I shouldn’t be too surprised, really. If a park sim based on Tim Burton’s 1996 B-movie homage Mars Attacks wasn’t on my bingo card, it’s because I recently threw it away and replaced it with a bobblehead that just nods amusedly at whatever video games do next. And conceptually, Jurassic World Evolution, with trapped humans instead of dinos, isn’t not a potential winner, right? Still, I was slightly confused when I learned that Mars Attracts, which will be released sometime next year, is the first licensed game to accompany the film. But then I realized I’d never thought to look before, which might also explain why there are no games. Do you think they made the pun and then worked backwards from there? Respectable, honestly.

You’ll notice how the trailer jumps back and forth between historical eras. There’s a cowboy despairing at a theme park attraction. An ancient Roman despairing at an attraction. An astronaut despairing at an attraction. Lots of despair at the attraction points is the theme here. The reason for all this despair is that you, as a Martian, are actually traveling through time to snatch people from different eras. Then you exhibit them in “highly customizable habitats” that mimic their natural environment. Once they’re well-behaved and docile, you can start snooping around and discovering new ways to entertain your guests. Apparently, if you question them too much, they may try to make a run for it. From a human perspective, that’s true.

As far as rides go, it looks a lot more like Theme Park than Planet Coaster, with single fixed attractions rather than customizable tracks. I assume Theme Park had customizable tracks too. My main memory of it is the swampy toilets, because my brain apparently thinks that memorizing books I read last year is less important than remembering a poop joke from a 30-year-old game. Thanks for that, skullmeat! So your skullmeat in Mars Attracts is mainly used to sort out power grids, keep your guests happy, and keep an eye on escaped humans and environmental hazards.

It comes from Irish studio Outlier, who previously made This Means Warp – a lively mix of FTL and Overcooked. I’m always up for a good park sim, and even more so for a good exploration one, so I’m excited to see how this turns out.