When it comes to swimming and deepdiving I would also like to see some more interactions in the water that aren't just a form of locomotion.
Tigers play-fighting, hippos and crocodiles sleeping underwater (not sure if hippos do the first, haven't played long enough with them to know), stuff like that.
I remembered that the patch notes for 1.3 or after (right before the Aquatic update/pack) had something about this in them, and at the time I thought it was a significant hint towards an eventual aquatic update (turned out to be correct). I went back and searched for the post:
"The following animals can now sleep in water of appropriate depth: Saltwater crocodile, gharial, hippo, pygmy hippo, flamingo, Nile monitor"
That was before the caiman and alligator were added but I'm assuming they can also sleep underwater, or at least in water.
I remembered that the patch notes for 1.3 or after (right before the Aquatic update/pack) had something about this in them, and at the time I thought it was a significant hint towards an eventual aquatic update (turned out to be correct). I went back and searched for the post:
"The following animals can now sleep in water of appropriate depth: Saltwater crocodile, gharial, hippo, pygmy hippo, flamingo, Nile monitor"
That was before the caiman and alligator were added but I'm assuming they can also sleep underwater, or at least in water.
What that means is, the animals that have shallow water sleeping enabled, since that particular patch, are able to sleep at the edge of water or in other words over very shallow water that isn't deeper than roughly a quarter of their own height while resting.
Lol, are you saying this because they were already leaked?
Unfortunately, as you alluded to, I don't think they'd do this. None of the exhibit animals have any color variations besides the ones that have albinism, which is mostly the snakes plus a few others.
Yeah, I know they said they would not add color variations to the exhibit animals and I kind of understand why. I agree it would be useless for most of the species. But I think it would be a very good idea for the Lehmann's Poison Frogs so we can have them in black/red but also black/yellow and black/orange.
Then, of course, it is just a suggestion and if you don't feel like it should be added to your list, I completely respect your decision. And thank you for all the work you're doing for the community !
Yeah, I know they said they would not add color variations to the exhibit animals and I kind of understand why. I agree it would be useless for most of the species. But I think it would be a very good idea for the Lehmann's Poison Frogs so we can have them in black/red but also black/yellow and black/orange.
Then, of course, it is just a suggestion and if you don't feel like it should be added to your list, I completely respect your decision. And thank you for all the work you're doing for the community !
Yeah the Alaskan subspecies is near threatened. I don't know if they would change it to Alaskan moose, because the model might need to be sized up a bit for that to be true (they are the largest subspecies) and it seems clear here they wanted it to be used as a European and Asian animal too. I've said before I dislike using generic species names in place of specific subspecies, but it is what it is. Given that we've found Alaskan moose references in the old game code, it seems obvious this was retroactively made as a conscious decision so I don't see it changing.
Agree. Unless there is a very significant morphological difference among subspecies, I think it’s far better to add animals the species level. If the Alaskan moose subspecies, rather than the whole species had been used then the strong probability is that Europe, Asia, and other parts of NA would remain forever mooseless.
Additionally, subspecies are generally much more contested than species and the definition of them often differs among institutions & authorities and they are much more likely to be changed with new research. The more subspecies added to the game, the quicker and more obviously out-of-date it will become, especially once support ends and changed subspecies designations can not be updated.
All that said, this is Bearcat’s list, so they can suggest whatever they want, and the vast majority of suggestions on it are things I agree with!
Agree. Unless there is a very significant morphological difference among subspecies, I think it’s far better to add animals the species level. If the Alaskan moose subspecies, rather than the whole species had been used then the strong probability is that Europe, Asia, and other parts of NA would remain forever mooseless.
Additionally, subspecies are generally much more contested than species and the definition of them often differs among institutions & authorities and they are much more likely to be changed with new research. The more subspecies added to the game, the quicker and more obviously out-of-date it will become, especially once support ends and changed subspecies designations can not be updated.
All that said, this is Bearcat’s list, so they can suggest whatever they want, and the vast majority of suggestions on it are things I agree with!
It is worth noting that the Siberian is still an evolutionary significant unit seperate from the Bengal Tiger (Population of genetic/evolutionary importance).
It is worth noting that the Siberian is still an evolutionary significant unit seperate from the Bengal Tiger (Population of genetic/evolutionary importance).
1) The game should allow us to place paths on slopes (evenly going up) when we align to a grid.
2) I've read that King Penguins are known to attack people, so I don't think it's appropriate for them to be a walkthrough habitat.
3) Indian Elephants should have mottling variations. Not all Indian Elephants have mottling on their trunks, and some of them have more distinct mottling than others. The colour also ranges from pale pink to light pink.
4) Remove Singapore from the Zoopedia on where Binturongs can be found. I have friends from Singapore and they have never seen or heard of a Binturong sighting.
5) Red Pandas are also a bit too fat. There should also be a colour variation where some Red Pandas should have faces which are almost entirely, or at least mostly white in colour.
6) Gharials should have colour variations. If I'm not wrong, Frontier has said that Gharials have no colour variations. But from what I've seen online, Gharials can be much darker than the ones in Planet Zoo, which are green in colour. (I've seen pictures of gharials being nearly entirely black)
Hello everyone, and welcome! This is the 1.8 Meta-Suggestions list. You may know this list as it's old name (small and easy suggestions), but we've rebranded! After well over a year of continuing this list and adding new things when the dev team implements our ideas, I have decided to finally open this list up to bigger ticket items. This includes model errors, overhauls and new scenery items (foliage too)! This list is quite a bit longer than you're used to seeing, but I think everything here has it's place and is warranted to some degree. It is the culmination of roughly 40+ hours of work/research since 1.7 has released. I would like to thank all of the community managers and the dev team, we had 13(!) items addressed between 1.6 and 1.7. That's easily the most yet! Those will be reflected in color at the bottom, so you can see what's new. Without further delay, the list:
Zoopedia, Biome and Geography Issues
Make the following appropriate biomes changes for the following animals/biomes
Remove Tropical Rainforest and add Aquatic for Cape buffalo (explained further down)
Taxonomy errors:
"Timber wolf " refers to specifically to three North American exclusive subspecies of gray wolf. Using the Zoopedia's distribution map, along with the overall model design and the different translation names, we can logically come to the conclusion that this is in fact supposed to specifically be the Rocky Mountain Wolf, aka the Mackenzie Valley Wolf. This means it's named should be changed, and all references to Europe be stripped away from it's Zoopedia entry and distribution map.
As a further expansion on this point, the translated names pointed out here by @Aramar are very inconsistent.
Rename the “African buffalo” to be the Cape Buffalo. The full Latin name in the Zoopedia along with the distribution map indicate this is meant to be this specific subspecies only, and not a catch-all for the entire species. Thus, the name is incorrect and should be changed. As such, the Tropical Rainforest biome no longer applies. It should have Aquatic regardless, as the Cape buffalo frequents wetland regions. The rest of the bio will need to be edited.
Rename the “Galapagos giant tortoise” to either Chatham island tortoise or San Cristobal island tortoise (this refers to the same animal). There is no such creature as a “Galapagos giant tortoise”, as many different species that look drastically different from each other make up that group of animals. Also, the scientific name chosen for the Zoopedia, Chelonoidis niger, refers to an extinct species. The name should actually be Chelonoidis chathamensis. The rest of the bio will need to be edited.
The “Pronghorn antelope” is not an antelope at all. The word needs to be removed from the name, so it reads only as “Pronghorn”. The rest of the bio will need to be edited.
For the "Nature" tab, Central American should be added to North America and removed from South America, in order to be accurate to geography and geopolitical issues.
Any animal that lives in Central America but only has the current South/Central tag will need to have the new North/Central America tag added.
General Zoopedia Errors:
Add Baird's tapir and giant anteater to North American Zoopedia filter (the rest of Central American animals are correctly there)
American alligator bio references saltwater crocodile (Link to image)
Exhibit System
Biome changes
Add Aquatic biome to Goliath frog and make it the biome shown in the exhibit box.
New Features
Allow glass, roof and bottom on exhibit boxes to be set to null individually. There is a mod that allows this, but being an official part of the game would be preferred. This will allow us to create custom displays and would go a long way for creativity options, which is easily the biggest complaint for exhibits currently. Can be implemented into the drop down menus that already exist for choose between window, opaque and background art.
Allow a toggle option either in the game settings or in the exhibit's settings that automatically sends newly matured animals directly to the trade center, to make balancing populations less tedious, especially when playing on triple speed.
Consistency issues
Add the ability to change water color and transparency to the Aquatic biome vivarium. Should be easy to implement given the system already exists for standing water and some scenery items.
Add 3D façade for the Aquatic biome vivarium. I was greatly disappointed that no effort was made to give it one since the base game biomes (Desert and Tropical Rainforest) both have one.
Since the Puff adder and Sacred scarab beetle are now in the Grassland biome rather than Desert, they deserve a new vivarium ground texture, foliage and two new custom 2D and 3D backgrounds for the Grassland biome. (Edit: It seems the beetle was moved into the desert biome, but the puff adder remains. Rather than moving the adder back to desert, please move the beetle back to grasslands, and give them their own terrain).
Animals Behaviors and Animal Models
Edits for/to major behaviors (Diving, burrowing, climbing)
The following animals need to spend more of their time climbing, especially climbing trees; binturongs, koalas, capuchin monkeys, Chinese pangolin and red pandas. These animals in particular should not be spending so much time on the ground.
Specifically, red pandas and binturongs should be spending at least 80% of the time climbing on trees and climbing frames. Koalas should literally only be on the ground to poop and when moving to a tree feeder, so 95% of the time at least.
Add Chinese pangolin to the climbing system, and give it the binturong's "hanging" animations. This species of pangolin is actually notably arboreal and also has a prehensile tail like the binturong. Credit to @macronecu for pointing this out.
Finish adding diving to relevant species: Baird's and Malayan tapir, Nile monitor, Moose
Not diving, but re-add the swimming animations for the Chatham island/San Cristobal island tortoise that existed in beta
Expanding enrichment usage:
Give all canids that do not already (except fennec fox, due to size constraint) access to rope toy, swimming pool and tennis ball enrichment items (fennec fox has this latter one anyways).
Add natural termite mound use and animations to chimpanzee, bonobo, pangolin, aardvark and meerkat. Currently, these can only use the non-natural one.
In congruence with this, give the giant anteater access to the artificial termite mound
Give forage wall access to all remaining bear species
Give hammock access to jaguar, giant panda, Formosan black bear and snow leopard
Replace herb scent marker with blood scent marker for polar bears
Give disco ball access to the bonobo and King penguin, since the chimpanzee and Cape penguin can use it, they may as well also
Give the moose the underwater herbivore feeder
New enrichment item ideas
Add a "sentry post" style enrichment item for meerkats, modeled after a tree stump (preferably some generic enough to fit in any setting). New animations only need to be created for getting onto the object, when on the object, the current "sentry" animations can be reused with no issue.
Add two new enrichments items: smaller versions of the forage box and mud wallow. This would be intended to be used only by smaller animals/smaller groups of animals. The current items are quite large, and can thus limit habitat design. Idea provided by @NZFanatic
A smaller version of the waterfall enrichment, for similar reasons to the above point. It looks a bit odd when using the giant one for a small flamingo habitat for instance.
Sleeping log/tree limb! One or two variations, perhaps a natural branch and one that's more of a generic log (flexicolor please). This would hang off of the edge of a hill or climbing platform and would provide unique sleeping/resting animations for the relevant animals, being binturongs, red pandas, clouded leopards, sun and moon (Formosan) bears, jaguars, lions. Super easy way to get animals climbing more often, and for longer.
Leafless, broken trees, but as enrichment items, with specific sets of climbing animations for different animals.
Water slide object that must end in a connection to a body of water, being used by otters. Could be made big enough in case, oh I don't know, a California sea lion is ever added.
Each biome should have a tree for a natural scratching post, except the aquatic biome. Currently the tropical rainforest and taiga biomes are the only two with trees that fit.
Temperate fall leaves sleeping pile
Give ambiance speakers a small privacy bonus for shy animals
Increase cold and snow tolerance for Formosan black bear to be more realistic.
Remove giant anteaters as a walkthrough habitat, they are incredibly dangerous and would absolutely never, ever be allowed as one in a real zoo.
Make the Bactrian camel a walkthrough habitat. Since this is supposed to be the domesticated animal, not the wild one, it makes sense to allow this as a walkthrough animal.
Make it so that water based plants, in particular the lilly pad and water lotus, are not able to be walked on. It completely ruins immersion to see a hippo or elephant walking on a patch of water lilies.
Slightly boost the number of spotted hyena able to be kept together without infighting. Generally, hyenas can be kept in larger family groups than the game currently limits.
Change any food texture items with polar bear food enrichment to be meat exclusive. Some still use a mixed fruits and veggies texture, which is fine for any bear species except polar bears, which are hyper-carnivores and would never eat fruits or vegetables, except very, very rarely in captivity only. Not common enough to justify the texture remaining the same.
Allow Southern white rhino and hippo to share habitats without fighting. Doesn't necessarily need enrichment bonus, just the no fighting caveat.
Increase size groups for American alligator, both mixed and same sex. They are social animals unlike other crocodilians and can be kept in larger groups without incident.
Every known animal model issue/error
California sea lion: The male model is much too small in comparison to the female model. Sea lion males are always far larger than the females, regardless of captivity vs wild. The male model needs to be made larger.
Southern white rhino: The rhino calf is the model of a juvenile animal, but is the size of a newborn infant. If the animal is to remain the infant size, the model needs to be reworked so that the horn is removed, as baby rhinos do not yet have horns. If the animal is intended to be a juvenile, then the model need to be made bigger, and the size of the head and feet need to be increased a bit.
Malayan tapir: Purple coloration, Baird's tapir mark on head is leftover, nose is too short, hump not pronounced enough etc. There.Are.Plenty.Of.Threads....that discuss this issue. I think of all the model errors, this is the most egregious, partially because the art team was able to make a sign that looks exactly like a proper Malayan tapir while the actual animal model is a 1 to 1 reskin, and partially because we know that Frontier is aware of this issue, and has patched other animals (binturong, dhole) but seemingly doesn't care enough to fix this one.
Llama: Not a bad issue per say, but for some reason, when color variations were added, the all white skin that was the default before color variations was removed. I am asking for it to be re-added.
Gharial: Skin texture should be slightly darkened, scutes missing from the back/spine, body is a bit too bulky/pudgy, head shape needs to be narrower. This 3D rendering shows how the changes to the model should be made.
Chatham Island tortoise: Model is too small for a full grown adult. These can usually get quite bigger than the ones in PZ are capable, as this picture will show.
Aldabra tortoise: Has the same issue as the above, the model is too small for a full grown adult. These can also get quite big, as this picture will show.
Jaguar: Fur is too fluffy and a bit too darkly colored (brown). The body is too lithe like a leopard, and should be stockier and more muscled. The head should be slightly enlarged and made more muscular, there should not be black on the front of the ears, and the spot patterns should be darkened.
West African lion: Probably the single most complained about animal until the binturong and Malayan tapir issues came. The lioness is good, but the cubs need these spots or mottling on them. If they were juvenile animals it wouldn't be an issue, but they are clearly designed as cubs. The male lion needs it's mane entirely redone with the updated fur shader/texture, the original one looks like plastic. Both male and female adults need the snout elongated. Male needs mane variations (both coloration and maneless variants).
Grizzly bear: Needs a rework because it's the wrong kind of thick. It looks way overly fat, instead of stocky with a good mix of muscle and stored fat. It literally has the body shape of a potato.This is what an actual Grizzly looks like.
Himalayan brown bear: Let's all be frank. This was an animal added to the base game to help pad out the roster. It's nearly an exact carbon copy of the Grizzly bear. Look at this picture and you tell me if you think Planet Zoo's bear is close to accurate. It's way too fat, the coloration is too dark, the ears are wrong. Just not great all around.
American bison: Slightly too small, the head needs to be a bit larger and in general should be a bit taller. Here is a diagram that compares what the average size of an America plains bison looks like when compared to an average size adult human. In Planet Zoo, the keepers are usually as tall as the bison's hump (which itself needs to be made a bit taller).
Bactrian camel: This is also undersized. Here is a similar diagram for you to compare sizes with. In addition, the Planet Zoo camel has the face of a dromedary camel, not of a Bactrian camel. It also needs color variations including white, dark brown, cream and gold/ginger. Seeing as this is intended to be the domesticated Bactrian camel and these variations are common in captivity.
Cheetah: The adults are good, but the baby cheetahs are carbon copies of the adults, when they are clearly supposed to be infant/cubs. Here is what PZ made. Now compare it to a real cub. Unfortunately, not even close.
Snow leopard: The face and body are too fat, overall should be more lithe. The face should be a little elongated and the eyes slightly enlarged.
Spotted hyena: Neck arch and hind legs need to be a bit more exaggerated than the PZ version. Also, the "mane" needs to be more pronounced.
Nile monitor: Skin patterning on the adult is somewhat inaccurate, but not game breaking. What is however, is that the babies are carbon copies of the adult, just smaller. This is totally inaccurate compared to how they should actually look.
Koala: Too cute and stylized, looks like a plush toy. The lines around the mouth should be more defined, the nose should be more defined. The ears should be whiter, and for once you have here a PZ animal that actually should have more fur but it doesn't. The ears need to be more scraggily, seen here.
Rocky Mountain wolf: Animal is overall too fluffy and way too fat, especially the face. It has jowls for crying out loud, it's so fat. Here are some pictures of what an actual North American gray wolf looks like.
Chimpanzee: Make adult face darker, not pink. Usually only infants have pink faces.
Foliage, Rocks and Landscapes
General foliage ideas:
Less bushy bamboo options. Sometimes we just want to be able to use the taller stalks and not have gigantic leaves and branches obscuring vision. This happens even with the smallest Bengal bamboo size.
Taller, skinnier trees. This follows the same logic as above, we want to use trees that aren't so short and fat they obstruct vision. Around 3-4m up for the foliage to start appearing would be good for line of sight. Think of how the yellow fever trees are, tall, skinny and spread out. That's what I mean here.
More grasses. The drinn grass was a fantastic addition, but we could use at least 2-3 more species.
More Western palms (and palmettos). I've changed this to specify "New World" palms as the Africa pack and 1.6 update did a good job adding some fantastic African palms.
More aquatic plants. Specifically, some more sea grass and giant kelp would be fantastic choices.
More natural looking climbable branches and logs. We're super limited still and usually have to resort to non natural looking options, which yes, I would include the log/wood climbing set. I want some really natural looking dead trees and branches.
Wood chip piles and flat wood chip surface covering items (just like the mulch items). These are heavily recommended by the AZA and EAZA for many habitats such as elephant and rhinos. In Goron’s video interview with a habitat designer, this was talked about and he specifically noted how PZ does not have any wood chip items.
Individual cattails and reeds
General rock ideas:
Add in 5-10 new medium and large models for the fake rocks, with some updated texturing, still make them flexicolor.
Add new faux rock items in the shape of the flat “rock cladding” items the “real” biome rocks have. Make flexicolor, same as the current faux rocks.
Kopje texture and shaped style rocks
Faux rock baobab tree (the tall, skinny, dead kind that zoos tend to use)
Dynamic snow rocks, using the taiga or tundra rocks as the base. Functions that same as the dynamic moss rocks.
Foliage options for regions that are underrepresented in general:
Aquatic-Saltwater/Coastal/Brackish (As mentioned above, the aquatic biome in general is lacking, but the saltwater side is especially lacking.)
Give umbrella thorn acacia the Asia tag (Exists in Middle East and India)
Give papyrus sedge, blackthorn bush, common water lily, Italian cypress tree, elm tree, hawthorn bush, ivy and oak tree Europe tag, and add Grassland biome as well (All of these exist across the Mediterranean)
Rename cypress to Italian or Mediterranean cypress
Add a drop down menu when creating a new zoo that allows you to choose a background that corresponds with that biome. For instance, creating a new taiga map allows you to choose between the vanilla map background, or any of the custom made scenario/campaign ones. The full list of map backgrounds that we would be able to choose to use is:
Temperate: (Goodwin house, Panda Park, Yamaguchi Prefecture, Red Barn River, Bernie Goodwin Memorial)
Tropical rainforest: None
Grasslands: (Great Caldera Safari Park, Myers Lake Island, Myers Entertainment Park)
Desert: (Mexico Conservation Park, Tanami Roadside Zoo, El Darar Bazaar)
Tundra: (Goodwin Arctic research, Karst Mire)
Taiga: None
Add at least one new map background for each continent. With the restrictions of how PZ biomes work, there are many locations that do not look accurate when trying to build a zoo in that location. For instance, trying to build a temperate deciduous forest zoo in the Eastern U.S, but the only map background is for the English countryside. Here are some of my favorite options:
Europe: Gieranger Fjord to represent Scandinavia. Almeria, or some similar place in Italy, Greece or Croatia, to better represent the Mediterranean, with which there is currently no accurate map type or background.
Oceania: New Zealand beaches to represent, well, New Zealand! None of the current maps or biomes truly represent NZ.
North America: The Great Smoky Mountains, to fix the example issue I highlighted. Also, North American Prairie, for similar reasons as the temperate biome. The current grasslands background and plants look too African savannah to convincingly look like the Great Plains.
Africa: Mount Kilimanjaro. Africa is actually quite well off, but this is so iconic that it would be an incredible background.
South America: Torres del Paine, to give some better representation to the cooler temperature areas of South America, like Chile and Argentina.
New Scenery Ideas
Topographic map items of each continent, with different depths to show either biome regions or elevation, similar to the style of the globe on the main screen. Different elevation, or biomes (whichever you decide) are flexicolor to each other (Level 1, 2, 3 etc.)
Additionally, one large world map item in this style
Focus on more cohesive theming for any statues added into a free update. What I mean by this is, instead of giving the hippo or Nile monitor for instance, a random theme for a statue, give them some statues in the theme of the new Africa pack, that way they can all be used together. Another example, give the Baird's tapir a statue that fits the SA pack theme.
I previously asked for artwork and statues to be added for animals that had no items in game, which was somewhat remedied, however it is still an issue. Here is the list of animals that have no representation at all
Aardvark, Cape Buffalo, African Wild Dog, Aldabra Giant Tortoise, Bactrian Camel, Bongo, Bonobo, Common Warthog, Formosan Black Bear, Chatham island tortoise, Gemsbok, Himalayan brown bear, Komodo dragon, Mandrill, Nile nonitor, Nyala, Okapi, Pygmy Hippo, Snow Leopard, Springbok, Thomson's Gazelle, Lehmann's dart frog, Golden dart frog, Gila monster, Yellow anaconda, Boa constrictor, Giant leaf insect, Eastern brown snake, Death adder, Giant cockroach, Goliath frog, Goliath beetle, Titan beetle, African giant snail, Lesser Antillean iguana
1-2 placeable “pond” items so we can have small water objects without actually using the terrain tools, which can be a bit hard to use for small areas. Faux rock borders that are flexicolor, as well as flexicolor water
Add fake eggs props for various in-game species (ex: Cassowary, caiman, Komodo dragon, Ostrich). Idea originally discussed with Chante in "Eggs" thread last December.
New Game Mechanics
The ability to make 2m and 3m wide paths without using exploits involving placing queues. This should at the very least be implemented for staff paths.
Add same color variations of staff paths without the logo imposed. Also, a new or color or two, such as a sandy brown, would be great.
Ability to place trash cans on sloped paths
Add a null path option
Add null kerbs to the terrain paths
Add an option to the null barrier that allows a toggle for visibility through it.
Tone down severity of light/godrays indoors
Space apart the barriers addition and extension buttons when building barriers as they often overlap, forcing you to change angles while building, which is restrictive.
Smaller version of the walkthrough habitat gate
Null Version of both would be good as well. Option made of metal or glass would be nice but not as needed, especially if a null option is made.
Allow zookeepers to walk through flat bottomed water that is 1.5m or shallower. This will allow just a little more flexibility when creating habitats such as monkey islands.
Ability to set genetic size and stats etc. in sandbox mode
General Quality Of Life Stuff
Add animal tags to climbable trees if the animal can actually climb said object. I have noticed that not every climbing animal can climb every tree with the climbable label, which means it’s very annoying to try and have to figure this out for yourself.
Habitat land size reductions for these animals:
Australia mandates that koala habitat space is 20m^2 for a koala, with an additional 10m^2 per each new animal. The largest habitat size was around 100m^2…..PZ mandates minimum size for a Koala be 180m^2. Visual representation found here. I recommend the new minimum be 100m^2.
The AZA specifies the minimum land requirement for a pair of red pandas be at least 40m^2, with more being preferred if possible. I would recommend shrinking the land requirements to something more realistic, from 220m^2 for one animal to a new minimum of 150m^2. Keep climbing area the same.
The AZA specifies the minimum land requirements for a pair of binturongs be around 42m^2. Taking into the recommended 8-10 feet^2 (2-3m) verticality that is required, I would recommend reducing from PZ’s requirements of 182m^2 per animal, to a new minimum of 150m^2 per animal. Keep climbing area the same.
Add large and small circular billboards.
Ability to specifically turn off "About to mature" notifications
There is a game decoration that is clearly an Asian elephant that displays the name of "African elephant sign". This hasn't been fixed in over a year and a half.
Take a break from the timed challenges and just make them regular campaign maps, even if they're a simple one-off without voice acting. This is highly requested by both people on the forums, and on the PZ Reddit.
Add in TikiChicki food stores and vending machines. This was the only base game PC store that was left out of PZ base game
Consider adding the PC world’s fair stores in a free update (since they are paid dlc for PC this may be a big ask, but I don’t think people would buy a store dlc for PZ)
Food stands/carts (ala ZT2) for existing brands would also be a nice touch
Add the ability to make longer zoo names. Suggested by @macronecu originally
Add flexicolor water and flexicolor rock to the forage pool enrichment item
Add option to disable animal scarring, if not in all game modes, then at least sandbox mode
Revamped tegicam system (made into an actual feature, rather than a hidden cheat)
Add a “still water” or “slow flowing water” effect (or 2) to the game. We have plenty of options for fast moving water, such as water falls and rapids, but none for slow or still water.
Increase giant panda star appeal to be the max amount in the game. As pandas are so rare in captivity to begin with, and generally seen as "cute", their rarity and real life popularity status should be reflected as such in the game.
Notable Bugs
Slow motion jumping for clouded leopards when climbing
Capuchin monkey facial glitch
Grid flickering with pathing and terrain during construction.
Spotted hyena black hole throat
Koala in passive climbing on a tree while being at the bottom of the trunk, so it clips into the ground.
New birch branch items have very low resolution/texture, even on ultra settings (This might just be a problem specific to me but I'm not sure why. I play on all ultra settings)
Animals swimming through barriers and walls
Added desert biome tags to cheetah, common ostrich, African wild dogs and pronghorn
Added taiga biome tags to Formosan black bear, giant panda and American bison
Upgraded capuchin conservation status from LC to V
Added more statues for existing animals
Added more art for animals by adding custom billboards
Added different sized education boards by way of custom billboards
Added more ambiance sounds by adding custom sound speakers
Added staff heatmap to show where keepers can and cannot walk in habitats
Added continent tags to all rocks, allowing them to still be used when filtering strictly by continent
Fixed visibility issue with water/tanks by allowing custom colors and visibility
Updated animal icon for the binturong to show the new model
Updated African bush elephant conservation status from V to E
Added a search bar to animal trade centers
Added diving to polar, grizzly, sun and Formosan black bear.
Added train all staff button
Made mesh fences see-through
North Sulawesi Babirusa name was changed to be the appropriate species, and the distribution map is fixed to reflect this as well.
African elephant name changed to specify African Bush/Savannah Elephant
Red kangaroos are now walkthrough
Significantly changed diving depth restrictions for all animals
Added diving for jaguar and the two tiger species
Rainbow eucalyptus now has Oceania tag
Bramble bush now have North America and Asia tags
Added natural birch branches
Added path kerbs and barriers
Increased cold and snow tolerance for Bactrian camel and American bison
And there you have it, the 1.8 meta-suggestions list! As a reminder, suggestions will be open for right around 2 weeks and then I will close the list, in order to give them team ample time to start thinking about what they might want to tackle next. I really appreciate all of the hard work the CM team and the dev team do respectively. It truly is incredible to me that we have gotten so much added into this game just from the continuation of this list.
As always, @Jens Erik@Eltanin Casciani@Francesca Falcini@Tim Smith , if you discuss any of these points with the dev team and they tell you something is impossible, for one reason or another, feel free to post that here and I will happily remove it! Thanks again for all the hard work you've done for us as a community.
The one constructive criticism I can think of is, I'm not sure taking tropical away from the Cape Buffalo is the right thing, as there is a thin coastal rainforest zone that runs from the Horn of Africa all the way south to the tip of South Africa, which is why I think the Reticulated Giraffe and Nyala also have tropical biomes in the game.
In that sense, for a more consistent approach, either all three need to be taken away or some other species like the African Savannah Elephant need tropical to be added.
If any biome needs to be taken away, I think the best candidate would be temperate for Cuvier's Dwarf Caiman, as these guys are a strictly tropical species native only to the lowlands of the Equatorial Amazon Basin, with their distribution restricted to the rainforests, as well as gallery forests in savannahs of the region.
The recent changes made to Cuvier's Dwarf Caiman's temperature suitability range prompted me to prepare this post. The lower limit even before the change bothered me for being too low, however, now that the figure has dropped to 6 Celsius, it is even more concerning. Cuvier's Dwarf Caiman...
Just updated it with a few things. I noticed that concrete do not have the panels that the mud and plaster sets have which is kind of annoying if you want to use concrete but are forced to use the wall items. So I'm suggesting those get added in.
Aquatic biome for Nile monitor. Ties into adding deep swimming for them.
Add grassland to the gemsbok. They don't need to be added to the "savannah gang" enrichment group (they wouldn't really coexist with them in the wild), but their natural habitat definitely includes arid grassland.
Remove tropical from the common warthog. I found no evidence that they are consistently found in tropical regions.
Extremely minor, but the word "death" for "age of sexual sterility" for the Komodo dragon is lowercase, when for everything else, it's uppercase. Again, not a huge deal, just something I noticed.
For animals that are a specific subspecies, the area under their Zoopedia picture listing their full classification should include their species as well.
The Amazonian giant centipede is not listed under North America, despite being found in parts of Central America and the Caribbean.
Animal Behavior
Add diving to the proboscis monkey.
Some sort of interaction between different species that enrich each other. Should be quite easy (correct me if I'm wrong) for things like springbok and Thompson's gazelle, which have very similar frames, and they could more or less reuse intraspecies interactions.
Interspecies bonus between pronghorn and black-tailed prairie dog. Not quite as fitting as bison, but pronghorn still share much of their environment.
Interspecies bonus between the warthog and meerkat and aardvark. All three frequently coexist in the wild.
Interspecies bonus between Indian elephants and peafowl. It was in the beta and then removed at launch, if I remember correctly. Have it replace the proboscis monkey, as their ranges do not overlap.
Following both real life and the Zoopedia, it doesn't make sense for wild dogs to require much smaller mixed-sex groups than bachelor ones.
For red ruffed lemurs, despite the Zoopedia saying females are dominant, the ingame social structure is just one male with a bunch of females, just like most other animals.
Bonobos, as far as I know, just fight like every other animal when overcrowded. It would add a nice touch if they simply became stressed and ran around.
Model Issues
The female lions are honestly not much better than their male counterparts, especially when compared to things like the new cougar. If the male lion is ever improved, the females should be as well.
The giant anteater has very well-defined patches of each color. In real life, it's a lot more blurred together.
On a more major note, I highly doubt the wonderful dev team legitimately can't do better than thisgoliath birdeater. It doesn't even have hair.
The Bornean orangutan, like the koala, looks very stylized and almost like a stuffed animal. Real orangutans have much shaggier hair that's a bit less "evenly distributed."
The Zoopedia explicitly mentions black springbok, but they don't appear in the game. Either add them or remove the mention, but this just feels like taunting.
General Quality of Life Changes
Change "release to wild" to "donate to breed preservation program" (or something similar) for llamas and Bactrian camels. This would also pave the way for more conventional domestic animals in later expansions.
True free roaming for peafowl and other small walkabout animals. There could be some sort of null barrier with special scent markers that discourage them from going too far. A more realistic choice would be some sort of shock-collar, but that's obviously something a game with a heavy focus on animal welfare should probably avoid.
Bugs
I've noticed a frequent bug where beavers seem to generate random water effects while on land.
If there's anything I missed, or something that was already covered, please let me know.
For example, mosquitos, rats, etc.
But, in order to fit the conservation theme of Planet Zoo, players have to decide on eco-safe ways to keep pests away.
For example, the Houston Zoo doesn't have a bad mosquito problem, despite all the standing water (Houston is a swamp, literally). What they did is they have these posts that hold water and attract the mosquitoes. Then, the zoo harvests the larvae/pupa and feeds them to the animals (if I'm not mistaken)
With that logic, the Gobi, Southeast Asia, and Siberia should all be their own continents. As would the Sahara, the Congo, and the Serengeti. Every continent has multiple biomes, I don't see why North America is an exception
With that logic, the Gobi, Southeast Asia, and Siberia should all be their own continents. As would the Sahara, the Congo, and the Serengeti. Every continent has multiple biomes, I don't see why North America is an exception
Because they’re not continents. In any case, Biologically (though, admittedly, not geographically) tropical Central America belongs with South America.
Because they’re not continents. In any case, Biologically (though, admittedly, not geographically) tropical Central America belongs with South America.
Raise the giant pandas species appeal to be way higher. In the zoos that have them they’re usually the most popular animals and people travel just to see them. They should be this popular in game.
And alligators group size should be raised. At the very least for bachelor groups
If there were categories for each ecologically district area on earth, drpending what scale you wanted to use. At the minimum scale to include central America separately to either NA or SA, we’d have far too many categories - just Oceania would have at least 6 (south-east Australia, South-West Australia, Northern tropical Australia, arid inland Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand), South America would have (off the top of my head, at least 4-5), Africa would have at least 5, Europe would have 4-5, Asia and NA would have even more. It would be unwieldy and not very useful.
