Tropical=Tundra? Why is Tierra del Fuego tropical on game's map?

[Ushuaia]

I absolutely love the game to pieces. But there are things in the game that ruin the immersion for me that I wish were fixed. Recently I wanted to build a zoo in my hometown in southern Argentina and noticed the biome for it is in the other end of the scale from reality. A subpolar place that is right off Antarctica is for some reason tropical? I really couldn't understand the reasoning behind this other than it being in South America, like if some place is in South America it has to be warm? Even a place that has summers as cool as European winters. Unfortunately I ended not being able to build my zoo there. The next place I wanted to build my zoo was in Miami, the city I love the most in the US. Then I noticed that a truly tropical place was temperate! Just because it is in "North" America? These two exact opposites shocked me and I ended up building the zoo elsewhere.

I'm leaving here the statistics for the coldest month in Miami and warmest month in my home town for comparison. You be the judge.

Ushuaia warmest month - Average high °C (°F) 14.5 (58.1) Daily mean °C (°F) 9.7 (49.5) Average low °C (°F) 5.6 (42.1)
Miami coldest month - Average high °C (°F) 24.7 (76.4) Daily mean °C (°F) 20.1 (68.2) Average low °C (°F) 15.5 (59.9)

 

[markun]

The maps are completely inaccurate in this respect and there are a number of regions that have the wrong biome.

And even then there are issues - such as not all tundra regions having high mountains and there being no flat temperate map so it’s pretty much impossible to make a realistic zoo set in most of the Netherlands due to the hills surrounding the map.

Personally I choose the closest map biome there is to the region where I wish to build a zoo and ignore where it is on the globe; after all, you don’t see the globe once you’re in the zoo.

 

[Ursidae]

I absolutely love the game to pieces. But there are things in the game that ruin the immersion for me that I wish were fixed. Recently I wanted to build a zoo in my hometown in southern Argentina and noticed the biome for it is in the other end of the scale from reality. A subpolar place that is right off Antarctica is for some reason tropical? I really couldn't understand the reasoning behind this other than it being in South America, like if some place is in South America it has to be warm? Even a place that has summers as cool as European winters. Unfortunately I ended not being able to build my zoo there. The next place I wanted to build my zoo was in Miami, the city I love the most in the US. Then I noticed that a truly tropical place was temperate! Just because it is in "North" America? These two exact opposites shocked me and I ended up building the zoo elsewhere.

I'm leaving here the statistics for the coldest month in Miami and warmest month in my home town for comparison. You be the judge.

Ushuaia warmest month - Average high °C (°F) 14.5 (58.1) Daily mean °C (°F) 9.7 (49.5) Average low °C (°F) 5.6 (42.1)
Miami coldest month - Average high °C (°F) 24.7 (76.4) Daily mean °C (°F) 20.1 (68.2) Average low °C (°F) 15.5 (59.9)

This is definitely something that needs to be looked into. It's not that difficult to fix after all. Several regions, mostly in the southern hemisphere, need a revision. What disturbs me the most is the game's map and preferred biomes of animals do no match because of the inaccurate map.

The maps are completely inaccurate in this respect and there are a number of regions that have the wrong biome.

And even then there are issues - such as not all tundra regions having high mountains and there being no flat temperate map so it’s pretty much impossible to make a realistic zoo set in most of the Netherlands due to the hills surrounding the map.

Personally I choose the closest map biome there is to the region where I wish to build a zoo and ignore where it is on the globe; after all, you don’t see the globe once you’re in the zoo.

Now that we are getting continent specific in-game maps, it is slowly starting to get difficult to ignore the location of your zoos. So, I think it is better to have the game's main menu map corrected to eliminate any confusion.

 

[macronecu]

On the game's map there is a section of tropical biome starting south of the Andes tundra that goes all the way to the tip of the continent. Non of it should have been tropical. The northern half of the strip is temperate forest, southern half is Magellanic subpolar forest. Even though it is subpolar, since it is broadleaf it is classified under temperate broadleaf instead of boreal (taiga). So the whole strip that is tropical should have been temperate biome in the game with the very tip and southern highlands tundra.

Ecoregions 2017 ©

 

[HeatherG]

Please keep the thread on topic. Off topic replies and any responses to it will be deleted. Thanks everyone!

 

[DrBurrito]

The frontend globe is one of the major Achilles heels of the game in terms of scientific accuracy. I really hope it gets looked into one day. South America, Oceania and Asia are the regions that suffer the most from this. The primary contributing factor to the erroneous map is the inaccurate source map used during the early days of development. As I've said in another thread about this topic elsewhere on the forum, there is currently an effort in Wikipedia by several editors to fix the issues with the main biome article map, which also happens to be the game's source map. I still think it's not late to implement those changes to the game's front end globe, despite the patch notes that came with the changes made earlier.

 

[NZFanatic]

As part of Update 1.2 they fixed the biome spread of China and explicitly said they would be making no further changes. It's disappointing but there it is.

Added additional biome types to China on the front end globe. Please note that this is the only change we will be making to the globe.

At the time this seemed to be in response to one particularly...passionate poster who made several topics about the Chinese biome map. It's always bothered me because there are hundreds of more accurate biome maps out there than the one on Wikipedia, and pulling that map from Wikipedia for a game rooted in scientific accuracy (even where mistakes are often made) seems like a fairly basic level of research.

New Zealand is another area that would need redoing. The biomes of the country vary in pretty small areas - far north is more tropical, west coast is temperate rainforest, east coast is more like shrubland/grassland, the Fiordlands are very wet, the Southern Alps are definitely alpine tundra, and so on. Sadly as per the 1.2 update notes I think we're stuck with it now.

 

[sympatrick]

A game that has its major focus centered around education should really be less sloppy with accuracy issues in general. The education aspect of the game is so fundamental to it that even the virtual education of the guests is presented to us as a game mechanic. I agree that the main menu globe can be quite confusing and misleading especially with the younger crowd. They don't take things with a pinch of salt like us adults do. When they see a game so focused on conservation and education, they automatically take everything they see in it very seriously and view the game as a whole as a reliable source they can learn from. This is why the game should be as flawless as possible in terms of accuracy for its educational value outside the game. I personally take this very seriously and thus try to stress it out as many times as I can on any thread about accuracy issues.

Sadly as per the 1.2 update notes I think we're stuck with it now.

I really hope they revisit that decision for the reasons I stated above.

 

[macronecu]

At the time this seemed to be in response to one particularly...passionate poster who made several topics about the Chinese biome map.

Which is why it would be very weird if development ignored reasonable requests when they took an emotional rant so seriously.

Yes, their request was valid. China having tropical biome almost entirely on the game's map was wrong but it's not the only place so if that request is taken seriously only because of an overreaction and others ignored, that would be very disappointing. For instance Japan and Oceania was also mentioned in that thread but they were ignored. Only China was changed. Keeping Japan tropical, when it is northeast of the region in China they changed to temperate was particularly an odd choice since they are next to one another.

It makes you think whether that choice was because of the huge player base potential in China due to its high population of 1.5 billion people. Frontier needs to stop people from asking these questions to themselves by doing the right thing.

 

[NZFanatic]

It makes you think whether that choice was because of the huge player base potential in China due to its high population of 1.5 billion people. Frontier needs to stop people from asking these questions to themselves by doing the right thing.

Gaming companies seem to have an interesting relationship with China. I suppose it could have been for any reason, but it does seem odd that the changes were made only to China and only in response to this one guy. And that they'd resolve to make no further changes after revealing that it's possible to make those changes. Frontier tends to hold their cards close, though, so it's not unusual for questions like this to never be answered.

 

[Ushuaia]

Glad to see so many people on the same page with my post. It is somewhat a relief to see I am not alone thinking like this.
I really hope they change their minds about that patch note. Such a great game doesn't deserve a map with such errors. I mean I am not a game developer, but how difficult could it be to repaint a map with the same continents? Not like there will be a change to the base design.

 

[NZFanatic]

Glad to see so many people on the same page with my post. It is somewhat a relief to see I am not alone thinking like this.
I really hope they change their minds about that patch note. Such a great game doesn't deserve a map with such errors. I mean I am not a game developer, but how difficult could it be to repaint a map with the same continents? Not like there will be a change to the base design.

I'm not sure how it works, but as said they changed China so we know it's possible.

 

[macronecu]

I'm not sure how it works, but as said they changed China so we know it's possible.

Yeah, I don't see any limitations to changing it either. If they've done it with China, they should be able to do it with the rest of the globe.

 

[Ushuaia]

Yeah, I don't see any limitations to changing it either. If they've done it with China, they should be able to do it with the rest of the globe.

I'm not sure how it works, but as said they changed China so we know it's possible.

I hope the same, as I think it is still possible. Sorry for the late post, wasn't active on the forum since.

 

[Roxxsmom]

I just saw this thread, and even without having ever been to Argentina, I associate it with grasslands more than I do tropics. But it is a large country and extends a great way north to south, and only the very northern bit is in the tropics. Since Argentina extends all the way down to the Cape Horn, I've assumed some areas are quite cold, as are the southern parts of Chile. The Falkland Islands have penguins, and they are north of Ushuaia!

 

[Ushuaia]

I just saw this thread, and even without having ever been to Argentina, I associate it with grasslands more than I do tropics. But it is a large country and extends a great way north to south, and only the very northern bit is in the tropics. Since Argentina extends all the way down to the Cape Horn, I've assumed some areas are quite cold, as are the southern parts of Chile. The Falkland Islands have penguins, and they are north of Ushuaia!

Yeah, it's a travesty that the game's main map is so faulty. Basically there is no temperate, taiga or tundra in the southern hemisphere, except for Antarctica. For instance according to the game's map the king penguins come from a tropical biome, yeah those islands are all tropical.

 

[Roxxsmom]

Yeah, it's a travesty that the game's main map is so faulty. Basically there is no temperate, taiga or tundra in the southern hemisphere, except for Antarctica. For instance according to the game's map the king penguins come from a tropical biome, yeah those islands are all tropical.

I've noticed this issue with world scale biome maps anyway, even when they acknowledge more than the four we see in Planet Zoo. I teach biology classes for non majors (among others), and when we have our crash course on ecology and biomes at the end, I always have to tell them that we actually have taiga, deciduous, desert, grasslands, scrub, rainforest, and (alpine) tundra in CA alone (and definitely not just one or two biomes for the whole western half of the US) and that the maps are really, really general and not at all fine scale accurate.

Still, showing Argentina and Chile as mostly tropical. Argh.

They do have some non tropical plants listed as native to South America in the vegetation choices, at least. And they have monkey puzzle trees, which are really cool! Wish they had pampas grass and more plants from different biomes in the Americas, though.

 

[DrBurrito]

I've noticed this issue with world scale biome maps anyway, even when they acknowledge more than the four we see in Planet Zoo. I teach biology classes for non majors (among others), and when we have our crash course on ecology and biomes at the end, I always have to tell them that we actually have taiga, deciduous, desert, grasslands, scrub, rainforest, and (alpine) tundra in CA alone (and definitely not just one or two biomes for the whole western half of the US) and that the maps are really, really general and not at all fine scale accurate.

Still, showing Argentina and Chile as mostly tropical. Argh.

They do have some non tropical plants listed as native to South America in the vegetation choices, at least. And they have monkey puzzle trees, which are really cool! Wish they had pampas grass and more plants from different biomes in the Americas, though.

The reason why the in-game biome map is so off was the source map. It was a very faulty map. It could have been considered incomplete even. Now it is all fixed though, if they want to use the same map for the game. The old version basically had the entire Southern Hemisphere marked as tropical (including Tasmania, New Zealand, Southern South America, Subantarctic Islands), as well as Japan and China. So it was beyond a scaling issue.

A Chinese player complained about China in particular so it was fixed in-game, but the rest remains to be a problem.

The current version of the same file fixes all of the known issues on that map. Only a few areas of alpine tundra are missing due to scale:

Biome - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Ushuaia]

The reason why the in-game biome map is so off was the source map. It was a very faulty map. It could have been considered incomplete even. Now it is all fixed though, if they want to use the same map for the game. The old version basically had the entire Southern Hemisphere marked as tropical (including Tasmania, New Zealand, Southern South America, Subantarctic Islands), as well as Japan and China. So it was beyond a scaling issue.

A Chinese player complained about China in particular so it was fixed in-game, but the rest remains to be a problem.

The current version of the same file fixes all of the known issues on that map. Only a few areas of alpine tundra are missing due to scale:

Biome - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I hope Frontier updates their map to match the up to date version

 

[macronecu]

Yeah, it's a travesty that the game's main map is so faulty. Basically there is no temperate, taiga or tundra in the southern hemisphere, except for Antarctica. For instance according to the game's map the king penguins come from a tropical biome, yeah those islands are all tropical.

Yes, it doesn't make sense at all... King penguin has tundra biome in the game, but the game map shows the same islands as tropical... The exact opposites of the spectrum. It's like interchanging a point guard and center in basketball Good luck to Shaq with his new role as playmaker.

It also doesn't make any sense that there's no temperate biome in Oceania or South America when a bunch of animals have it in their filters.