfort level is one of the key aspects of this, and every dinosaur has its own comfort level that can go up or down depending on the environment in its enclosure. You'll want to manage this carefully, and our Jurassic World Evolution 2 Comfort Guide has you covered.

Park Appeal

Appeal is a core aspect of the game, and a park that's more appealing earns more money - which you can use to continue upgrading and expanding your park with. It's important to manage your appeal consistently, and we've got some great tips for that in our Jurassic World Evolution 2 appeal guide.

Scientists

You need scientists to do everything in Jurassic World Evolution 2. When you've built a Control Center, you can select the Control Room tab in the menu. The third tab, featuring an icon of a person will bring you to the scientist management screen. You'll pay an upfront recruitment fee to hire each scientist as well as a salary, the cost per minute.

After every task performed, a scientist's unrest will increase by one pip. As long as their unrest is still white, you can assign them to more tasks with no problem. However, if it's red, as seen on the management screen or when you try to assign them to something else, they'll become disgruntled. Upset scientists have a risk of sabotaging your park. The caution sign meter in the lower right-hand corner indicates the current threat of sabotage.

Scientist Skills

Each scientist has three skills: 

• Logistics is primarily used to research structures and building upgrades and go on expeditions to collect fossils.
• Genetics is primarily used to research gene modifications and extract DNA from fossils.
• Welfare is primarily used to research medicine, perform surgery, and incubate egg clutches.

When you assign scientists to tasks, you'll need to meet skill point requirements, for instance, two points in logistics and nine points in welfare. If you overcap in a skill, the task time will be reduced based on how many spare points you dedicate. Some tasks have a limit to how many scientists can be assigned, meaning you can't just throw several scientists at a task to get it done. Naturally, you'll want multiple scientists that excel in specific areas as well as a generalist or two with pretty even stat spreads to fill in any gaps.

When you train a scientist, you'll receive one or more skill points (an additional one per level of training) to put in a single skill. Take note of the maximum points each scientist can have in a particular skill before hiring them, as some might only be able to train up to one or two points in a skill.

Scientist Traits

Scientists also have traits that complement their skill point distribution: 

• Altruistic Salary - Cuts their salary in half.
• Cheaper Research/Expeditions/Synthesis/Incubation - Reduces the cost of these tasks by 30%.
• Faster Research/Expeditions/Synthesis/Incubation - Decreases the task time for these activities by 50%.
• Generalist or Logistics/Genetics/Welfare Specialist - Generalist increases all base skill points by one while Specialist increases the base points by three and potential points by five for that skill.
• Motivated - Increases the number of unrest pips by four, allowing them to complete more tasks before becoming disgruntled.
• Positive Influence - Decreases task time by 20% if assigned with one or more scientists.

These perks stack, so you could potentially decrease the time spent on a task by 70% or decrease the cost and time spent on a task, for example. Also, be sure to keep these perks in mind when training scientists.

These beginner tips should help you get a good grip on the game. If you need help with things like dinosaur comfort or park appeal, check out our other general guides listed below.