Hi there! How are you? How do you think if the game add new chromatic versions like golden tiger or mutuation that change the color?
More chromatic versions of animals
- Thread starter Oenanthe92
- Start date
I think we need more natural variations first. It's bad practice for zoos to deliberately breed pigment mutations in animals because it almost always results in inbreeding to get those specific genes (which is also why purebred pets, like dogs, cats, rabbits, and so on often come with a host of genetic diseases). I don't begrudge the inclusion of these mutations in the game because often they do pop up if the animal has the recessive gene for it in real life, but for the sake of conservation and realism I think adding more and increasing the frequency of their appearances is a bad idea.
That said, I'll be particularly perturbed if they give us a white jaguar in the future instead of a melanistic one, like they did with Zoo Tycoon 2013. Melanistic jaguars and leopards do occur more frequently in nature because in many specific biomes it's actually beneficial for the animal to be less visible (so the genes are selected for naturally rather than artificially). In general melanism is more useful to a species than leucism or albinism.
I agree with you. The example of the melanic animal is the best for what I have written in the other post. There are some variation in the wild that can be add in the game for me, but many of them are particular for subspecies. For example the lion of South Africa have their mane more black than the other but I'm correct they are an other subspecies than the one in the game
Well, no, coat and colour variations occur within subspecies. Some subpopulations are more prone to certain phenotypical expressions, but that isn't a rule. Also, the southern African lions are not prone to dark manes. I don't know where that misconception started but it's not true at all.
Most lion subspecies look fairly similar. The point I was making is that at the moment every animal in the game is a clone. All members of a species are identical in every way. We need more visible variation within species to make the animals more individualistic without resorting to genetic mutations.