Ludia Report Card 2022-2023

It’s been another year of Jurassic World Alive! The last time I made a report card, we were introduced to the Dominion update when Rexy, Dreadnoughtus, Therizinosaurus, and the mighty Giganotosaurus made their way into the game. We also said goodbye to the Ludia Forums and now have the Ludia Discord instead. Many things have happened since then. Some good. Some bad. However, like all my report cards, we will be grading Jam City on the 5 main categories of the game: Designs & the Creatures themselves, Quality of Life Features & General Gameplay, The Arena & Overall Balance, Tournament Formats & the Balance Within Them, and Customer Relations. These will be graded on a scale of A through F, and I will be going over WHY they received these grades. So, let’s get started!

Designs:

Since my last report card, a total of 37 creatures have been implemented into the game. There were quite a few new animation rigs added and some new animations made for existing rigs. Beta has a unique death animation where she simply runs away, and both Beta and Atrocodistis have new pouncing animations for specific moves. Panthera Blytheae also adds an additional animation to the cat family with the evasive hunt animation while the wolves come in with a spooky howl. Indonemys also has a nice roar for its cloak as well and Toro has a bit of a temper tantrum before running away. A few ceratopsians do a little dance before goring you. And while I despise Pteranokyrie, another animation for the mostly forgotten medium pterosaur line is pleasant to see. It’s great to see new animations on existing rigs as it shows that you guys actually care about what you want your final product to look like, which is important. You never get an ugly dish in a restaurant because if your plate looks ugly, it effects your experience and that affects your decision to return.

Next up are the new creatures added to the game. Many of these creatures did already exist within Jurassic World: Dominion, and they look good here in Jurassic World Alive. All the Atrociraptors, Oviraptor gen 2 and Quetzocoatlus gen 2 are impressive. There are only three issues I have when it comes to some designs. Dire Wolf’s face looks like it was drawn on a balloon before it was inflated. Ceratosaurus doesn’t belong on a rex rig. It was smaller than Carnotaurus, but now looks absolutely massive, even by canonical Jurassic Park standards. The Carnotaurus rig would’ve been better. And speaking of Carnotaurus, Toro just doesn’t look right. He looks like a low-quality Carnotaurus.

But other than that, everything in the nonhybrid department is beautifully executed. As for the hybrids, again, all of them look good. Unlike Dire Wolf, Aenocyonyx looks like a sleek but burly wolf, with Indolycan looking like a rabid feral wolf. I love the ultraviolet glow from Alacranix and I wish the other scorpions had something similar, but then again that would make it less unique. Alankyloceratops is one of my favorites and looks like a dragon, which is why it deserves the move dragon’s flight. Atrocodistis looks very cool, and for all you Metroid fans out there, Pyrorixis is basically Ridley. However, there is still more!

We have quite a few new skins as well! I will be covering skins and their availability in a bit, but here I will judge the skins based on how they look, and they look GREAT! There isn’t one bad skin in my honest opinion. Harpy and Haze on the 2 armored pterosaurs look beautiful. I love the blues on both Jet and Firebreak for Pyrosuchus and Pyrorixis. They aren’t too overdone and they have coloring in the right areas with the right shades to make a cool skin. Exile is probably my least favorite, but it’s not bad. Sirius makes Aenocyonyx look like a spirit wolf or a bulkier arctic wolf. Spawn does well with the orange and blue, which don’t normally mix that well. Drift again does a really good job with the blue. I am not normally a fan of yellow, but Dsungaia’s Overload has grown on me, especially with the added black and white splotches. Outbreak does a nice job by making Dsungascorpios’s extra spines pop out and has that classic bright color that screams “DANGER! DO NOT TOUCH!!” that you see in nature. Pagan is a fine skin for Testacornibus, making the armor stand out along with those antlers. I am a big fan of Thylos’s Brood, making it look almost like a dalmatian, which fits with its dog-like animations. Druid makes the monochromatic Spinoceratops more like Spinosaurus with a new flashy sail. And we finally got nonhybrid skins as well, and again, they are all decent. The love for Albertosaurus shows as the Monolith skin really gives off vibes similar to the spirit bears of British Columbia while Desert almost reminds me of the Diplodocus from Walking with Dinosaurs. I like the Kentrosaurus and Dimetrodon skins on top of Hawk and Mantle. Home run with all these skins.

BUT WAIT! We then have a few new rigs to add to the mix as well. We first start off with Moros Intrepidus, who came in with some cool animations. They feel like the terriers of the game with their rapid and violent head shakes. Sure, they may not have a voice like Bobby Kimball, but many creatures do make high-pitched noises and I’ll take those sounds over Compsognathus’s any day. Next up is the scorpions, (and I like that you made a big scorpion with Alacranix and decided against a flock), while the other 2 scorpions are a flock, again showing effort to make this possible in the final product. Now if this was it, it would already be a solid lineup. This is already a very good grade, but this is the design team. THIS is the team that goes above and beyond, and that’s exactly what they did with this final rig: The frog rig. Released in time for April Fool’s Day, Beelzebufo is probably in the top 2 for the title of “Most famous amphibian in the Mesozoic” with Koolasuchus. However, I never thought it would really make it in the game due to it literally being a frog.  This is the dumbest thing they have released, but in a good way. With a face like this, you know the design team had a blast making these guys. I love them so much, and I love them to the point where I cannot give you anything lower than an A. 10 out of 10 for these little goofuses.

The Arena: 

The arena hasn’t had any major changes as of this year, however it’s meta has become incredibly centralized. Last year, the meta looked something like this. This is taken from the paleo.gg website and it shows what the most used creatures are in the top 50 pvp players. So last year we left off at 2.16, and this is what the meta looked like:

This isn’t too bad. And at the time, Rexy was exclusive which is why she is slowly on the rise, and Giganyx also got some love at this time too, hence its rise as well. Imperatosuchus was also unleashed too, so that’s why it is surging in popularity. And notice something also in these four tiers. Only five creatures have an on escape pinning effect and Hydra Boa has an on escape rampage, which really makes six trappers. Now we look at today:

Not only do 11 of these creatures have pinning abilities, but two thirds of the creatures above D tier can trap, and Ceratosaurus is sure to join those, as it is only held back thanks to its exclusivity and paywall and Styracos Lux is also sure to make an appearance up there soon. So basically, in order to survive in this meta, you either need to pin, be immune to pin, or just be an absolute beast that can handle either of these creatures, and that is what leads us to two resilients: the aforementioned Styracos Lux and the monstrous Geminideus. Geminideus essentially changed the meta. People were still gathering Dire Wolf DNA along with Red and Ghost to make the other big uniques to go along with it, but Geminideus immediately shot up to over a 96% usage rate. And then once the Atrociraptors and Wolves caught up, the meta focused on them and really hasn’t changed until Ceratosaurus and now Styracos Lux came in. Geminideus is able to handle these top tiers because it does a lot of damage while also having a giant hp stat. And with the ability to increase its armor to 100%, no resilient is breaking through. And almost every ability it has can bypass absorb, so fierce flocks like Allodrigues or Dsungascorpios are no match. You need a bulky fierce like Tyrannometrodon or Aenocyonyx to break through, and they come out of this ordeal bruised and on low hp. Styracos Lux is still a bit unclear yet, but with goring charge and a priority fierce rampage, it has a very good shot at sticking around. Ceratosaurus is the other one that I want to discuss. It is only low in usage due to the paywall in front of it, but seeing as you can boost it up to 10000 hp and with that moveset, it’ll join the top ranks soon. Now, this was a bit of a last-minute thing, but I decided to get a sample of 31 people (30 is typically considered to be the smallest general sample size in statistics) and decided to survey them on what their experience is in the arena. If they voted 1, then that means it’s fresh and exciting. A 10 means it’s boring and stale. Here are the results of that survey (dark red is 9 and dark blue is 10):

When I took the average of all of these, the average came out to about 8.5. And when I took out the one outlier, it rose to 8.8. I also asked the participants if they had any reasoning behind their choices, and here were a few that stook out to me:

Jimbohi (answered 1): “because I play in all arenas and they vary so dramatically”

Celtic Dragon: “Been thinking about how to answer this for a while now.

Overall I'd say about a 5, but currently about a 9.5

The arena for me has always been a way to pass time just enjoy it for what it is. It's always been flawed. But coming from pogo pvp this is still a million times better. The current issue is the few things that have changed over the last few weeks aren't viable to a ftp player. It's impossible. I stopped spending money and won't level things like Cerato to have something new and fun to use. Things went from changing too much too fast. To not changing at all. To changing a little bit only for some. There's no balance”

Charles932: “I have no other words. It’s like the cracker you find in the cabinet that’s been there for 7 years. It doesn’t even taste or smell like anything. It’s just….. stale.”

VaporVenator: “Pretty much every arena battle at my level (Aviary-Library) is full of teams consisting of either extremely high level beginner uniques or meta dinos that have been handed out a ton. Very little variety which forced me into using a team that was not just good because good against all the common threats, on top of using what I personally liked. I do occasionally get a battle with a pretty even and interesting team like my own but it's very rare.”

Mr. Troodon: “I quit because of the arena experience, I wasn't able to play with the creatures I enjoyed effectively, so I kept losing cups, meaning I got worse incubators, stopping me getting DNA, even if I wanted to use the better creatures I could not. Easy 10”

This one stands out to me. I would love to play with my favorites, but I can’t. And while I get that Euoplocephalus wouldn’t stand a chance in a unique format. With how the game is set up, that is how it’s supposed to be, and that’s fine. The different rarities make it OK. But the problem is that many creatures within their own raities drastically differ from others. If you are a fan of Spinoconstrictor, Trykosaurus, Tenontorex, or Albertospinos for example, you’re out of luck. These creatures stand no chance in a unique format or the higher arenas. The meta is too centralized for you to do anything. Now, having a few key creatures or players rule a meta isn’t a bad thing. Let’s look at Pokémon for a second at the official regulation C analytics on the website Pikalytics, which looks at the teams on Pokémon Showdown, a battle simulator for the game, above a certain threshold. The best current Pokémon is Flutter Mane at a whopping 67% usage rate:

That’s a lot. And you have many more outside these top 5 that are also have over 20% usage rates. And yet, some of the worst Pokémon can shine. Take this one, Orthworm:

Now this is a pretty low usage rate. Yet, it was won tournaments recently. You can almost use anything when you build a good team around it. Some of my favorites to use are Sableye, which only has .39% usage and Scream tail, which has only 1.39% usage and has also won a major tournament. In fact, many times you can use incredibly weird picks that seem like they would have no chance and come out on top. Empoleon, Lanturn, Vaporeon, and Pachurisu have all top cut the world championship despite major flaws or shortcomings. Eevee, Haunter, and Cottonee, which are not fully evolved forms, have all won tournaments despite being significantly weaker to the surrounding competition. But they could all do something that filled a role no other Pokémon could for that player. And that’s the issue here. Jurassic World Alive will never be as complex, but there is no way you would ever pick Mortem Rex because Tyrannometrodon and Aenocyonyx do the job so much better as well as do so much more. Compsocaulus never will have a chance as long as Compsoraptor is around. Scorpios Rex gen 3 has no chance with Dsungascorpios existing. Utarinex can’t compete with Styracos Lux. With Geminideus around, Erlikospyx, Erlidominus, and Haast Maximus can’t do squat. And with Geminideus existing, there is no point in using Geminititan or Skoonasaurus, and when there is no point in using Geminititan, there is even less of a point in using Ardentismaxima. In Pokémon, it may seem like the gap is big, but it really isn’t. Some things are better than others yes, but you can find niches and strategies to use other picks to their fullest potential. Andrewtops’s fullest potential falls way short compared to something like Compsoraptor or Pteranokyrie. The wiggle room in this game is so incredibly limited. Even boost spreads are almost identical. Again, with Pokémon, you have so much room for customization with your individual Pokémon that may make two Flutter Manes drastically different. Many Flutter Manes run the same few moves like moonblast or protect, but some run imprison, trick room, hex, substitute, thunderbolt, mystical fire, and perish song to name a few. In Jurassic World alive, you really can’t stray that far. Back when Phorurex was king, if I want to build a high-damage Phorurex, I would immediately drop to the faster Phorurex, and that made a speed war where Phorurex got faster, faster, and faster. The same is always happening. For example, Rexys in the legendary advantage formats used to sit at about 120 speed. Now they’re easily cracking 130 because the faster one always wins. With how restrictive the meta is, the game is far too rigid, and this causes boost spreads to almost line up with each other, which causes staleness, which causes boredom, which then leads to people leaving. In all honesty, with the arena being your biggest selling point while looking like this, it’s an F. Two thumbs down.

Customer Service and Community Feedback: 

I’m shocked, but in a good way. The last 2 years when I would do this, I could easily point out a whole number of things you guys screwed up on when it came to customer relations. However now, there are still some things, but you have improved. However, while improvement is good, there is still definitely even more room for improvement.

One of the biggest issues that I’ve seen really pop up is more cheaters. A good example of this is someone who was fighting a level 30 Ceratosaurus well before it was legitimately possible to own one. Here is an image taken on May 5th of this year:

And then after that, on May 29th of this year, another player had a level 30 Styracos Lux. This is an image of that Styracos Lux, which to my knowledge still isn't possible:

Now I know in your other games you say you will crack down on cheaters and in the sister game to this one, Jurassic World: The Game, you said bans would be swift to any player caught hacking. Well not only is this game still littered with players who hack like this, but I can go on YouTube and find dozens of players with dozens of accounts with infinite and obviously hacked resources. So, what I see is a company who said “We will not allow cheaters!” But then when it came down to it, you realized it would take work and just gave up. I know many people have fought players who use these hacks and suffer losses of time due to them, and while players do report it, it seems that justice isn’t that swift, if it even happens at all. But God forbid a scent that should cost 500 bucks but is accidentally priced at 50 bucks is fixed right away.

My other big issue with your community relations has to do with your honesty, or lack of honesty to be more precise. Let’s go back to your October Community Update and look at something many players have had an issue with:

You made not one, but 3 claims in this statement. We will be getting new huntable common and rares by the start of 2023. It’s June. Not a single common or rare has been released in 2023. The omegas have been released, but those aren’t commons or rares. They are omegas. You can’t make a new rarity and then chuck it under another. Miragaia can be used in an epic format, but it’s not an epic. And then the last thing you claimed was “look out for a few new rare creatures before the end of the year”. Then you only proceeded to release one rare with the Dire Wolf, bringing the rare total for the year to two. A few rares and one singular rare not the same thing.

But this isn’t a one-time deal. Now let’s look at enhancements and skill formats. Now let’s look at this announcement:

And this one:

So, just to rip into the second statement pushed out, what do you mean by “Should there be a significant impact” for a skill format? That is one of the most blatant lies I have ever read. Person A has no enhancements on a team of 8 uniques. Person B also has a team comprised of the same creatures, but each of them are all tier 1. So, let’s say those 8 are the following creatures:

Allodrigues

Ardontognathus

Dsungascorpios

Compsoraptor

Erlidominus

Utarinex

Compsocaulus

Lystrosavis

So even though these 8 creatures have the lowest hp in the unique rarity, person B has a net total of 2805 extra hp, and that’s with the lowest hp you could have on a unique team. If you want a good team like:

Dsungascorpios

Aenocyonyx

Compsoraptor

Dracoceratosaurus

Atrocodistis

Pyrorixis

Ceratosaurus

Styracos Lux

Then that net hp difference is 3480 hp. And that isn’t including attack and speed bonuses as well. Now, there are ways to adapt to some creatures. Like Alankyloceratops is great at handling any Atrocodistis or Dracovenator could be a great way to take on a tier 1 Dsungascorpios, but there is only so much you can trade off. However, there is no need to monitor anything. It’s simple logic. Let’s look at 2 creatures: Einiasuchus and Triceratops. You give any player an option to build a rare team with one of these 2 creatures. No one is ever going to pick Triceratops as Einiasuchus is just strictly better in every way. Even if you remove resilient impact from Einiasuchus, it’s still the better pick because of the hp stat. The same applies here. What is more favorable to win: Creature X or Creature X with an extra 10% hp.

All of this leads me, as well as many other players, to believe that you don’t actually know how to remove enhancements from unique skill formats. In fact, I am convinced you don’t. But stop with messages like this:

Come out and admit it. In all honesty, I’m sure the reception you’d get from admitting this is a lot nicer than the reception you’re getting now. But back in college, if I didn’t know something, I went to my professors and asked for help, even if the assignment was a day late and I hadn’t finished. They would be more likely to give me the credit back than if I were to go and cheat and be dishonest about my work. The same thing applies here. Just admit it. The community would be a lot more understanding if you were to do so than if you keep up this charade. And if you are also looking for feedback from the community, here is a sample of 385 people on a google form and were asked if you liked enhancements in skill formats. Of those 385, 94 said they liked them in skill formats, with 58 of those 94 not even cracking top 1000.

My last issue with you guys is just the amount of greed you show. First up, you had mentioned a while back that you were planning on limiting exclusives. In the same community update, you discussed exclusives and how you’re releasing things into the wild, which is nice. But then you started to make literally everything after that an exclusive creature. In fact, let’s count how many new creatures you can hunt from the past year. There’s Panthera, Pyroraptor gen 2, Tiger, Dracovenator, Oviraptor gen 2, Quetzalcoatlus Gen 2, Microraptor, Stegouros, Diabloceratops, and Red. Oh wait, that was locked behind the arena, so that brings your total to 9. Meanwhile there are 11 creatures locked away behind more paywalls and exclusivity. However, it’s actually the omegas I really want to dive into for this. In order to fully level up an omega and unlock every attribute, you need over 41000 DNA to fully max out an omega creature and get all of the moves unlocked as well. That isn’t the worst thing in the world. Rares take far more DNA to max out, so it’s not impossible. And 2 of the 3 are huntable, which is great! However, there’s a catch. The omegas have a cap as to how many you can dart. You can dart a maximum of 1 per day and 3 per week, and that is including Stegouros and Diabloceratops. And let’s look at someone who does not have VIP, and yet gets a perfect score on 12 darts, which is the normal amount of direct hits you can physically achieve outside of many commons and a few rares. You get a maximum of 12 DNA per direct hit, so we’ll also say this player is level 20. That mean the maximum amount of DNA that this player can get for 12/12 direct hits is 144. So if this player darted 3 Diabloceratops a week perfectly, it would take them 96 weeks to fully unlock everything and to get it to level 30. And that is with perfect accuracy. And the best part, that’s only for ONE of the omegas. And right now you have only Stegouros and Diabloceratops. I’m positive there are more omegas on the way, and when more enter the map, the thinner you are spread. No one was happy about this. However right before this came out, you covered your rear ends and bumped it to 6 a week and took off the one-per-day limit. That's nice, but it's still not going to be enough. Especially if more omegas are coming. And it's either these limited 6, or more event exclusives, neither of which are that amazing. 6 is still too low for the future. Another thing that demonstrates this greed is the new pass. Yes, Toro is good, but the pass you need to pay for is the only route with any unique DNA.  If you were just shy in the Isla event and darting Styracos Lux, people without this glowing ceratopsian were hopeful they could get it in the pass. Well, they can't. It's just so blatantly obvious how you treat the majority of your players like peasants. So I am giving you a D. That's an improvement to the last 2 years, but if you give yourselves a pat on the back for a D, that's sad.

Tournaments: 

Now tournaments allow players to branch out from the normal grind that is the arena, and unlike the arena, change here moves at a much slower pace. While some creatures in the arena may only last in the spotlight for a couple patches, Giganotosaurus is still standing tall and strong nearly a year later despite having to deal with the same old threats as well as some new ones. When it comes to the creature changes and additions in this category, some were pretty good, while others were not. Some of the good creature additions include Beelzebufo, which has good stats and abilities, but is held back by the lack of an on escape, a swap, or better multipliers. Tiger, Red, and Ghost all provided a unique and interesting new archetype of creature to use in an Epic format that really branched out from the stereotypical raptor. Oviraptor gen 2 is also a new creature introduced, eventually buffed, and I enjoyed using it. It has some cool & good tools. Quetzalcoatlus Gen 2, Pyrosuchus, and Moros Intrepidus are decent additions.  While not the strongest creatures around, they are still unique, cool, and fun to play & test with.

Now onto the bad. I mentioned these guys in the arena section, but I guess you weren’t done with the insanely strong Legendary additions as now we have both Spinoceratops and Panthera Blytheae to tack on with Rexy. And seeing as the few Thylaconyx counters are dying off, it just keeps getting better and better. But let’s talk these two new guys. Despite fear that this cool cat would be the #1 legendary around, it thankfully was not as strong as once thought. But it still is a pain to deal with. And now with its swap being precise (it wasn’t supposed to be, but more on this later as well), you can just swap in and one shot something like Ankylodactylus. Now I do like that you can always kill Rexy as long as evasive hunt is ready to go, but unfortunately, you also can do that to a whole host of creatures. Alloraptor, Indominus Rex, Scorpios Rex, Tarbognathus, Rinchicyon, Diplovenator, and Segnoraptor to name a few. And with that nullifying counter, it also screws over Resilients. Ankylomoloch should be able to take down any cunning, but with that counter, Panthera Blytheae just runs through it. And to make it more annoying, it has stun, deceleration, and distraction immunity, which are 3 great immunities. Thankfully it lacks pin immunity, because then otherwise our next creature would also struggle to take it down. Now Spinoceratops is walled by both Thylaconyx and Rexy, which is nice. The problem is that it can swap in and kill everything else, and it can even give the 2 creatures who shut it down a tough time too thanks to its swap in stunning strike and on escape obstruction. You have probably the best set of immunities and resistances in the format, a kit that is almost an upgrade of the old Thylacotator kit with a 33% bleed to a PRIORITY rending takedown. Heavy strike allows it to bypass armor and dodge while removing speedups, which are fairly common. And brace allows you to easily shrug off a non-fierce hit from even a boosted Panthera Blytheae rampage. And then you have both the swap and on escape. So, when you pair this all together, you have another legendary that puts such a strain on the overall format. Let’s now discuss some more problematic epics. First up is the creature that has shaped so many future epics like Beelzebufo: Pulmonoscorpius. With possibly the best move in the game in enfeebling impact (only other competition is the rampage version), a bleeding counter, no escape, and decent stats across the board, this epic is a terrifying addition that shaped so much of what came after it. The issue with these creepy crawlies doesn’t really lie in a format where everything is on an even playing field. The issue comes in when you have an advantage format, because if you do not resist bleed and stun, or have a group attack, you lose straight up. You can rock up with a level 20 Pulmonoscorpius and just casually kill a level 30 unique, legendary, or epic with relative ease. There’s no point in running many level 30 max boosted epics when a level 20 unboosted epic does the job better, which just isn’t great. Then there’s Panthera. Not the cat, but the raptor. I mentioned that I liked the Atrociraptors and how they all provided something different and new, and Panthera does that too. The issue is, she does it too well. I hate flocks as much as anyone else, but the problem is that on revenge, you take a KO and you just swap out. You cannot stop Panthera. You can slow down Giganotosaurus and can even punish its swap with a swap to something like a low hp Procerathomimus or Velosracos. Argenteryx has been getting so many new counters and ways to shut it down now like Pulmonoscorpius, Sonorasaurus, Red, and, well, Panthera. Megalotops is on the brink of falling off with the only real reason to keep it around involving swapping it on Panthera. And one of the things that annoys me most is the armor. Why? Well, Titanoboa should be a decent way around it with pin resistance and the rampage on escape, except that Panthera can never really go down to a rampage because at base levels, a boa rampage crit does 3250, which is the same amount of hp Panthera has, but because of that armor, Panthera always lives. And then there’s the 10% critical hit chance, which then allows you a small but very real chance of one-shotting many different creatures you could use to your advantage against it like Dimodactylus.

The rares…weren’t that bad. Dire Wolf wasn’t that crazy and Pyroraptor gen 2 isn’t a top tier either. It’s a shame that these two didn’t make an appearance, and unfortunately the rare buffs weren’t that amazing either. Speaking of tournament meta buffs, let’s talk about that. For buffed rares, almost every single buff had little to no effect on the rare meta. Albertosaurus, Dreadnoughtus, and Rodrigues Solitare still run amuck everywhere. And Dracorex is still a thorn in my rear end. Cervalces’s hp buff is nice for Albertosaurus, it didn’t do much for the rare itself. Quetzalcoatlus had absolutely no change. Oviraptor’s buff has decent potential, but it is too RNG-reliant. Arctops gaining cunning strike, again, did nothing. But…one buff DOES matter: Majundasuchus. Majundasuchus went from a mid-tier rare to a top tier overnight, which brought some fresh air to the tournament meta because it can not only put the hurt on top tier like Dreadnoughtus, it also brings in the new armor buff/debuff mechanics into a new format. I enjoyed using it, and it was a great addition to any team.

As for epic buffs, the armor buffing mechanics got a bit out of hand. Sonorasaurus got a good buff with the addition of brace, allowing it to live to turn three and fire off a big hit. Dimodactylus was a bit too good. Not only did it get an hp buff, but now its swap gives it a whopping 50% armor. I love Dimodactylus, but this is a bit extreme. However, there is an issue with this that I will cover in a bit that really pains me to say, but this buff is a bit necessary. However, in the epic format, this is a bit overboard. Giganotosaurus and Pulmonoscorpius thankfully just ignore this buff, but even other counters like Megalotops can’t two-shot it anymore when it swaps in, allowing it to constantly pivot. However, apart from Dimodactylus, most of the epic buffs were actually pretty good I’d say. Yes, creatures like Monolophosaurus and Ouranosaurus got shafted a bit. However, others like Acrocanthosaurus, Tyrannosaurus Rex, and Allosaurus gen 2 got buffs that set them apart and make them have traits over Giganotosaurus. Oviraptor gen 2 was fun to play with after its buff, and the Pulmonoscorpius nerf made a big impact in skill formats. However, one epic buff went a bit overboard. Now the legendary changes are interesting. More creatures were nerfed, but unlike Pulmonoscorpius, these creatures didn’t deserve the nerf really. Tarbognathus was falling out of the meta, but the damage nerf looking back didn’t really cause its downfall. However, Alloraptor was absolutely shafted. This fan favorite FINALLY got a buff that made it viable and really strong, but then you changed it and claimed it was a buff, when in actuality, removing rending takedown essentially buffed Spinoceratops and other tanks.

You then have all the big bad uniques that came into the game this year, and they absolutely changed everything. Atrocodistis, Pyrorixis, Ceratosaurus, Styracos Lux, Dsungascorpios, and Aenocyonyx are probably the biggest unique tournament faces of the year, and they are also all relatively new. Last year, your big faces included the likes of Testacornibus, Albertocevia, and Allodrigues. Today, not a single good unique from last year remains. So, the powercreep in the unique formats is still bad. It’s nice to see you care about some of the older uniques that do need help like Diorajasaurus. But there is very little it can do against something like Tyrannometrodon or Alankyloceratops. The only buffed unique that has any shot still is Diloracheirus. But to see you still care about the lesser uniques is still good. But the problem with uniques in tournaments came with reactives and enhancements. And while I have already covered this, it was still a great issue for many of the players who cannot afford these enhancements. And while there is some blame to be placed on a player’s end for those who used the same team as those who had the enhancements, the fact remains that this is far more on you.

In all honesty, I though tournaments were really going to suffer, but you pulled this one right out of your rear ends let’s put it that way. Omegas are a cool and interesting idea. I like that Stegouros is a great pick in a common format, falls off in higher rarities, and then makes a resurgence in the arena. Meanwhile Toro sucks in common formats, but then is a monster in rare formats. And Diabloceratops is decent, but it becomes a beast in a unique format/the arena. And while these are good, many players fear they are too good for the format and may become absolutely unstoppable. We haven’t had a chance to test these guys out yet, so we can’t say for certain.

My last real issue is the same formats being used over and over and over again. We’ve had the same things crammed down our throats for the past year. Very rarely do we ever get a restriction. And when we do, it’s very minor. The only shake-ups we really ever see are on the week five tournaments, and some of them are cool. Like for example, only using creatures before a specific patch or the 1 KO unique format. But after that, the biggest shakeup we have received to a tournament format is a rare format with no flocks. That’s it. People are tired of the same thing being thrown at us over and over again. It’s BORING. Like the legendary tournament. Rexy, Thylaconyx, Spinoceratops, and Panthera B. are so much stronger than the rest of the rarity that they are basically required. Panthera is the best revenge killer, Dimodactylus is the best pivot tool, and Ankylodactylus is just a legendary that is better than everything but a step below the big four. And then you have your choice of filler from Dreadactylus, Pulmonoscorpius, Lystrosuchus, Tarbonathus, or Alloraptor. The same twelve creatures with about seven of those on every team. I go more in depth in the arena section on this topic, but due to how stale tournaments have become, it’s a D. While it is the more worthwhile focus in my opinion for leveling creatures, tournaments are just so much more boring than what they could be.

Quality of Life Features and General Gameplay:

Finally, the category of Quality-of-Life Features and General Gameplay. This is honestly a bit of a wastebasket subject that goes over all sorts of things. This includes bugs, item/resource/creature availability, events, passes, and everything not covered in the other previous categories. Let’s start off the good first- the events.  For starters, while many people say you are stingy and cheap, you have been very generous with the events. The community is getting quite a few weekly events that include Legendaries and Uniques as well as more Epic attempts than usual. I remember when everyone freaked out when you included a unique attempt, but now its more of a “Oh, that’s cool” kind of response. There are pros and cons to adding Uniques and Legendaries to events, but it isn’t terrible to really take a toll on your grade. And speaking of events, let’s talk about creature availability, which, in my opinion, has somewhat improved since last year. I brought up how exclusives were basically dominating the arena and tournament metas, and many still do. However, you have been relatively generous with the opportunity to dart these creatures in weekly events. I am completely free to play and have maxed out Giganotosaurus in under 6 months, which is a decent timeframe. My only issue with this is that you guys tend to focus on a specific few creatures while others are basically forgotten. Ailurarctos is a prime example of a creature that you just don’t see in events. Heck, I have more Pulmonoscorpius than Ailurarctos despite the latter being 5 patches older. That being said, there is definitely an improvement from last year when it comes to handling event exclusives.

However, one thing you have completely missed the mark on is SKIN AVAILABILITY. Originally, you’d have the skins be the final reward in the pass, and I was hoping down the line you would make the VIP skins more available for purchase with coins or bucks.   This was done with Indotaurus, but THEN, you changed it up.   Now skins are only able to be purchased for REAL MONEY. And they aren’t cheap either. The Testacornibus and Refrenantem skins cost 20 dollars each. THAT’S INSANE! I could go and buy a used video game and still buy a pound of bacon from Walmart for that much money! And I would say that's a far more worthwhile purchase.  Here’s the proof:

This is ludicrous. I didn’t know how you could make it worse, but then you did by making these skins cost money for those who ALREADY spend money on VIP. I’m of course talking about the premium pass. I was really bummed out because I had just maxed out my Albertosaurus and was excited to use the skin, but as per usual, you crushed my hopes with a price tag. I don’t care about all the other resources that come with the pass. I want the skin. The rest I can grind and farm for later. However, something that has no effect on the creature itself shouldn’t cost nearly 50% more money than an actual video game. Pagan doesn’t give Testacornibus another 10% armor and Druid doesn’t give Spinoceratops 6000 hp. I also feel bad for the design team. Putting all their work behind a paywall so that a large majority of the players cannot enjoy it is essentially a kick to the groin. Is making a skin that difficult in comparison to say the creature itself? Probably not, but again it still takes some work. You can’t just take something like Alankyloceratops, give it a red head, a blue body, and green wings and call it a day, and the design team obviously did not do that. They made sure the skin is pleasing to look at and the colors used work well with each other. I’m not a religious man, but I’m going to quote the Bible on something that really sums up how I feel about these skins (Matthew 5:15 to be exact). “Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.” Think about those words.

Speaking of more items you’re being stingy with, let’s talk reset tokens. Now, do I think reset tokens should be given out constantly? No. However, they shouldn’t be as rare as they have been. Heck, half the time I forget these exist because you barely give them out. And with the meta always in some sort of shift, something like one of each stat boost once a month would be nice (and no, I mean outside the VIP pass). There are tons of people who have creatures they no longer use that they would want to deboost. And with the prices you have for boosts, I think you could be a bit more generous with these tokens. Many people are getting one or a couple creatures to level 30 at least once a month, so the amount of boosts needed usually outweigh the number of boosts being refunded, so there is no reason to keep these items locked away. I do like that you are doing more boost strikes that give out 50 boosts. But we need more tokens.

The last big issue that I need to address is the number of bugs in the game. Now in the past, there were a few bugs here and there, but it has gotten ridiculous. It’s like the line from How the Grinch Stole Christmas. “Oh, the bugs, bugs, bugs, bugs! There's one thing I hate: oh, the bugs, bugs, bugs, bugs!” There have been quite a lot, from tracking creatures to battles. Let’s start off with an easy one to explain: The Dreadnoughtus pin glitch. Basically, if you were locked down or pinned the previous turn, swapping into Dreadnoughtus will infinitely pin you. This also works for other creatures with a swap in shield. Here are a few examples of the many bugs that have plagues the game this year:

The pin bug with other swap in shielders:

The classic 2v1 bug:

The visible Dracovenator bug:

Whatever this one is:

There are also many other bugs out there, like a swap in stunning strike killing a 3800 hp Refrenantem, Alankyloceratops one-shotting Tenontorex, and the bug where when you rally heal and your opponent takes out the entire flock, you need to exit out of your game. Now some bugs like Rexy getting an extra turn of speedup can happen from someone going whoops and changing a singular number, but how do you screw up Alankyloceratops vs Tenontorex specifically and that badly?

So with all the bugs, the slow removal of cool features like skins for free to play players, but an improvement with the events, I say a C is fitting.

So, for a bit of recap Jam City, you got an A in Creature Design, a C in Quality-of-Life Features, a D in Tournaments, a D in Customer Relations, and an F in The Arena. So, after averaging everything out, you land at a solid D. Pathetic. It’s honestly pathetic. And the only reason why you’re this high is because of how important your design team is. If I could tell the design team anything right now, it would be “Jump ship. Get out of here. Scram.” I don’t want to see their talents wasted here, because they really are. This is a good-looking game that is plagued by poor coding and a company that has dug itself into such a deep hole that only gets deeper. You don’t care about your playerbase, and you never have. Back during the tiny flyer update, our two dataminers offered help. While you do not like datamining, that doesn’t mean you should refuse help. They found the issue in 30 minutes. You lollygagged for a week and slapped those who were locked out. You have no interest in what the player wants. It’s only what you want. And while a business has priorities, player satisfaction is a top priority, and very few players seem to be satisfied. Many spenders, free to play, casual, and hardcore players are all leaving in droves due to your bad choices. You almost feel like Disney when it gets access to a beloved franchise: you milk it for everything it has at the expense of the consumer. If you can’t attach dollar signs to it, you won’t go through. Issues like cheaters and bugs can fly under the radar, but if you can potentially milk something for double of what it’s actually worth, that is priority number one. It’s really sad to see this game go, as I have had good times and met good people, but with every passing day, I lose more desire to play. This is probably my last report card. I don’t see myself playing much longer. I don’t support these types of practices and I hope the next game you make learns from these past mistakes for the betterment of the consumer. I don’t see a way you can bring the game back. All I can say is learn from your mistakes, because you’re going to suffer if you ignore them. Thank you for reading. This took quite some time, and I would also like to thank all those who partook in surveys and proofread and whatnot. This was a big ordeal and all the help I received was extremely valuable. Again, thanks for reading and have a great day!