DLC 19 Speculation

[Antonin]

Even if it was delayed (and given that the 2026 CMS game hasn't announced to be delayed yet and probably is the most likely candidate); why would Frontier abandon their engine they poured so much money in already, especially in their current financial situation where either developing a new engine or licensing an existing one is going to cost them tons of money?

Honestly, I don't even get where the idea gets from that the Cobra engine is the big limiting factor here Yes it has its limits, but so does every other engine out there and the benefit of having their own engine means that they have control over its potential more so than using a third party engine.

Does Frontier is in a so really bad financial situation ?

 

[Milurian]

Even if it was delayed (and given that the 2026 CMS game hasn't announced to be delayed yet and probably is the most likely candidate); why would Frontier abandon their engine they poured so much money in already, especially in their current financial situation where either developing a new engine or licensing an existing one is going to cost them tons of money?

Honestly, I don't even get where the idea gets from that the Cobra engine is the big limiting factor here Yes it has its limits, but so does every other engine out there and the benefit of having their own engine means that they have control over its potential more so than using a third party engine.

I think its partially because people dont understand what the "engine" is and partially because cobra is old.

 

[Iben]

I think its partially because people dont understand what the "engine" is and partially because cobra is old.

Yeah but "old" is relative; AFAIK we're at the second to latest version of the cobra engine, with PC2 most likely being on the most recent version. You could say Unity and Unreal are old as well lol.

Does Frontier is in a so really bad financial situation ?

I mean, they had mass layoffs, their stock went down massively at one point, multiple games didn't launch that well; we at least know that they weren't in the best financial situation

 

[Swjosdotschka]

Can someone quickly get me in the picture again what "2026" means in the context of the CMS game? Are we talking fiscal year or calender year? I forgot.

And was it own IP CMS or not own IP? Because we are still waiting fpr JWE3.

 

[KönigDerKaffeebohnen]

Saw that whole discussion around the criticism thing and the good old saying of live and let live do be gripping here.
Ofcourse everybody should like and praise what they want to, but the same goes for voicing criticism.
Not all criticism is created equally but thats something for the Moderators to point out, theres no use or sense at calling out people on their opinion cause it wont change it, just silencing it or leading to a discussion about each other instead of the actual game.
We are all or atleast mostly are adults here and while discussing opinions critically can be insightfull and fun, not everyone is open to that and thats fine. Some people just want to get their distaste out of the System and move one, which is well and good and something they quite Frankly should do cause where else then in this thread and possibly steam reviews do they even a chance to have been heard?

Personally id rather discuss my opinions here, including the negative ones as i also called the Coyote an insult due to the context surrounding it, as its the only way for frontier to see it besides voting with my wallet, which is kind of hard to do with the saki in the pack. By the nature of Planet zoo packs its just natural that the opinions about the content in a pack will be mixed between people and even for one person just between different parts of the same pack and to a certain extend thats inevitably but this time it just is more extreme then usual and for good reason as the one animal everybody wanted and is the top 2 on the metawishlist is absent, but not one, but two animals barely talked about or wished for made it in, one of them on the Cover, both of them from animal groups the majority of people are getting sick of.

And if we dont give clear and loud criticism here, when are we?
I want Planet zoo and frontier to succeed, but decisions like that are just baffeling to me. Best case its tonedeaf to an extend we havent seen yet, from a company that is struggleing and relying on their most loyal fanbase as their golden goose to get some revenue in and in the worst case its a sign that they lowerd their Bar significantly as they can just put a few requested yet easier to make animals in a pack and we will buy it no matter what they fill the rest and even the Cover with.

And i dont like that second part one bit and want to make it loud and clear that this shouldnt Set a Trend, because if not next time i might not buy 4 animals + clones (this term is overused here but the flamingo and bighornsheep are as close to literal colorswaps as it gets and the Coyote is certanly something), but 3 or 2 and i just dont stand for that

 

[Cooper_yang]

Aren't the limitations of the Cobra Engine obvious enough? I can't build a real zoo in the game. I either have to turn off tourists or turn off some functions to make it a little smoother. If it is about "potential development", five years have not been enough time to develop potential? During the game, I have to give up some functions to complete other things, which is not a good experience in itself.
This is my computer configuration. I know it's not the best, but it's definitely not a "bad configuration". If such a configuration can't enjoy the game as you wish, then the target market must be very small.My configuration can support me to play the top blockbuster games commonly seen on the market, but PZ has to give up some things.

 

[Cooper_yang]

I don't know how other people in the community view their relationship with the production company. As a person who just wants to spend money to buy happiness, to be honest, I really don't care what means are used to achieve the goal. This is a decision that the production company needs to make. I really only care whether it is what I want. PZ's current flaws are obvious, and the community has discussed them too many times.
So the question now is:
If the basic problems of the game that we often talk about can be solved by some technical means based on the current basic engine, why don't they do it?
If the current engine can't solve it, why not change it?
I don't understand.

 

[Iben]

Aren't the limitations of the Cobra Engine obvious enough? I can't build a real zoo in the game. I either have to turn off tourists or turn off some functions to make it a little smoother.

But that's the nature of a CMS game really, that has very little to do with the Cobra engine itself. These sort of games give you near limitless freedom, but the price you pay for that is that you're going to hit the limits of your hardware sooner than later. Any game of that sorts runs into it, regardless of their engine.

You can optimize these games for sure, and I'm 100% sure that there's much room for optimization in the Planet games because there always is in any sort of development context; but absolutely nothing guarantees that switching engines is going to magically fix that. It's a big gamble.

If the basic problems of the game that we often talk about can be solved by some technical means based on the current basic engine, why don't they do it?
If the current engine can't solve it, why not change it?

I feel like that's relatively simple no? Costs.

Switching to an entire new engine is a massive cost. You have to convert everything you already have to a new codebase, in a new language than you're used to, there's different limitations you didn't have before, etc. etc. (And no, this cannot be done with AI, just putting that out there already for those who think that it can, it absolutely cannot) On top of that, your developers have to switch, they have to want to switch and not just go and do something else, etc.

Updating their engine is less of a cost comparatively, hence why they've done it multiple times already. For JWE, for PZ, for JWE2 (and for PZ again) and for PC2. But your engine is your foundation, so it takes time and skill to do so as you don't want to break things that other things rely on. So it's slow and tedious, two things that are going to influence your cost.

So they have to compare those costs with to what they're going to gain from it. And clearly, they found that the gains do not outweigh the costs. Because if it did, they would have done it already.

That's the answer to your question. Not going to say you have to agree with Frontiers approach here btw, just to make that clear; but that's the answer.

Can someone quickly get me in the picture again what "2026" means in the context of the CMS game? Are we talking fiscal year or calender year? I forgot.

And was it own IP CMS or not own IP? Because we are still waiting fpr JWE3.

Calendar year, and the FY26 one has already been confirmed by Frontier to be JWE3.

Other than the fact that it's a Creative Simulation Game. Either they're doing an entire new own IP, they go for a sequel or they do another tie-in like JWE.

 

[Swjosdotschka]

Calendar year, and the FY26 one has already been confirmed by Frontier to be JWE3.

Other than the fact that it's a Creative Simulation Game. Either they're doing an entire new own IP, they go for a sequel or they do another tie-in like JWE.

Am I missinga "not" or am I dumb today? Because if it is calender year and it is JWE3, you color me really surprised here. Shouldn't JWE3 come out together with the bloody film, which would be this summer?

If the sentence is missing a "not", as in "the 2026 game is not JWE3", yeah, unless delayed it probably is PZ2 in november 2026. I have so many mixed feelings about that, it would make up for 3 Roller Coaster DLCs for PC2...

 

[Iben]

Am I missinga "not" or am I dumb today? Because if it is calender year and it is JWE3, you color me really surprised here. Shouldn't JWE3 come out together with the bloody film, which would be this summer?

If the sentence is missing a "not", as in "the 2026 game is not JWE3", yeah, unless delayed it probably is PZ2 in november 2026. I have so many mixed feelings about that, it would make up for 3 Roller Coaster DLCs for PC2...

There's a FY27 (aka calendar year 26) CMS game that is currently unannounced to what it is going to be; the FY26 CMS game (aka calendar year 25) has been confirmed to be JWE3

 

[Swjosdotschka]

There's a FY27 (aka calendar year 26) CMS game that is currently unannounced to what it is going to be; the FY26 CMS game (aka calendar year 25) has been confirmed to be JWE3

Thank you for spelling it out for me, I appreciate.

 

[Cooper_yang]

But that's the nature of a CMS game really, that has very little to do with the Cobra engine itself. These sort of games give you near limitless freedom, but the price you pay for that is that you're going to hit the limits of your hardware sooner than later. Any game of that sorts runs into it, regardless of their engine.

You can optimize these games for sure, and I'm 100% sure that there's much room for optimization in the Planet games because there always is in any sort of development context; but absolutely nothing guarantees that switching engines is going to magically fix that. It's a big gamble.


I feel like that's relatively simple no? Costs.

Switching to an entire new engine is a massive cost. You have to convert everything you already have to a new codebase, in a new language than you're used to, there's different limitations you didn't have before, etc. etc. (And no, this cannot be done with AI, just putting that out there already for those who think that it can, it absolutely cannot) On top of that, your developers have to switch, they have to want to switch and not just go and do something else, etc.

Updating their engine is less of a cost comparatively, hence why they've done it multiple times already. For JWE, for PZ, for JWE2 (and for PZ again) and for PC2. But your engine is your foundation, so it takes time and skill to do so as you don't want to break things that other things rely on. So it's slow and tedious, two things that are going to influence your cost.

So they have to compare those costs with to what they're going to gain from it. And clearly, they found that the gains do not outweigh the costs. Because if it did, they would have done it already.

That's the answer to your question. Not going to say you have to agree with Frontiers approach here btw, just to make that clear; but that's the answer.

Okay, let me make it clearer. First of all, I agree with your point of view, every CMS has its limits, that's fine. But the question is where is the limit? Let's take PZ as an example. If we turn on all its functions and use a mainstream computer on the market, will the lag and unsmoothness appear after building a few habitats? And how many species of animals are generally kept in a real zoo? The limit exists and it should exist. But the question is where the limit should be? In the game, we have 1 square kilometer of land to use, but how many people have used up all this land? Games are like many things. Few people will not accept that it has an upper limit, just like few adults think that there is nothing they can't do in the world, but the problem is as I said, where is the limit is the key.
As I said, I don't really care how the better game experience comes from. If they use the Cobra engine to perfectly solve all the current problems, it's simple, I will pay for it. But based on the fact that it has been 5 years, I really don't think there is much potential to be tapped than this engine. Yes, their financial situation is not good, but they have also launched many new games in the past few years. I think the cost of developing a new game is not low, which is also a gamble. But why ignore PZ, a project that has always brought them a stable cash flow? This is also one of the key issues. Just like how long we waited before getting the repair of the Malayan tapir model.

 

[Swjosdotschka]

Errrrm.... I doubt the engine has anything to do with users hardware reaching it's limits before or after building on the whole map.
And they are actively not ignoring PZ. They are porting it over to console, they give us new paid content (whether it meets the quality standards of past packs is debateable).

Just because they don't add major new features does not mean they ignore the game. If that was the case they would have "ignored" Planet Coaster 1 for the wholeness of it's existence.

There is also a difference between ignoring a game vs. not being tuned in to the community. I would fully agree the latter is the case currently, but I don't agree they ignore the game.

 

[Iben]

But based on the fact that it has been 5 years, I really don't think there is much potential to be tapped than this engine.

Usually, you don't go and mess with your engine when your game is up and running.

Again, the engine is your foundation; once you have it you don't really go and start changing big things about it. Everything is build on top of it, making changes to it can cause big issues. PZ isn't being completely ignored, as I mentioned, we know that PZ's Cobra engine got a version update alongside JWE2. But at the same time they're not going to make big changes to the engine and potentially break tons of stuff when you're already far in development, that's a big risk and can result in a big cost.

So from the current state of PZ you can't really make any claims about the potential of the engine, you'd have to look at PC2 for that as it is on a newer version of the engine so you can see what potential there is for that.

Again, you can disagree with Frontier's choices; but you wanted an answer and I think this is as close as we're going to get without infiltrating their teams lol

 

[RightWhale]

If Frontier is gonna just keep making DLCs until God knows when, I really want them to add exhibit animals again. Put a fish in the exhibit box, bite the bullet and give us some parrots for the WTE. If the habitat animals (while appreciated) are just gonna slowly and slowly have less effort at least counter balance that with something.

We don’t have the pack out yet so I don’t 100% know the quality of the animals, but as far as I know none of the animals from this pack have new rigs and provide “something new”.

Don’t get me wrong, I am happy to have the building options with the “clones”. However the clone argument only makes sense when one animal in the pack is high effort, like the gibbon having new animations. Now it’s just an entire pack of just “options”. Which is still good, but I agree something about this pack is just missing something. That little extra pizzaz.

I’m sure I will still use the pack, and I will enjoy the new animals. But if not the coati this pack is missing something. And I do feel like it could have been some great exhibit animals.

 

[aubreykitsune]

There's a FY27 (aka calendar year 26) CMS game that is currently unannounced to what it is going to be; the FY26 CMS game (aka calendar year 25) has been confirmed to be JWE3

I've been giving this some thought, and while I'm not trying to be negative, I think it is strongly in the playerbase's interests for the FY27 release to be a small-scale title rather than Planet Zoo 2. Think about this. Frontier is already struggling to give us PZ1 clone packs alongside developing their other two big CMS games. In what world are they going to suddenly be able to balance post-launch support for Planet Coaster 2, Jurassic World Evolution 3, and Planet Zoo 2 at the same time without sacrificing the expected quality?

Each of these games has a bar set by their predecessor(s) for DLC and free updates. If Planet Coaster 2- which hasn't even properly begun its DLC cycle yet- gets robbed of receiving new content rather than just its (needed) TLC, fans will be upset. If Jurassic World Evolution 3 somehow manages to receive even less substantial content than JWE2 did in its later updates, fans will be upset. If Planet Zoo 2 doesn't receive quality DLCs alongside meaningful free updates, like PZ1 did in the old days, fans will be upset. Imagine the backlash if PZ2 were to end support with a roster half the size of PZ1's for example, while having to balance more variety within that scale (aviaries and/or aquariums.)

I can't see a scenario in which at least one of the three games simply does not get the attention and care that fans expect, if all of them have to be balanced at once. As a JWE and PZ player, I'm not looking forward to the possibility of an existing game's support being canned, simply to be replaced with a subpar sequel that can never live up to its potential because Frontier had too much on their plate. They should hold off on Planet Zoo 2 for when either PlanCo2 or JWE3 ends its DLC cycle - whichever comes first.

 

[Iben]

Frontier is already struggling to give us PZ1 clone packs alongside developing their other two big CMS games. In what world are they going to suddenly be able to balance post-launch support for Planet Coaster 2, Jurassic World Evolution 3, and Planet Zoo 2 at the same time without sacrificing the expected quality?

Frankly, I don't think we have enough information on their in-house working situation to really make claims like that. Going into a post-launch support for 3 games might actually even be less pressure than them being in a state where there are new games being worked on behind the scenes.

Regardless; Frontier has been in a situation where they were working on multiple games throughout PZ's and JWE1&2's entire history. This isn't a new thing for them. During the lifetimes of those games they were working on Warhammer, Stranded, F1, PC2; etc. Yes, some of those are different games but I wouldn't say that either JWE or PZ never got the time and care because of those games. We simply don't know enough about their inner workings to really know if that was ever the case.

At the end of the day, the next CMS game we're getting has been decided on long ago ( probably more than 2 years ) and I doubt that they're going to pivot on that decision. With 2/3 announced games being sequels, I'd say we'd best prepare for a sequel to Planet Zoo, whether we like that or not.

 

[Swjosdotschka]

The good news is: They did not get away with a lackluster base game and a questionable DLC with Planet Coaster 2. They HAVE been called out on dropping quality. Very much so. And despite being not very satisfied with their quality and delvery lately: Frontier HAS shown they learn from mistakes and accomodate.

Does that mean I look forward with absolute psoitivity to a PZ Launch around Nov. 2026? Hell no.

 

[Milurian]

Can someone quickly get me in the picture again what "2026" means in the context of the CMS game? Are we talking fiscal year or calender year? I forgot.

And was it own IP CMS or not own IP? Because we are still waiting fpr JWE3.

We are confirmed getting JWE3 this year fy26 probably around the time the movie releases.

we are also getting a cms game in 2026 (fy2027) that is of unspecified origin but since 2/3 of the announced future cms games are now known to be sequels I can almost guarantee that the game releasing next year is planet zoo 2

 

[Milurian]

The good news is: They did not get away with a lackluster base game and a questionable DLC with Planet Coaster 2. They HAVE been called out on dropping quality. Very much so. And despite being not very satisfied with their quality and delvery lately: Frontier HAS shown they learn from mistakes and accomodate.

Does that mean I look forward with absolute psoitivity to a PZ Launch around Nov. 2026? Hell no.

I am waiting to see what they do with JWE3 before making any assumptions about the quality of a speculative planet zoo sequel because if they go the path of jwe1-jwe2 and included "all" the previous animals at the start we can assume a similar path will be taken for planet zoo 2.