App of the Day: Dinosaur Zoo for iPad

Gizmodo: Dinosaur Zoo for iPad

Casey Chan
Dinosaurs in any shape, size or form are freaking magical. I don't care if you're talking about T-Rex or the little critters, I love them all. Dinosaur Zoo is an interactive encyclopedia-type app that lets you see dinos in their natural habitat—attacking, eating and dumping on your command.

What is it?
Dinosaur Zoo, $4, iPad. 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 (hence the name). You can slide through various dinosaurs and have them attack your finger tap, get fed, or drop a deuce. It's like having a Jurassic Park on your iPad!

But Dinosaur Zoo isn't all play, there's basic information on the dinos and a slick map interface that shows you where they roamed (and additionally, what the Earth looked like in that era). The app also let you know what type of fossils have been found of particular dinosaurs and what the bone structure was like.

It's an app that lets you play with dinosaurs man, who's not going to love that?

Who's it good for?
People who like dinosaurs. People who like interactive encyclopedias. People who like learning new things. Who doesn't like dinosaurs!?

Why's it better than the alternatives?
The dinosaurs are interactive, the environment is vividly delicious and it's fun as hell. Some apps about dinosaurs are much more informative, that's for sure, but it's super cool to pretend that you're visiting an actual Dinosaur Zoo like Jurassic Park. I've been making that Argentinosaurus take a dump for like half an hour now. I especially love the 'map view' of the app, as I can see how our world once looked and where particular dinos lived.


How could it be even better?
More dinos! A lot of the big time dinos are 'coming soon' so that'll help flesh out the app. When you click on a particular dinosaur from the zoo map, it'll cycle through all the other dinosaurs to get there—it'd be better if it was instant. Also, I'd love if it was possible to cycle through 'Dangerous, Feeding, etc' for each dinosaur so I can see how all of them react. It'd be super cool if I could pan around the environment too. There's a decent amount of information here but more wouldn't hurt it (or a link to Wikipedia or something).