animal food cost still high, zoo's finances still tanking

[xesta]

idk what that update was supposed to do but it didn't do it jdgfhg.

my animal food costs have not changed. I've been running the same minimal starter zoo for 13 years with my finances peaking at first then dipping gradually over time. from what I've noticed it's a combination of:

• animal food cost being stupidly large for no understandable reason, despite having the lowest grade food. (for me, it's never lower than $20,000)
• guests are not using my donation boxes. my donation boxes by my tigers have a maximum of $900 in them, despite being there since the beginning (13 in game years), and in the most trafficked spot.

yes I know how to play the game and successfully start a zoo, I've done it several times. yes I know how to place my donation bins. this is a gameplay bug/design flaw, and is new as of a few patches ago.

edit I apologize for the grouchy tone, but it's literally game breaking gsdjkghsdf

 

[TheGaijin87]

General Fix

• When moving hungry animals they will be automatically fed. The calculation for how much the food was costing was incorrect and would cause larger animals’ food costs to be significantly higher than they should.

thats the quote from the patch notes of said patch. you get it now?

 

[peon2t]

I assume what TheGaijin87 wants to say is that the calculation was only fixed for the special case of when animals are moved.

However I think a developer recently stated in another thread in this forum that the "food cost bug" generally has been addressed.

Since I don't think that I'm affected by this specific bug, I can't really say anything about if it's still there. I just can confirm that I've read various complaints about extreme feeding cost and that they indeed were extreme. (The affected users spoke about feeding cost that were much higher than mine even if their zoos were much smaller.)

 

[Stef]

I dont move my animals and still the costs exploded. Baby bear eating more than their parents together is not logical at all. Got from food costs of around 4000 a year to 17000 a year in an instand, just because of one baby bear?

I thought removin nearly all of the food items would help, but nope..

 

[xesta]

I assume what TheGaijin87 wants to say is that the calculation was only fixed for the special case of when animals are moved.

However I think a developer recently stated in another thread in this forum that the "food cost bug" generally has been addressed.

Since I don't think that I'm affected by this specific bug, I can't really say anything about if it's still there. I just can confirm that I've read various complaints about extreme feeding cost and that they indeed were extreme. (The affected users spoke about feeding cost that were much higher than mine even if their zoos were much smaller.)

yeah, that's what I'm referring to. I even linked the response ghdf the game devs think they've fixed the food cost but they haven't. that's what my post is meant to bring light to

my poor starter zoo will be a starter zoo for life lmao. I can't even play this game it has so many problems

I dont move my animals and still the costs exploded. Baby bear eating more than their parents together is not logical at all. Got from food costs of around 4000 a year to 17000 a year in an instand, just because of one baby bear?

I thought removin nearly all of the food items would help, but nope..

I frankly don't know where they got the moving animals thing from? maybe it was an issue for some people but I'm literally watching my zoo, without doing a single thing, have it's money just Drop

 

[Kai]

Donation boxes only show money for a certain period (I assume it's a year).

Best way to counter food costs is to set up a massive block of exhibit animals (on contraception) surrounded by donation boxes, and run your zoo off their donations. It sucks to manage them, but it seems to be the best way to offset enclosure animals food costs until they (hopefully) fix it. I get ~100k donations Vs 40k ticket sales in my small bear zoo at the moment (6 enclosures, 20 exhibits, ~2500 guests).

Something else that I've noticed is that animals in the trade center are located in a specific zoo and count towards your entry ticket price - if you put a couple of high appeal animals (I like lions) into your zoo then store them in the trade center it lets you ramp up the price of your tickets (while keeping the same animals/food costs in the actual zoo). Ticket prices make a huge difference when it comes to offsetting food costs (but the donations from exhibits are still more important).

For example when I start a new zoo I can dump a pair of my spare lions/tigers/cheetahs into a pen, then insta trade house store them and ramp up the price of tickets - even though the guests are just looking at a couple of exhibit animals, they think the other animals are in the zoo (and happily pay more).

Personally, I think they need to either increase donations for enclosures or lower the food costs. Needing a donation 'bank' of exhibits just to pay for my animals food is daft.

 

[Stef]

Thats a good tip, thank you! I think with this i can save my north american zoo!

Also, i saw that the people donate less and less each year. I got donations of 30k for many years, then suddenly it dropped to 12 k, while the food costs exploaded the same year. Its like the donations went into the food in the system.

 

[Cocolori]

Thats a good tip, thank you! I think with this i can save my north american zoo!

Also, i saw that the people donate less and less each year. I got donations of 30k for many years, then suddenly it dropped to 12 k, while the food costs exploaded the same year. Its like the donations went into the food in the system.

This may be a stupid question but have you got ATMs around the place so people in your park for multiple years have a way to get more money? Also efficient transport so they can get out again when they are leaving?

I'm just a bit puzzled by this issue because I have had no issues at all with profitability as I've gone through the campaign.

 

[marcnesiumHH]

I'm just a bit puzzled by this issue because I have had no issues at all with profitability as I've gone through the campaign.

Campaign is a different story - scripted campaign maps, which are much smaller than having an at least mid-sized zoo (15-20 species) in challenge/ franchise mode

 

[retainedkitten]

Are you getting hit by refunds? That is where all my money goes now that my zoo is fully expanded and successful in franchise mode. I believe there is a bug with happiness, all needs show green, all thoughts are positive and yet guests are still unhappy. I posted an issue in tracker if you would like to report https://issues.frontierstore.net/issue-detail/10306

 

[Dr4gon]

Are you getting hit by refunds? That is where all my money goes now that my zoo is fully expanded and successful in franchise mode. I believe there is a bug with happiness, all needs show green, all thoughts are positive and yet guests are still unhappy. I posted an issue in tracker if you would like to report https://issues.frontierstore.net/issue-detail/10306

Can it be that they waited in a queue to long. I think the game registers waiting times in a queue. Also maybe the influence of beautification isn't in the game yet, and these visitors may have walked long boring walks from one perfect habitat to the other. That seems something I would investigate about. Make the train go faster or something.

 

[Stef]

Didnt get one refund at all tho, guests are pretty happy too. They look at the animals and go, enough atms are there too, but many of the donation boxes are empty and the ones that have money in them dont have the amount they had many years ago. also, its just wierd that happened the moment the food costs exploded...

 

[ChantalS]

Are you getting hit by refunds? That is where all my money goes now that my zoo is fully expanded and successful in franchise mode. I believe there is a bug with happiness, all needs show green, all thoughts are positive and yet guests are still unhappy. I posted an issue in tracker if you would like to report https://issues.frontierstore.net/issue-detail/10306

Have you checked the education heatmap for overlapping speakers? It seems like the most clear reason for this is when speakers are overlapping, making people unhappy almost instantly (even if they're not IN that area). Secondly it's crime and litter that may cause happiness to go down drastically, so make sure you have enough caretakers and security guards. I'm still struggling with the litter, as I can never actually SEE the litter that guests are complaining about, thus I don't know which area to put extra caretakers in...

Regarding the topic: I also still see extremely high feed costs. Out of nowhere, the costs for certain animals (in my last case it was elephants) just skyrocket and keep on going, even though nothing has changed apart from maybe 1-2 animal births (and not even an elephant in this case).

 

[retainedkitten]

Have you checked the education heatmap for overlapping speakers? It seems like the most clear reason for this is when speakers are overlapping, making people unhappy almost instantly (even if they're not IN that area). Secondly it's crime and litter that may cause happiness to go down drastically, so make sure you have enough caretakers and security guards. I'm still struggling with the litter, as I can never actually SEE the litter that guests are complaining about, thus I don't know which area to put extra caretakers in...

Regarding the topic: I also still see extremely high feed costs. Out of nowhere, the costs for certain animals (in my last case it was elephants) just skyrocket and keep on going, even though nothing has changed apart from maybe 1-2 animal births (and not even an elephant in this case).

Yep, all of my speakers are not overlapping, checked that too. I didn't close that zoo but I opened a new franchise until maybe a patch addresses some of the happiness bugs. My zoo is profitable it's over a million dollars, but if I leave it running as is it will start tanking I'm sure. The other issue is it's the smaller tropical map, so I can't refresh and renew guests with new exhibits etc. I think the food cost is still bugged as well. My gorilla's alone were over 30k a year, and I didn't have that many.

 

[The_Tick]

idk what that update was supposed to do but it didn't do it jdgfhg.

my animal food costs have not changed. I've been running the same minimal starter zoo for 13 years with my finances peaking at first then dipping gradually over time. from what I've noticed it's a combination of:

• animal food cost being stupidly large for no understandable reason, despite having the lowest grade food. (for me, it's never lower than $20,000)
• guests are not using my donation boxes. my donation boxes by my tigers have a maximum of $900 in them, despite being there since the beginning (13 in game years), and in the most trafficked spot.

yes I know how to play the game and successfully start a zoo, I've done it several times. yes I know how to place my donation bins. this is a gameplay bug/design flaw, and is new as of a few patches ago.

edit I apologize for the grouchy tone, but it's literally game breaking gsdjkghsdf

This game in my opinion is way too easy, I never had any cashflow issues whatsoever. I only play Franchise mode. Maybe you should reconsider structuring your park in a proper way or find ways to increase your cashflow. Entrance prices, increase the education levels add donation boxes etc, increase staff efficiency. Staff is also expensive, especially vets keepers and mechanics. Make sure they are efficient. Still got issues? take out a good loan, reduce the monthly payment cost and build a new habitat and guest facilities so you can increase cashflow.

 

[Aiste]

This game in my opinion is way too easy, I never had any cashflow issues whatsoever. I only play Franchise mode. Maybe you should reconsider structuring your park in a proper way or find ways to increase your cashflow. Entrance prices, increase the education levels add donation boxes etc, increase staff efficiency. Staff is also expensive, especially vets keepers and mechanics. Make sure they are efficient. Still got issues? take out a good loan, reduce the monthly payment cost and build a new habitat and guest facilities so you can increase cashflow.

The same. No problems with cash at all. If problems with money occur, something is wrong with management.
Btw, there is a patch note 1.0.3 and further Bo Marit comment about food prices. The game worked and calculated food costs as intended, the bug was only in UI prices.