Another thing that stands out to me about the reveals is that none of animals are "new rigs" in the way we view them. Baboon is based on mandril just with a lot of work put into the fur probably, markhor is just another goat based on ibex probably and Palla's cat will probably use the san cat rig with new animations for the tail and stuff, so that makes me wonders what the high effort animal(s) would be this time.
DLC18 discussion and predictions
- Thread starter Leaf Productions
- Start date
The African leopard
So thoughts aside from the ones I sneaked in while at work:
African Leopard - is fine. It was on my long want list. It's free. No complaints really.
The hinted/pretty much confirmed reveals:
Hamadryas Baboon (mostly confirmed) - to be honest I was never big on the baboon bandwagon but I know they've been strongly wanted. If it turns out to be true which it pretty much looks like it, I'm happy for yall who wanted it. I am happy to get another African monkey as well, even if I've never been a baboon fan.
Markhor - great addition, iconic and nostalgic back to ZT2. Even though I was willing to not get it to allow more Latin American animals and birds get in, I'm still really happy about it.
Pallas Cat - much like the Baboon, just wasn't on the bandwagon. But I admit it's popular and fits the potential themes well.
Potential pack ideas/additional animals:
Highlands (global) - 7 habitat animals and a small set of scenery, like the Barnyard pack was
Spectacled Bear - for the love of ursa Frontier, please get us a Latin American animal in here. Plus, this one was one of the standard inclusions for most Highlands pack ideas.
Himalayan Tahr - another ungulate and we know Frontier loves ungulates, and IMO anyways, absolutely beautiful animal.
Goodfellow's Tree Kangaroo - they are in mountain ranges, so they would be appropriate and popular and would likely take up the main design resources of the pack
Himalayan Monal - definitely want to include a bird in this pack!
Rocky Mountain Goat, Bighorn Sheep and Alpine/Himalayan Marmot would also be great inclusions.
Asia pack 8+1 pack
Himalayan Tahr - see above
Blackbuck - third ungulate and why not because Frontier.
Raccoon Dog - got a cat, need a dog! (Golden Jackal would be an okay replacement)
Mandarin Duck - sorry Monal but if it's an Asia pack I know where I want my bird pick to be.
King/Indian Cobra (E) - there should be no question at all what animal should be picked for the exhibit animal for an Asia pack. I can't even think about any alternative.
I think what frustrates me most with either pack is that Latin/South America is in such dire need comparatively to the other 5 habitable continents. It's like Frontier is purposefully avoiding putting in animals from Latin America at this point. Which the last few packs has really made me feel like a Latin America pack of some sort is eminent. And yet...here we are. not only that, it's potential to not include a bird is also quite possible. Imagine, two of the bigger things we've been vocal about in the last two years...and this pack may avoid both of them.
Despite this, I do not think this will be the last pack. It could be, and the other additions could be a Coati, New World Monkey, Spectacled Bear/ABB and Tree Kangaroo and all would be well mammal wise. But I suspect that's not the direction this pack is going. Could be wrong though. But as I mentioned above, imagine no Latin American animals and no birds in this pack. And that it would be the last pack. Frontier could be saving those for PZ2 but we're in the here and now right now, they'd have to be willfully excluding these animals if this were the last pack and had none.
African Leopard - is fine. It was on my long want list. It's free. No complaints really.
The hinted/pretty much confirmed reveals:
Hamadryas Baboon (mostly confirmed) - to be honest I was never big on the baboon bandwagon but I know they've been strongly wanted. If it turns out to be true which it pretty much looks like it, I'm happy for yall who wanted it. I am happy to get another African monkey as well, even if I've never been a baboon fan.
Markhor - great addition, iconic and nostalgic back to ZT2. Even though I was willing to not get it to allow more Latin American animals and birds get in, I'm still really happy about it.
Pallas Cat - much like the Baboon, just wasn't on the bandwagon. But I admit it's popular and fits the potential themes well.
Potential pack ideas/additional animals:
Highlands (global) - 7 habitat animals and a small set of scenery, like the Barnyard pack was
Spectacled Bear - for the love of ursa Frontier, please get us a Latin American animal in here. Plus, this one was one of the standard inclusions for most Highlands pack ideas.
Himalayan Tahr - another ungulate and we know Frontier loves ungulates, and IMO anyways, absolutely beautiful animal.
Goodfellow's Tree Kangaroo - they are in mountain ranges, so they would be appropriate and popular and would likely take up the main design resources of the pack
Himalayan Monal - definitely want to include a bird in this pack!
Rocky Mountain Goat, Bighorn Sheep and Alpine/Himalayan Marmot would also be great inclusions.
Asia pack 8+1 pack
Himalayan Tahr - see above
Blackbuck - third ungulate and why not because Frontier.
Raccoon Dog - got a cat, need a dog! (Golden Jackal would be an okay replacement)
Mandarin Duck - sorry Monal but if it's an Asia pack I know where I want my bird pick to be.
King/Indian Cobra (E) - there should be no question at all what animal should be picked for the exhibit animal for an Asia pack. I can't even think about any alternative.
I think what frustrates me most with either pack is that Latin/South America is in such dire need comparatively to the other 5 habitable continents. It's like Frontier is purposefully avoiding putting in animals from Latin America at this point. Which the last few packs has really made me feel like a Latin America pack of some sort is eminent. And yet...here we are. not only that, it's potential to not include a bird is also quite possible. Imagine, two of the bigger things we've been vocal about in the last two years...and this pack may avoid both of them.
Despite this, I do not think this will be the last pack. It could be, and the other additions could be a Coati, New World Monkey, Spectacled Bear/ABB and Tree Kangaroo and all would be well mammal wise. But I suspect that's not the direction this pack is going. Could be wrong though. But as I mentioned above, imagine no Latin American animals and no birds in this pack. And that it would be the last pack. Frontier could be saving those for PZ2 but we're in the here and now right now, they'd have to be willfully excluding these animals if this were the last pack and had none.
Possibly a duck or salamander?!?!
They are so close to 200 animals now. Would be foolish to stop here.
Tree kangaroo maybe?
Although i dont think having a pack full of relatively simple animals is super unlikely either.
Great except for the tree kangaroo, I would personally prefer the rock wallaby.
When will the release the trailer and full species list? I’d expect late October but love for it to be earlier.
Leaf posted a highland animal pack video 
They said a couple of weeks, so id guess early ish to mid october so 2-3 weeks
If I am lucky, it’s gonna be another waterfowl species. I got to be honest, I do think there are good odds to get a bird. So we will see. As I said before, the baboon makes this pack 5/10 on its own for me already. Now it’s up to the rest of the roster.
At first I was a bit worried, I have since calmed down a bit. I still stand by my somewhat mixed reactions, but I will say something doesn’t feel right either. “Doesn’t feel right” in a good way though. Lots of weird choices and things going on.
Mid to late October. The latest it could be released would be the last week of October, because (I think) it's coming before the anniversary (idk if I'm wrong or not, don't remember if they said the anniversary and dlc update are the same or not). Earliest could be the third full week of Oct, as they said it'll be a few weeks before we hear more.
Yeah I'm thinking the earliest we get the trailer is the week of 13th-19th, gives them enough time and is a "few" weeks away, but the week prior could be on the table I guess
If it's anything like Barnyard, I'd say no exhibit species but some decorative items instead, which the banner seems to hint at as well.
Species-wise, I think your selection is both solid and likely. I could see the hyrax be replaced by a marmot/pika and wouldn't be surprised if the tree kangaroo is saved for a future pack too. I'd like to hope for a golden pheasant or Himalayan monal, but I don't consider these very likely.
Honestly I want the olive baboon over the hamadryas simply because that is the default baboon I think of and it was in zt1
Humming Birds is not at all likely imo
Asiatic Lion is a weak pick i think
Ok idk if I'm going crazy or not, but I thought I saw someone say this, but did someone talk about how that if this is a zookeeper's collection, that there would be "mini-themes" or whatever, and that the three we saw today were just the three in the highland/mountain theme, and that we would get other sets of themed animals within the pack (tropical, arboreal, grasslands, etc). Sounds better than what we might get with just a highland pack, but it could be too good to be true.