Dinosaur Zoo
Encyclopedia
Dinosaur Zoo information from leading paleontologists and expose them together with current knowledge on specific species in a more accessible medium. Dinosaur Zoo was released on iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....

 May 2011.

Users tap, stroke and roar at the screen and the various animals display their hunting and defensive techniques. Pop-up panels give a detailed account of the animal based on current palentological knowledge. Additional animals then become available in the form of extension packs for users to customise their menagerie.

Gameplay

Interaction

The users are provided with prehistoric animals in a suitable environment and the animals react to tapping, stroking and sound by demonstrating their defense strategies or hunting techniques.
Gameplay is limited to simple interaction and there aare no points, level-based reward system or assets which can be unlocked.

Information

The current

Production

Production began in 2010 and was completed and released in May 2011. Dinosaur Zoo was initially developed under the name Dinosaur Safari but later renamed in order to shorten the name for iTunes. The project was directed by Andrew Kerr and code development was provided by Thumbspark. Digital models and animation were provided by Dotnamestudios.

Development

An iPhone version is currently under development and an android tablet version is currently under discussion but awaiting a clear market leader in the Android tablet market.

Distribution
Dinosaur Zoo is currently solely distributed through iTunes and is available only for iPads.

ular dinosaur colouration is scant although recent clues from the recently discovered Hadrosaur and fossilized skin fragments from sinosauropteryx
Sinosauropteryx
Sinosauropteryx was the first genus of dinosaur outside of Avialae to be found with evidence of feathers. They were covered with "furry" coats of very simple filament-like feathers...

 suggest both crytic patterns and bright colours are in evidence.

ENVIRONMENTS

Critics have suggested two errors in the background environments, the blue-bell flowers in the Kentrosaurus
Kentrosaurus
Kentrosaurus is a genus of stegosaurid dinosaur from the Late Jurassic of Tanzania. Its fossils have been found only in the Tendaguru Formation of Tanzania, dated to the Kimmeridgian stage, between about 155.7 ± 4 Ma and 150.8 ± 4 Ma . Apparently, all finds belong to one species, K...

 environment and the modern variety of banana tress in the Muttaburrasaurus
Muttaburrasaurus
Muttaburrasaurus is a genus of herbivorous ornithopod dinosaur, living in what is now northeastern Australia between 100 and 98 million years ago during the early Cretaceous Period. It has been recovered in some analyses as a member of the iguanodontian family Rhabdodontidae...

 environment were unlikely to be present during the Jurassic
Jurassic
The Jurassic is a geologic period and system that extends from about Mya to  Mya, that is, from the end of the Triassic to the beginning of the Cretaceous. The Jurassic constitutes the middle period of the Mesozoic era, also known as the age of reptiles. The start of the period is marked by...

 and Cretaceous
Cretaceous
The Cretaceous , derived from the Latin "creta" , usually abbreviated K for its German translation Kreide , is a geologic period and system from circa to million years ago. In the geologic timescale, the Cretaceous follows the Jurassic period and is followed by the Paleogene period of the...

 Periods.

AUDIO
In the audio of some scenes, there are sounds of modern-day frogs, although it is again conjecture to assume prehistoric frogs sounded much different.

PALEOGEOGRAPHIC MAPS
The Maps are accurate in form althuogh the pin-point location is somewhat broad and critic might argue not specific enough.

SCALE
On the “relative to an average human male” scale, Dinosaur Zoo has tended to err towards the maxium size of each animal rather than the median.

TIME PERIODS
The time periods are mostly accurate except for the Ornithocheirus
Ornithocheirus
Ornithocheirus was a pterosaur from the Cretaceous period of Europe and South America...

 which is said to live in the Middle Jurassic
Middle Jurassic
The Middle Jurassic is the second epoch of the Jurassic Period. It lasted from 176-161 million years ago. In European lithostratigraphy, rocks of this Middle Jurassic age are called the Dogger....

 when in reality it lived in the Early Cretaceous
Early Cretaceous
The Early Cretaceous or the Lower Cretaceous , is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous...

, this was most likely a mistake.

Reception

Reviews of Dinosaur Zoo have been positive. Casey Chan of Gizmodo for Gizmodo's app of the day wrote "Think of it as an encyclopedia for dinosaurs but instead of giving you monotonous info that bores you, it places you in an interactive Dinosaur Zoo - It's an app that lets you play with dinosaurs man, who's not going to love that?"

Awards

In June 2011, Dinosaur Zoo was named "App of the day" by Gizmodo.
Later that month, Dinosaur Zoo was named "New and Notable" on the US iTunes app store

Charts

Highest iTunes App store ranking : Over all

United States: #34

Ireland: #21

Highest iTunes App store ranking : Education category

United States: #2

United Kingdom: #2

Ireland: #1

Singapore: #1

New Zealand: #1

Argentina: #1

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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