None of that bothers me. I could understand all the problems if this was a new game engine. What bothers me is the extent that the game isn't working properly with a game engine they are familiar with. That proves the game was released too soon with not enough testing.
Save this game fast... bugs & flawed gamedesign are getting out of control
- Thread starter peon2t
- Start date
None of that bothers me. I could understand all the problems if this was a new game engine. What bothers me is the extent that the game isn't working properly with a game engine they are familiar with. That proves the game was released too soon with not enough testing.
The even better way would be if we simply would apply the frefund policies that we have for more or less every other kind of product also to software:
If it's broken, you get refunded.
Please don't mention Jurassic World Evolution... I just want to forget that I spent much money on that insolent fraud... but actually it should have served us as a warning....
I didn't experience a lot of bugs up until this patch, but ever since the update, it is honestly not fun anymore. Suddenly, staff gets stuck somewhere they could easily pass before.There are TONS of animal messages, which I guess would be fine and I would get used to that it's more than before (for example I think messages like "got food from guests" are more helpful than "is stressed") but they it just adds up because they result from bugs or are followed by bugs. Since the patch, for me at least, my zoo is no fun anymore. Things just changed without me changing anything. And I only say this bcause I have so much fun playing the game and I would love it to go back to normal.
My sentiments exactly! I was having a ball in Sandbox mode where there were hardly any bugs. I found myself actually staying up late playing because I was having so much fun. I haven't done that in years. I actually squealed with excitement when I read the 1.0.3 update list. Then I played the game for about an hour and everything went to absolute e. I just want to be able to play and have fun again. I think Planet Zoo is going to be a great game, an amazing game even - someday when they finish building it - but definitely not now. Right now it's worse than it was in beta.
UPDATE Jan 29, 2020 - I no longer experience any bugs in this game whatsoever. I think Frontier was too fast out of the gates but I'm very impressed with how they've turned this game around. I'm LOVING it!
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Maybe the latest patch brought out and showed some mistakes in the game you've done before?
Yes, clearly this is the player's fault. I also didn't experience much in the way of bugs before the patch and now have an unplayable zoo. My fault, surely. rolls eyes
UPDATE Jan 29, 2020 - In retrospect Aiste was partially right. However, I think it has more to do with starting a new game after the update. I was never able to play my old game again but the new one I started after the patch has no bugs at all. I'm LOVING it!
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Strange way to look at it... players can only recognize something as a "mistake" if they get to see the consequences. But if consequences that haven't been there before are suddenly introduced in a patch, that just ruins the player experience.
Besides this I don't see how animals glitching through glass/fences, animals getting auto-boxed en masse, animals refuse to drink, caretakers refuse to feed, animals suddenly want 100 toys in their habitats etc. is something I'd have done wrong...
So far I've only found one change where I'd admit that it punishes me for something I did wrong: cooling/heating units now only work if they get power while before they also worked without power. (But again: How should you properly notice your fault, if it has worked all the time... I've actually seen this in the past and just assumed that cooling units don't need to be in the powered areas)
The fact of the matter is, that the game was heavily bugged before and that it's even more heavily bugged after the patch. At least I haven't seen any of the bugs I noticed before been fixed... but I see a dozen of new and grave bugs now that are basically make the game unplayable. At least in a big zoo like mine.
Everything you said was spot on. I love Planet Zoo and besides a few hiccups here and there and the awful speed, things were going pretty good. Then this most recent update happened and things have just fallen apart for me. One thing in particular that really stood out is the advanced research. I thought it was only me, I too spent quite a bit of time wasted having my vet advance research and nothing happens. The bar would fill but nothing, eventually I gave up but it sucks because these are those details as you said should have been planned ahead of time.
I like to pop back on when there's a patch to check on how the game is now. As I've said before I have encountered issues every time I play and today included:
This is my franchise zoo, which is extra fun and this covers approx. 15 minutes of gameplay.
- Billboards/ education speakers still not listing animals that are present in my zoo.
- A big red panda habitat housing just 3 red pandas and which has enough land area (in the green) but listing space at just 20% (in the red).
- In the same habitat I have a network of climbing frames but the number (which is in the red for the red pandas) is unchanging, bringing their overall welfare down.
- Hard shelter was not recognised until I put a ceiling over the habitat. When there was more than enough shelter provided by structures built inside the habitat.
- Keeper got stuck on an animal and walked endlessly on the spot.
- Red pandas kept being boxed. Their climbing areas did not go higher than the barriers however.
This is my franchise zoo, which is extra fun and this covers approx. 15 minutes of gameplay.
I mentioned on another thread that I had a random thought...It sounds crazy but just go with me on this for a second. Ehem.
What if, the Dev's lock the game so it's no longer playable (you don't have to buy it again, you still own it)....So they can spend more time on it without the added stress of players nagging at them (to put it bluntly). So they spend a few more months on it to reaalllyyy get it at least a score of 8/10 bcuz atm with most players it's like 5-6/10. They do the testing themselves over the months also to make sure the updates actually work and don't caused another 200 bugs.
Highly doubt something like that would even happen but I think players would actually accept that. LOL.
PS: No game is perfect. There will be bugs. But I've never experienced so many bugs in one game jesus man.
What if, the Dev's lock the game so it's no longer playable (you don't have to buy it again, you still own it)....So they can spend more time on it without the added stress of players nagging at them (to put it bluntly). So they spend a few more months on it to reaalllyyy get it at least a score of 8/10 bcuz atm with most players it's like 5-6/10. They do the testing themselves over the months also to make sure the updates actually work and don't caused another 200 bugs.
Highly doubt something like that would even happen but I think players would actually accept that. LOL.
PS: No game is perfect. There will be bugs. But I've never experienced so many bugs in one game jesus man.
I'd perfectly accept that.
As a matter of fact I'd wish to get an official announcement when the devs think that they made the game finally playable (again). Because at least since patch 1.0.3 it has become absolutely unplayable for me.
However I fear that this will not happen because in order to do this they'd have to acknowledge that right now the game is unplayable. And this is probably nothing they want to do.
So I guess it will just silently become forgotten in my game list... because honestly... I don't feel like checking the state of the game every few days or weeks.
There are'nt any bugs in this game. Believe me, its an illuision! When i was complaining about those critical bugs (already explained by you) when game was running in open beta, some really hyped people told me, that im 100% wrong and its all about me (and my computer). I have to exept that this game is in beta mode. Maybe two month later the game is in a released beta mode.. who knows 
looking at your initial post, I would say no overall.
micro management is the same, tho if you turn on slowering animal ageing it's bearable. Animals glitching through barriers is nearly gone, boxing got rarer but still noticeable.
Franchise mode is still the same, laggy animal market, awful path finding, visitors need shops more than animals...Every day there are more players reporting that their franchise zoo isn't loading any more. Regarding feeding: they keep saying that there are no issues and have tested that many times. Technically that's kind of true but the game and devs fail to explain the mechanism and its constraints.
After the latest patch many players report the game crashing, which I have not encountered so far myself.
I miss the days when games would actually be released polished with few bugs if any at all....
I haven't encountered any feeding bugs myself however in my polar bear habitat I've had my bear's cub get stuck on slopes multiple times. Like it'll just stand there. Making noise, but with no animation. Just frozen there. I tried smoothing out the slop a bit to see it she would get unstuck but instead she just floated in the air, no boxing or anything. Still frozen. The only way I managed to fix it was to manually move her because she was starting to die of thirst and I got fed up with it...
What was also weird is that she was stuck within the traversable area, just on the edge of it.
I've had to keep a very close eye on her to make sure she wouldn't get stuck again....
Honestly I never really liked Frontier to begin with... I only got the game because my sister bought it for me for Christmas and I always wanted a new "Zoo Tycoon" game in the modern day. Every time I looked at a review for a modern Frontier game it was almost always "Game looks great, game play is buggy, stressful and/or boring or lacking"
I was hyped for the game when the trailer came out but then I noticed it was made by Frontier which killed some of my hype as I already knew that it might've been a warning flag.
It's sad to see that, that red flag turned out to be right....
I want to love this game but just having 3-4 habitats starts to spiral the micromanagement to the point where it causes me anxiety and give me a headache to which I have to quit the game. In ZT2 if I set up my zoo right I can basically leave it to auto-run and build up money while I go make some food or do a chore or something with very little to worry about.
This game... Can't leave it for more then 2 minutes before something goes wrong... If even that.
The enrichment decay is a feature that should just go... It's not only manual but it's a little detail that's just to much.
I've seen suggestions to have Keepers switch the toys out, however that wouldn't work for some animals with fewer toys or if you ended up using most toys for the enclosure.
Doesn't help that there's no alert for it either and for some animals it impacts wellfair far to much.
Speaking of alerts, I get the "Animals will fight for alpha" warnings 24/7 for my Dull Sheep, even when they're not fighting at all and are pretty chill. They haven't once injured each other and honestly I like seeing them butt heads like real sheep do... Again it's a useless notification that I have learned to completely ignore. Heck, I would turn it off completely if I could without disabling other notifications or disabling fighting all together.
Also I made several lakes for my polar bears to swim and play in, even made a under water viewing area and put in some ice rocks as glaciers to climb on but they NEVER use any of them! They require water area but they never even use it! They just sleep in their den and eat and drink from the smallest pond and that's it. No swimming or playing or anything. Makes them extremely boring which is sad...
The rest of my animals I've seen utilize their entire habitat but my Polar bears won't use even half of there's... And it's the biggest habitat so far in my zoo because of their required needs!
I haven't encountered any feeding bugs myself however in my polar bear habitat I've had my bear's cub get stuck on slopes multiple times. Like it'll just stand there. Making noise, but with no animation. Just frozen there. I tried smoothing out the slop a bit to see it she would get unstuck but instead she just floated in the air, no boxing or anything. Still frozen. The only way I managed to fix it was to manually move her because she was starting to die of thirst and I got fed up with it...
What was also weird is that she was stuck within the traversable area, just on the edge of it.
I've had to keep a very close eye on her to make sure she wouldn't get stuck again....
Honestly I never really liked Frontier to begin with... I only got the game because my sister bought it for me for Christmas and I always wanted a new "Zoo Tycoon" game in the modern day. Every time I looked at a review for a modern Frontier game it was almost always "Game looks great, game play is buggy, stressful and/or boring or lacking"
I was hyped for the game when the trailer came out but then I noticed it was made by Frontier which killed some of my hype as I already knew that it might've been a warning flag.
It's sad to see that, that red flag turned out to be right....
I want to love this game but just having 3-4 habitats starts to spiral the micromanagement to the point where it causes me anxiety and give me a headache to which I have to quit the game. In ZT2 if I set up my zoo right I can basically leave it to auto-run and build up money while I go make some food or do a chore or something with very little to worry about.
This game... Can't leave it for more then 2 minutes before something goes wrong... If even that.
The enrichment decay is a feature that should just go... It's not only manual but it's a little detail that's just to much.
I've seen suggestions to have Keepers switch the toys out, however that wouldn't work for some animals with fewer toys or if you ended up using most toys for the enclosure.
Doesn't help that there's no alert for it either and for some animals it impacts wellfair far to much.
Speaking of alerts, I get the "Animals will fight for alpha" warnings 24/7 for my Dull Sheep, even when they're not fighting at all and are pretty chill. They haven't once injured each other and honestly I like seeing them butt heads like real sheep do... Again it's a useless notification that I have learned to completely ignore. Heck, I would turn it off completely if I could without disabling other notifications or disabling fighting all together.
Also I made several lakes for my polar bears to swim and play in, even made a under water viewing area and put in some ice rocks as glaciers to climb on but they NEVER use any of them! They require water area but they never even use it! They just sleep in their den and eat and drink from the smallest pond and that's it. No swimming or playing or anything. Makes them extremely boring which is sad...
The rest of my animals I've seen utilize their entire habitat but my Polar bears won't use even half of there's... And it's the biggest habitat so far in my zoo because of their required needs!
I too miss the days where game makers could take their time and release a polished title. I don’t however put this on the game maker tho as usually deadlines have to be meant which is everything that’s wrong with the gaming industry nowadays. For me I can’t complain as I usually only play sandbox and haven’t experienced too many bugs except for the occasional staff member stuck on a path. I actually give frontier credit with the job they’ve done so far and also a good example is jwe as they’ve listened to requests and wants of players. To me I enjoy turning the micromanaging off and just enjoying the game without some of the hassle. But it’s great to have that challenge also tho.
Agreed has been 3 weeks now not playing the game caurse of the manegement of the zoo went out of hand, and i could not handle the pressure when it came to ppl want to refound, i have been playing whitout problems and now its just insane.. im waiting for them to fix the game.. its not enjoyable when i cant play franchies..
Or they just released a broken game and never fixed them properly (just 1 or 2 updates p if you were Lucky)
Was a big fan of Black and White/Black and White 2 - play as a God with a creature - but both had a lot of bugs and missing promised features
(Peter Molyneux had a reputation for promising features not ending up in the game or less impressive)