The visitor behaviour is very questionable.

[Solovar_Grodd]

Dear Frontier employees,
I've been playing Planet ZOO since it was released, have all the DLCs and, if Steam is to be believed, have played a total of 4385 hours.
And although I still enjoy playing it and will continue to do so, today I would like to offer a criticism of the game.

Yesterday I decided to close down and completely clear out an almost 800-year-old franchise zoo in order to build something new with the 130 million credits I had earned.
The reason was that it bothered me that the more distant areas were only visited by a few visitors, while the entrance area was crowded. Although the most attractive animals like apes and predators were located in the outer areas, there were plenty of restaurants and food stalls, and there were benches to rest on the way there, the visitors were too lazy to move there.
I was even more surprised when I gradually sold all the animals or put them into storage, but neither the mood of the visitors nor the assessment changed.
Even when there was not a single animal left, they were full of praise. "Admission price is reasonable (after all, 60 credits for zero animals), great zoo, lots to see" etc. etc. And new guests kept coming.
Even when I kicked out all the staff except for the shop assistants and zookeepers, nothing changed.
Only when I closed the restaurants was the fun over.

When I visit a zoo as a real person, I also look at the animals in the more distant areas and don't just run from food stall to food stall.

The programmed visitor behaviour is very questionable.
Apart from the fact that they complain that they can't see the animals, even if they are not a virtual 10 metres away, they can look through walls in other places. OK, so be it, you can live with it if you have to.
But the fact that the visitors only come to enjoy the food and sales stalls is beside the point.

Can this behaviour be changed in an update?
I would appreciate a comment on the visitors' behaviour.

 

[criswaller]

I've noticed this too. I have a franchise zoo that I have changed from a big zoo with many species to one devoted to breeding red foxes. I have one large exhibit that I have long-lived grasslands animals in (elephants, hippos, ostriches, giraffes) and one with great apes. I stick cheap animals from the market in these and basically ignore them as I raise thousands of foxes. And the visitors keep coming and the money keeps rolling in, even though there are many empty habitats and almost all the rest are filled with foxes...

 

[cheddartabby]

I had this problem in my wetlands zoo,(shortly after the pack came out). Because it spanned over such a large area, guests stayed packed in the middle and never visited the further away habitats. They even complained that there wasn't much to see!

 

[Solovar_Grodd]

I had this problem in my wetlands zoo,(shortly after the pack came out). Because it spanned over such a large area, guests stayed packed in the middle and never visited the further away habitats. They even complained that there wasn't much to see!

I hope that a Frontier employee will comment on this topic.

 

[Karen F]

It has always been like this. I doubt anything Will change, but you could post it on the issue tracker and hope for the best.

 

[Kolikokoli]

It's the same as in real life. Place more entrances/spawn points on the other side of the Zoo to populate it more evenly with visitors.

 

[Captain Callum]

I highly doubt guest pathfinding would be reworked in such a huge manner which would be the single biggest improvement of guests since the release of planet coaster. It's more that guests already allow the most performance friendly option that allows each guest party to follow a different route that feels natural. Think of the way that if the tigers at the back of the zoo are first, followed by polar bear, lions etc - then you have a very predictable guest flow pattern that would be extremely artificial that looks nothing like real life. Random patterns despite how troublesome ingame are the best way to implement realistic guest movement

Yes we have problems with allowing guests to reach further areas but the key to do this by limiting guest needs to plaza areas forcing your guests to move plaza to plaza and ideally have a single guest spawner at the back of the zoo to increase foot traffic at the back of the zoo. Guests don't move into the back? Stop putting high appeal animals at the front - please stop it, you are only making it worse having lions near the entrance

 

[Karen F]

Not sure if guest behavior improved over time, (cause now I use guest spawners in 'empty' parts). But before, I also couldn't fix this issue. Some Parts of the zoo just remain empty, even if you place high appeal animals, gift shops or food stalls.

 

[Roxxsmom]

Dear Frontier employees,
I've been playing Planet ZOO since it was released, have all the DLCs and, if Steam is to be believed, have played a total of 4385 hours.
And although I still enjoy playing it and will continue to do so, today I would like to offer a criticism of the game.

Yesterday I decided to close down and completely clear out an almost 800-year-old franchise zoo in order to build something new with the 130 million credits I had earned.
The reason was that it bothered me that the more distant areas were only visited by a few visitors, while the entrance area was crowded. Although the most attractive animals like apes and predators were located in the outer areas, there were plenty of restaurants and food stalls, and there were benches to rest on the way there, the visitors were too lazy to move there.
I was even more surprised when I gradually sold all the animals or put them into storage, but neither the mood of the visitors nor the assessment changed.
Even when there was not a single animal left, they were full of praise. "Admission price is reasonable (after all, 60 credits for zero animals), great zoo, lots to see" etc. etc. And new guests kept coming.
Even when I kicked out all the staff except for the shop assistants and zookeepers, nothing changed.
Only when I closed the restaurants was the fun over.

When I visit a zoo as a real person, I also look at the animals in the more distant areas and don't just run from food stall to food stall.

The programmed visitor behaviour is very questionable.
Apart from the fact that they complain that they can't see the animals, even if they are not a virtual 10 metres away, they can look through walls in other places. OK, so be it, you can live with it if you have to.
But the fact that the visitors only come to enjoy the food and sales stalls is beside the point.

Can this behaviour be changed in an update?
I would appreciate a comment on the visitors' behaviour.

I've found that transport rides and tours help a bit. Putting a second entrance on the other side of the zoo can help too, as well as the advertisements for some of the habitats. But yeah, the guests are pretty lazy and seem to have to eat their weight in food every day! When I was a kid, my folks were reluctant to buy us food at the zoo, since it was so expensive compared to going out to a restaurant later (let alone going home to eat). Guests in real life vary in their priorities, of course, but they seem pretty uniform behavior wise in the game.