Planet Zoo 2 Speculation and ideas
- Thread starter yoav_r
- Start date
I mean assumably alot of groundwork would have been laid out by planco 2 by then, like the new pathing tools, lighting system and scaling aswell as whatever they cook up for the free updates.
So in theory the Pz devs can focus on all the zoo and animal specific stuff. Regarding missing feature i would be fine with them keeping it to whatever the big new seller is (aquatics and/or aviaries) and another smaller thing or two, there has to be new features left for the free updates aswell.
And yeah there will be bugs at the beginning which is also fine imo, just happens with every video game
They cut out custom media again just to give it at a later update. The game just has a unfinished vibe to it and because of console there’s a 6000 guests limit and smaller parks
Yeah i have watched a couple of videos and i got the same feeling.
You mean the billboards? That would suck
Cant really say anything about it feeling unfinished as i havent watched any gameplay of it, nor the first game to compare it to, but i think an important thing to keep in my is that the creators do get an early access version and stuff like that might be still worked on and are in the release version
Yes the billboards and speakers.
There probably will be a day one patch but the optimization issues are bad and the guest limit and park size really need to be fixed as soon as possible. There’s no reason PC should be hindered because of console
Yeah the Leaf video looked cool, but I will say Rudi’s video highlighted a lot of issues. It does sound like Frontier kneecapped themselves for console.
I don't think anyone's mentioned this yet, but something I just realized...improvement to the way enrichment is used.
Obviously we all want more enrichment, but I'm not talking about that.
Here's my point:
The above are the bare minimum update for this. What I would prefer in PZ2 would be to allow the keepers to automate enrichment. We can choose what enrichment we want if we so desire. But if not we can just allow the keepers to cycle through enrichment, both food and toys.
Obviously we all want more enrichment, but I'm not talking about that.
Here's my point:
- Make enrichment easier to select/swap. When you click on a habitat or animal, you can get to a list of enrichment in the habitat, but you cannot select the enrichment. You have to click on the physical items one by one. You should be able to select them straight from the habitat/animal window. In addition, many animals require frequent changing of toy enrichment. In the enrichment section you should be able to pre-select groups and swap them out with 1 click. Nice and easy. The way we have to search for enrichment and delete them, then remember which ones to replace with is just far too tedious.
- Food enrichment could be scaled down. There's no reason we need 20 food enrichment items cluttering up the habitat for an African savannah with 30 animals(not exact).
The above are the bare minimum update for this. What I would prefer in PZ2 would be to allow the keepers to automate enrichment. We can choose what enrichment we want if we so desire. But if not we can just allow the keepers to cycle through enrichment, both food and toys.
After talking about the possible agenda tool for PZ2 in the speculation thread I’m a bit motivated to share some more ideas for PZ2, but to save the scrolling I shall use spoilers 
I’ll keep adding to this post later on but this is all I got so far lol
Besides management, education is an area that needs a lot of attention for a sequel. I talked about this in the speculation thread but having events like behind the scenes tours that guests can pay for would be amazing. Here’s how I believe this would work:
On the side panel you will have a tab called the “calendar” tab or “agenda” tab in which when you open it, you will see a calender for the month you are in. You will also be able to zoom out to see the whole year as a whole. The point of this tab isn’t to make events, it is to manage them. To actually create let’s say a VIP tour, you would need to go to enclosures themselves.
For example if you would like to create a behind the scenes tour for porcupines, you would click on the habitat and click “make event” from there you have 2 choices: make a backstage tour or a keeper talk point.
Keeper talks are a lot simpler to schedule. Simply place a keeper post at any place near or in the enclosure and schedule when it takes place. This works the exact same way as how they currently do, only difference is the posts can be turned null and the keepers actually interact with the animals like feeding or training them.
If you select “tour” from the “make event” selector in the habitat menu you will be brought up with a route maker very similar to the barrier system. To complete a successful VIP tour you will need 4 things:
Just like keeper talks you can assign a time of day and months of the year where the tours will run - this will show up in the calendar tab along with keeper talks.
On the side panel you will have a tab called the “calendar” tab or “agenda” tab in which when you open it, you will see a calender for the month you are in. You will also be able to zoom out to see the whole year as a whole. The point of this tab isn’t to make events, it is to manage them. To actually create let’s say a VIP tour, you would need to go to enclosures themselves.
For example if you would like to create a behind the scenes tour for porcupines, you would click on the habitat and click “make event” from there you have 2 choices: make a backstage tour or a keeper talk point.
Keeper talks are a lot simpler to schedule. Simply place a keeper post at any place near or in the enclosure and schedule when it takes place. This works the exact same way as how they currently do, only difference is the posts can be turned null and the keepers actually interact with the animals like feeding or training them.
If you select “tour” from the “make event” selector in the habitat menu you will be brought up with a route maker very similar to the barrier system. To complete a successful VIP tour you will need 4 things:
- Start/Meeting Point
- Ending/Farewell Point
- At least 1 break point (a point where the keeper will stop and talk or feed animals you decide)
- A walkable route going from the start point to the end point.
Just like keeper talks you can assign a time of day and months of the year where the tours will run - this will show up in the calendar tab along with keeper talks.
I know a lot of us would love having stuff like boo at the zoo and Christmas themed parks however not everyone has those holidays so I don’t think frontier would directly have these as events in game however this would work with the ability to create events and reminders in the calender tab.
This has a fun side and a logical side. Fun side is being able to make events and reminders for yourself. Not so much building reminders but more like “boo at the zoo” marked for the month of October or Christmas stuff in December. These events wouldn’t do anything they would just be reminders for yourself or if you wanna make things a bit more realistic in your parks.
The logical side is using the custom events for management stuff. For example in franchise mode you could have a keeper say “the inspector will be here in X month, would you like a reminder in place?” Clicking yes would highlight that month and remind you of when the inspector is coming. Just stuff like that, not a huge feature but a helpful one.
This has a fun side and a logical side. Fun side is being able to make events and reminders for yourself. Not so much building reminders but more like “boo at the zoo” marked for the month of October or Christmas stuff in December. These events wouldn’t do anything they would just be reminders for yourself or if you wanna make things a bit more realistic in your parks.
The logical side is using the custom events for management stuff. For example in franchise mode you could have a keeper say “the inspector will be here in X month, would you like a reminder in place?” Clicking yes would highlight that month and remind you of when the inspector is coming. Just stuff like that, not a huge feature but a helpful one.
Playgrounds, Carousels, more fun stuff for kids to do other than just learning about the animals. It would be cool if they moved go karts over from PC2 to PZ2 as an attraction in kids zoos haha.
Why? I always viewed the "free updates" as a pittance for publishing a completely unfinished game in the first place. Many of the free update features were shown in the original PZ trailer, and yet it still took years to get us the features. They knew it would be a complete embarrassment to try to charge for basic features that belonged in the game at launch.
If Frontier actually finishes the game before releasing & charging money for it, then there would be no need to provide major free content updates.
like which ??
Every time I see someone claim they are holding features from release, it's always without any evidence. Last year we had someone so sure they had actual late stage dlc quality animals shown at the E3 event while continuing to roll out poorer quality animals which turned out to be a complete lie as I chose to rewatch the videos that person referred to. So I did it again, none of the original pz trailers show any free update features that is obvious to spot.
Educational talks were in the reveal trailer and didn’t come out till much later
I think it depends. Certainly all the educational updates we got should have been in the base game given how important education is for real zoos and the base game had pretty much nothing.
But other things like the restaurants and gift shops I'm okay with them saving for the free updates.
Ohhh right, in the tease trailer, well that's one but I don't think there are more??
Last edited:
Not that I know of
I agree it wouldnt make sense to hold features from the release only to add them in later the free updates always have and always will be for feedback management ideas that they didnt know needed to exist until fans wanted it. It makes even less sense for them to go through the effort of making both a high and low quality animals so the free updates look good when they update bad textures.
The only exception to this idea was deep diving which wasnt held back to purposely release alongside aquatic it just wasnt done yet at the time of release.
No there doesnt free updates have never been for strategically placing features ingame they always been for fixing or adding things fans have complained about. Very rarely we get things for the sake of getting things usually its just random decor or occasionally stuff like the viewing dome. That is why free updates can look very different from each other and are usually headlined by bug fixes or other not planned changes.
I agree to that. I'd rather wait a little longer than have a Planet Coaster 2 scenario with my beloved zoo game. I never again wnat to look forward to a Frontier game and then not play it afer some initial hours because the UI frustrates me or the game is just TOO unfinished. I don't expect everything we had in PZ1 in a sequel right from the start, but basic QOL features in sandbox, basic building pieces like glass and lot of shop brands etc. should be in there right away.
Not in the trailer, but they did advertise right from the start different fur shades, patterns and colors for every species - and the feature did not make it to launch and was implemented quite a bit later.
To be fair, now two weeks after the official release, by looking at the steam charts, I guess Frontier can only realize how they screwed up their launch. Not only after the second day PC2 is far behind in terms of players number than PC at the same stage of life, but since today PZ has more players now (5 years post release) than PC2 (3 weeks).
What hurts is that more than half of the players that were on PC before PC2 released actually stayed on PC. So their player base didn't make the jump and I would argue it's not an advertising problem. I think they will do along the content releases but still it's not a beautiful picture.
It's not only the game quality (even if the lack of content is critical), as the economical context is not the same as back when PC was released.
But Frontier must be careful, because I am not sure if they can afford their game to "underperform".
And I am pretty sure that it will be the same pattern for an eventual PZ 2. Economy might be still tough and players might wait a decent content in the game to do the jump.
So they might be smart and learn the lesson.