What did you do in Planet Zoo today?

Makes you think if san diego really deserves the praise it gets
That's why I prefer Houston Zoo (apart from because I grew up here). It does have some old, kinda cramped habitats, mainly in the cats section, but in general, the zoo is really trying to improve in making larger, more natural enclosures for maximum comfort for the animals, and all this in a relatively small space, being right between the medical center and the museum district. But that's just my 2 cents😅
@Captain Callum How can you recreate the zoo so well and so fast at the same time? I spend a whole day to make a fence lol
He's Bob the Builder
 
@Captain Callum How can you recreate the zoo so well and so fast at the same time? I spend a whole day to make a fence lol
I used to be that person aswell :LOL: There was a time when i couldnt make a single custom thing and relied on steam workshop blueprints to build an entire zoo, i actually started on learning how to build with fences funnily enough. I can never say exactly how i can build quickly these days, it must a combination of no imagination needed since its a recreation and the experience i have gained from previous zoo builds. I'll admit i learn fast and able to retain alot of knowledge, extensive knowledge of the building menus is a must to be able to build fast.

Let's demonstrate my ability with a picture of an upcoming cage style area of the same bear pit habitats:

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30 seconds analysing the picture i can tell you:
  1. Paths - plaster wall panels half sunken into the ground. The default asphalt path serves as the portion of the bus tour road we can see throughout san diego zoo. Using plaster panels we can create decorative cuved pathways for a realistic effect.
  2. Fences and pathside foliage - Fence is made out of metal rods from the australia pack, color them a brown shade. There is 4 horizontal rods, with 2 vertical. Copy paste the fence to create a long fence that allows curving. For the foliage, we can see a mix of possible tropical and temperate plants leaning into the asian theme - it is an asian area after all. A mix of crowberry bush and creosote bush can serve as our leafy bushs on the side, occasional tropical sapling trees or ferns can be planted to vary the scenery. That stone wall we can see on the left could easily be a masonry brick wall from the twilight pack. There is also bamboo seen on the right of the picture, this serves as a visual barrier between these habitats and the grizzly bear habitat over to the right.
  3. Cage Habitats - I know these are already habitats for the francois langur and aye aye. Chainlink barrier, curved on the corners serves as the main barrier for the habitat. The roof is a little tricky as no small curved roof like that exists in game. Use of the smaller twilight shingle roof or a custom made metal roof will top the habitat to stop our primates from escaping. Inside the habitats, providing there is plenty room for traverse space, african branches are the climbing material of choice. Include sparse foliage on the ground as little to no leafy saplings or bushes can be seen.
  4. Background forest - This is on the hill upwards to the completed urban jungle area. Generally we can expect a mix of tropical and temperate trees as seen throughout the zoo already. Elm, foxtail palm, mpingo, sycamore maple, ash trees typically form our standard forest scene. Place creosote bush, custard trees, tree ferns into the ground level to create a lush forest and if space allows a large kapok tree sunken into the hillside to minimise piece count.

With exact knowledge of the area i plan to build, then the building process can begin. There is little need to experiment with pieces or waste time browsing through the nature or construction menus as i know the exact piece i already need. Follow the picture and build away. I would start with the paths, then the cages, then pathside foliage and fences followed lastly by the forest behind. I would spend around 1.5-2 hours at most in this area depending how stubborn space requirements are inside the cages.
 
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Well today i caved in and restartet my beloved Zoo on the nile (rip) and started with the entrance. Which is based on one of my local zoo's which fits a desert setting oddly nicely imo. Im a little unsure about the colors, so if anyone has suggestions let me know :)
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Decided on swapping the colors for something lighter and added this small tower+wall section in front. Alot of old cities still have some remnants of their past as monuments or vistas around . And since this zoo is supposed to be in Kairo i thought it would be cool to incorporate a section of an old historical city wall in there
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"Think it'll scare the kids?" "Kids? This will give the parents nightmares." Props to you if you got that reference lol.
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In all seriousness the Australian night house is coming together, Tasmanian devil indoor area is finished, really maximized the “devil” part with all the red, I like it though, adds character.

Video on this should be up tomorrow, then it’s onto the second half of the house with the kiwi 🥝!
 
"Think it'll scare the kids?" "Kids? This will give the parents nightmares." Props to you if you got that reference lol.
There's an American Navy man here. Part of a research program one of my companies is running. Owen Grady.

...

His animal often try to escape. They are smart. He needs to be smarter...


Charlie, you're talking to a Jurassic World saga fan. My favorite franchise ever, since I was young, yes sir
 
Anyone want to feel sad for some bears? Well you can with these tiny bear pits at the san diego zoo! This is the bad side of making these recreations, the tiny habitats make you feel bad building for them when you have previously built a great naturalistic habitat for them.

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I’m definitely not saying that these habitats are perfect, but you cut off a good 1/3 off the area the bears have in the zoo. Their habitats use so-called ha-has, i.e. the incline is not so steep and not blocked off as you have it and the bears can and actually do go down there right up to the wall that separates them from the guests. And they also have their sleeping ”caves” attached at the back side plus the backstage area. The two grizzlies of the zoo have the use of two of these areas.
 
I’m definitely not saying that these habitats are perfect, but you cut off a good 1/3 off the area the bears have in the zoo. Their habitats use so-called ha-has, i.e. the incline is not so steep and not blocked off as you have it and the bears can and actually do go down there right up to the wall that separates them from the guests. And they also have their sleeping ”caves” attached at the back side plus the backstage area. The two grizzlies of the zoo have the use of two of these areas.
Yeah i know the size isn't perfect, the alignment I got the bears at is does prevent any indoor area and water pools being built. To maintain the true size alignment would of had the grizzlies and sloth bear under the urban jungle - building between 2 large areas with no room for manoeuvre does lead me to certain size limitations. Still though, it captures the 1930's era bear pit atmosphere well enough, an endless row of faux rock pits to hold bears that are in dire need of a replacement. The incline however is true to real life data, if the incline isn't that steep then the way real life elevation data is translated into the game is wrong. The top of the bear canyon is 88 metres, the bottom is 68 metres - 20 metres on this roughly 200 metre stretch is one steep incline. Pictures of bear canyon seem to agree that this is a steep section of the zoo.

I obviously blame my alignment of the urban jungle too far to the left which forced 3 out of the 5 bear pits to be smaller. The remaining 2 bear pits holding spectacled bears are true to life at a length of 20 metres, whether that Allow any indoor area, proper water pools and climbing area is doubtful. A 20x20 bear pit including room for the guest side ditch is still nothing to brag about. I shall return with pictures when the area is complete, I have been rather generous with space for the primate cages so perhaps the spec. bears may be living in luxury.

I'll also mention that I am very well aware of game traversable space, trying to force the game animal to enter the same kind of spaces leads to extremely exaggerated habitat sizes that many community designs are based on. I will often put the habitat door on the implied indoor area, I built the indoor building, but the hitbox on the bears and faux rock arch is never going to let the bears pass. In fact the faux rocks have among the largest hit box in the entire game for whatever reason.
 
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Do y'all have any tips for a platypus habitat?

I wanna build one in franchise, but I'm struggling with how to build it
Impossible to do realistically- the space requirements (especially land) are WAAAAAAAAY to high - try to make the water area as small as possible and hide some land area “backstage” to make the land area look as small as possible (IRL, they don’t have much more than some logs they can rest on and their burrow entrance)… keep the depth as low as possible and use darkly recoloured flexicolour or already-dark scenery to (as much as possible) give the impression of a nocturnal house.
 
I took some screenshots of "the wild."
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Specifically a place I have made up years ago... It is known as White Fox Valley. I first came up with the place (set in Alaska) nearly a decade and a half ago.
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It is from my family's days of playing Sims 2. One of my Sims was from Hawaii and for some reason (IDK why) ended up in Alaska by herself haha. She was lonely and thus was sent a Husky (with a bit of border collie in his ancestry) to keep her company. There was a scary pack of wolves nearby that she and her dog (she named him Snowboy) were scared of. There were three white wolves...
These screenshots are supposed to taken in White Fox Valley. The PZ version of a Sims memory.
 



Redecorated a WE with Spectacled Flying Foxes I built last session and did not like.
It has a main entrance for guests that do not want to walk through the exhibit but rather watch the animals from the outside and a walk through option. I'm... semi-okay with the building now. Not the best I ever made but at the moment I just want to move on.

I'm also side-eyeing my Cassowary habitat but also don't know how I want it different.
 
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