Credit: Inside the MagicThe Jurassic franchise is going through a renaissance.
This has happened before–back in 2015, when director Colin Trevorrow and Universal Pictures gave us Jurassic World. Not only did that film gross over $1.6 billion worldwide, but it also swiftly marked the beginning of a new era (and a rebranding) for the franchise.
Fast-forward 10 years, and we’ve had three more sequels–Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018), Jurassic World Dominion (2022), and this year’s Jurassic World Rebirth (2025).
The latest film stars Marvel veteran Scarlett Johansson as the lead and grossed over $880 million worldwide. However, it received mixed to negative reviews from audiences and critics, largely for bungling the setup of dinosaurs co-existing with humans around the world explored in the previous two films. It also isn’t a very good film–it’s lazy, dumb, and there’s about as much in the way of character development as you’d expect from a part-seven entry.
Alongside the recent Jurassic World films, we’ve seen two animated shows (five seasons of Camp Cretaceous, with the fourth and final season of its follow-up Chaos Theory coming next month), new attractions at Universal Studios theme park resorts, waves of merchandise, tie-in novels, and the “Jurassic World Evolution” video game series.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll be familiar with “Jurassic World Evolution” – even if you’ve never played it. It’s a park management simulation that allows players to create and run their very own Jurassic World (or Park) resort. The first two games even saw actors from the films such as Bryce Dallas Howard (Claire Dearing) and Jeff Goldblum (Ian Malcolm) return to lend their vocal talents as their respective characters.
Related: Next ‘Jurassic World’ Sequel Confirmed to Be Last Entry in the Series
Now, after months of anticipation, the third installment in that series has arrived: “Jurassic World Evolution 3”. This time, the franchise really does go global, as players can build dinosaur-filled theme parks all around the world, in locations such as Hawaii and Japan.
It also sees the return of Jeff Goldblum, who, in true Ian Malcolm fashion, provides ominous warnings about the perils of meddling with nature and genetic engineering.
A new “launch” trailer, which premiered yesterday, also showcases the many dinosaurs on offer, including Mosasaurus, Megalodon, Quetzalcoatlus, and T.Rex. If this trailer is anything to go by, the game looks absolutely thrilling. Watch it below from IGN:
Eagled-eyed fans will be quick to notice that the Spinosaurs that appear in the game have the same design as the one from Jurassic Park III (2001), a look that was retconned in favor of a more “paleo-accurate” design in Rebirth, much to everyone’s disappointment, with the 2001 Spino widely considered a fan-favorite Jurassic dinosaur.
Not only that, but the new game leans also heavily into the premise of dinosaurs living around the world, which was also swiftly and inexplicably retconned in Rebirth, as the film states that the planet’s ecology is no longer hospitable to the animals, with many having died off and surviving ones now residing along the equatorial belt, whose climate resembles the one in which they thrived millions of years ago–and none of it makes any sense whatsoever.
In other words, Frontier Games’ “Jurassic World Evolution 3” feels instantly at odds with Rebirth, and we love that. It might not necessarily be canon, but it’s nice to see other corners of this franchise, whether it’s “Evolution”, or Chaos Theory, continue to focus on dinosaurs living in our world, even if Rebirth, and Dominion, absolutely bunged that awesome concept.
The game was released on October 21 and is available now.
Will you be picking up a copy of the new game? Did you enjoy the latest film? Let us know in the comments!