Spring 2024 DLC Speculation

[RightWhale]

The sloth bear is easily the hardest for me to understand. I get that they wanted to throw a bone to india in the eurasia pack, which i think is definetly the right choice.
But the animal choice they chose for it is just so weird to me. India already had 3 bears to chose from, so giving it the 4fth one instead of blackbuck, langur or something is just so bizarre to me. Its wasnt even a super highly requested animal either. Although it was probably one of that took the most amount of effort.
Its like doing an americas pack and the SA representative is another caiman instead of literally anything else

I got to be honest, the sloth bear is cool and all. But I might have preferred we got a fifth ungulate in the more useful blackbuck. Also it feels weird thinking the bears might not be finished, but India got so many alone when the Americas only have a grizzly.

But yeah, I bet so much time was on the sloth bear. Imagine we got anything else. The fur is amazing though, so credit regardless.

 

[SalamAnders]

The sloth bear is easily the hardest for me to understand. I get that they wanted to throw a bone to india in the eurasia pack, which i think is definetly the right choice.
But the animal choice they chose for it is just so weird to me. India already had 3 bears to chose from, so giving it the 4fth one instead of blackbuck, langur or something is just so bizarre to me. Its wasnt even a super highly requested animal either. Although it was probably one of that took the most amount of effort.
Its like doing an americas pack and the SA representative is another caiman instead of literally anything else

Especially considering the amount of macaque species they could choose from for that pack, doesn't get easier than that. While they are far from the monkeys we desire the most, they are still monkeys! I would have taken a rhesus macaque over the bear even though that is probably in the bottom of needed monkeys.

 

[RightWhale]

On a more positiv note, it also doesnt take that much to make a pack worthwhile.

Just a few slamdunks can turn a mostly mediocre pack into a good one, just look at grasslands.
We got 3 carnivorans and the least interesting antelope possible, with the armadillo where i got mixed feelings and the 5 butterflies which are amazing but severly held back by the WTE and its flaws, with the only 2 animals id give above a 6/10 being the emu and the wallaby, which both are a clean 20/10, finally giving us the two most important australian species, especally for International zoos.
That was a real game changer for australian areas, even if it were the only banger inclusions they completly carry my perception of the pack.

Something as simple as adding 2 monkeys would easily carry an otherwise completly mid animal pack for me, same thing with a monkey + bird for a scenery pack + obviously the consistently great scenery.
But with frontier tendency even this quite low bar feels very uncertain, which is just sad

Honestly I think the 10 animals thread you made highlights that pretty well.

If the final dlc contains:

1. Monkeys, always useful
2. Birds, yes plural is important. Even if it’s two “100% clones” like the Caribbean flamingo and the black swan I can get more use out of them than not at all. Though if I get a duck, oh man I would be happy.

That would literally be all it takes for me. That’s it. All the other picks might be not as useful for me, but just throw me a bone frontier! I’ve waited a long time!

 

[CharlieXGaming]

On a more positiv note, it also doesnt take that much to make a pack worthwhile.

Just a few slamdunks can turn a mostly mediocre pack into a good one, just look at grasslands.
We got 3 carnivorans and the least interesting antelope possible, with the armadillo where i got mixed feelings and the 5 butterflies which are amazing but severly held back by the WTE and its flaws, with the only 2 animals id give above a 6/10 being the emu and the wallaby, which both are a clean 20/10, finally giving us the two most important australian species, especally for International zoos.
That was a real game changer for australian areas, even if it were the only banger inclusions they completly carry my perception of the pack.

Something as simple as adding 2 monkeys would easily carry an otherwise completly mid animal pack for me, same thing with a monkey + bird for a scenery pack + obviously the consistently great scenery.
But with frontier tendency even this quite low bar feels very uncertain, which is just sad

I’d compare this to the Eurasia pack, not grasslands as that for me had all bangers, even including the wildebeest, even though that one is heavily disliked.

The Eurasia pack has a lot of animals that are mid to a general audience; Wolverine, wisent, boar, etc the swan is the slamdunk pick that made people buy the pack.

 

[KönigDerKaffeebohnen]

I got to be honest, the sloth bear is cool and all. But I might have preferred we got a fifth ungulate in the more useful blackbuck. Also it feels weird thinking the bears might not be finished, but India got so many alone when the Americas only have a grizzly.

But yeah, I bet so much time was on the sloth bear. Imagine we got anything else. The fur is amazing though, so credit regardless.

Nah bro that sloth bear slot has monke written all over it.
I know that its also controversial, but the golden snub nose monkey would have been in every way superior to the slothbear and even would have fit their snowy vibes.
Otherwise changing it to the lion tailed macaque and the saiga to the black buck to double down on filling up india would also have been a very easy and most likly popular thing to do

Its just a big why to me, because why did anyone ever think that in a pack thats gonna be controversial anyways they took what should have been the easy crowd pleasing asian side and butcher it with not one, but two animals that are to the shock of no one controversial addition.
Even just picking the pallas cat as the easy way out carnivoran would have made significantly more sense and would have been much more popular

 

[CharlieXGaming]

Sloth bear should’ve been Pallas Cat, that’s all I’ll say.

 

[KönigDerKaffeebohnen]

Sloth bear just should have been literally anything else, but guess that isnt our timeline.
I would have taken one less animal in the pack and a redesigned orangutan or wolf over it

 

[Cooper_yang]

Regarding the last DLC, I want to have a 15+2 lineup. This DLC will complement the species that have been requested most.
Here is my list:
1. Spectacled Bear
2. Black howler monkey
3. South American coati
4. Baboon
5. GSNM
6. PD deer
7. Muntjac
8. Secretary bird
9. Shoebill stork
10. Yellow-throated marten
11. Blackbuck
12. Markhor /Tahr
13. Echidna
14. Tree Kangaroo
15. Golden Pheasant

Exhibition animals:
1. King Cobra
2. Chinese giant salamander

 

[frank1055]

If this is the last DLC, how many animals would be suitable to be stuffed into the border, including the top few on the forum's wish list, and the DLC theme should be the most difficult to guess
（But I don't think this will be the last DLC, I think they should at least spend their fifth anniversary smoothly，This is the best time to end）

 

[RightWhale]

For my preferred outcome it would probably be the TreeTops pack I made up earlier, I just want to make a change or two:

1. Hamadryas baboon
2. Black howler monkey
3. Golden lion tamarin
4. Tree kangaroo
5. White nosed coati
6. Secretary bird
7. Scarlet ibis
8. White faced whistling duck (any perching duck would do)
9. Roseate spoonbill
10. Grey crowned crane
11. Exhibit: Jackson chameleon
12. WTE: Scarlet macaw

If we got a bird in the WTE this would be my guess. To make a more realistic take:

1. Hamadryas baboon
2. Black howler monkey
3. White nosed coati
4. Secretary bird
5. Roseate spoonbill
6. Perching duck species
7. Grey crowned crane
8. Exhibit: Jackson chameleon

For a take like the Grasslands pack, and this being the last dlc, we get multiple WTE birds:

1. Hamadryas baboon
2. Black howler monkey
3. White nosed coati
4. Secretary bird
5. Roseate spoonbill
6. Perching duck species
7. Grey crowned crane
8. WTE: budgies
9. WTE: lorikeet
10. WTE: bee eaters
11. WTE: finches (gouldian or zebra)
12. WTE: toucan

Is this easily the most unrealistic part? Most definitely. Fun to make though, and I definitely don’t think it’s gonna happen! I’m excited to see what the news will be!

Here is what I think the most realistic pack will be, that I can also get behind:

1. Hamadryas baboon
2. Black howler monkey
3. White nosed coati
4. Musk ox
5. Pallas cat/ Ocelot/ Serval
6. Secretary bird
7. Bird #2: American flamingo/ duck/ pelican/ grey crowned crane
8. Exhibit: cobra or Jackson chameleon

 

[CharlieXGaming]

TreeTops pack

White faced whistling duck

Walk me through the math behind this lol

 

[Captain Callum]

Walk me through the math behind this lol

Whistling ducks like trees

 

[RightWhale]

Walk me through the math behind this lol

Whistling ducks are known for perching, in fact a number of duck species are known for nesting in trees or perching in them. Two of the most popular examples (besides whistling ducks) are the closely related mandarin and wood ducks.

And as @Captain Callum said whistling ducks are famous for it.

 

[RightWhale]

I’ll admit it is a bit of a stretch to fit ducks into my ideal wishlist, but we could still have a cool selection of species to choose from.

Though if Frontier were to give us our first duck perching probably wouldn’t be part of it. So a more regular dabbling duck like the mallard would be what we get.

 

[Leaf Productions]

steamdb or whatever

 

[Fallax]

Imagine telling someone before Eurasia dropped "there is an Asian antelope and India rep" and then it's not the blackbuck.

 

[Swjosdotschka]

I'm still super happy about the sloth bear. The only short comming is, that they didn't add puggy back riding with it. But it's not the first time they took disapointing short cuts with unique animals.

All our marsupials have their pouches for nothing, as offspring never gets in and out of it.

The Orang Utan moves on it's nuckles

The Ass doesn't make ass noises (still the most unexcusable for me, as it's not that there went super much development time elsewhere in the arid pack and sounds are usually Frontiers biggest strength).

On the other hand we got wastd development time (imho) on deep diving cats and this Rudi Rennkamel mode. (I always forgot what it's called... diorama? Totally unneccessary in a zoo game)

 

[NachoB]

as it's not that there went super much development time elsewhere in the arid pack

Is called a porcupine

 

[CharlieXGaming]

I’ll admit it is a bit of a stretch to fit ducks into my ideal wishlist, but we could still have a cool selection of species to choose from.

Though if Frontier were to give us our first duck perching probably wouldn’t be part of it. So a more regular dabbling duck like the mallard would be what we get.

Idk though still a “Treetops” pack does not scream duck to me, treetops makes me think of rainforests.

 

[markun]

and this Rudi Rennkamel mode. (I always forgot what it's called... diorama? Totally unneccessary in a zoo game)

Agree entirely on this. I just don’t get why this was seen as a priority given all the limits to creativity in terms of biomes, maps, temperature and weather amongst others.