Great video Rudi! I stand by everything you've said 🙏 My biggest complain would be that we still dont have flying birds and aquariums in the game.. ugh! 😂
I agree! Planet Zoo is honestly an amazing game. I'm constantly blown away by the graphics, and the things the game lets me do. It can be overwhelming at times, because the game gives you almost absolute creative freedom, but it still manages to be accessible to most playstyles, with a sandbox mode, and a career mode. The scenery pieces, plants and animals are so well done, I can literally just watch the animals go about their day, or make botanical gardens if I wanted to with the sheer variety of plants. Also the roadmap for the way the game works, with a sturdy, fleshed out and already very solid basegame, with not very in depth, mostly thematic DLC that are actually fairly inexpensive, feels very considerate to the player base. Yes, the DLC comes with many animals and things to add, but as someone who played for a long time with the base game only before adding the DLC, I can honestly say I never felt like I absolutely needed to get DLC to make the game interesting. Nothing about the game feels sloppy, rushed or cash-grabby, each pack comes with a well thought out, cohesive theme. Trailers are not unrealistic, and usually show things you can 100% do or recreate, and the game actually does have some educational value, which is incredible. Quality of Life updates also show thoughtfulness for the user experience and as a player, and there's just a lot of goodwill amongst the community to the devs. Which is also incredible and so refreshing. Thanks for the video, Rudi, you are spot on, more people should really get into this game!
I bought the base game on sale and several of the dlcs so far. It was so worth it. Such a fun and creative game, I love animals so this was a shoe-in! I just need a better computer so it runs better!
My computer is so bad, I didn't even realize there was animal poop in the game until I saw it on TH-cam. 😂 I am basically playing with PlayStation One level graphics and loading times and I still love it.
Imagine if Rudi was like "I just realized I have wasted all this time in these years! But at least luckily for you guys I have the Palm zoo pre-recorded and just gave the Zoo Sicily tour, so that's enough of that. Other than that, have a good time, thank you for watching and see you in the next one!! 😊"
I bought the game on launch but I had a hard time getting into it in the beginning with not much time to play. After countless youtube videos, practice and the desire to want to build nice zoos now I'm at the point where I really enjoy it (also have more time to play). I'm only 300 hours in but I really love it and feel so inspired to build! It is veeery time consuming though that's for sure. Aquatics and birds are the only thing really missing and it would be a 10/10 game for me. Fingers crossed Frontier listens to the community🤞
Absolutely tons of replay in this game. The free updates are really generous! My favorite games are usually "Sims" types (I have been a Simmer since 2000). But we know how bad EA has become so when Frontier gives people free stuff I just can't believe it. I bought the base game on Steam on sale (be patient). I have several DLC packs but only highly rated ones. I don't do franchise mode AT ALL. I just make my poor pathing and square, boring exhibits but it's still so fun. I appreciate all you wonderful builders and reviewers out there--I've learned a lot from you all. I actually HATE the idea of zoos and keeping captive wild animals (I know I'm a contradiction) but this game is amazing. Thanks for the review. It was spot on.
I had a friend who didn’t like Jurassic world evolution because it was too complex, so he tried planet zoo because he knew I played it… he refunded it pretty quickly😂 Planet Zoo is not a game for everyone. That being said, if you enjoy any type of creative building, be it video games, legos, whatever, this is the game for you. I would’ve given replayability 10/10 because I’m never gonna quit this game❤️
Well 150h in and still loving all the cute animals in franchise and sandbox modus thanx to the amazing sharing community that offers beautiful blue prints so I havent to spent that much time.
I still love the idea of the game, but I did stop playing it. To me, it was not beginner friendly/casual friendly. Making ANYTHING half decent takes hours. But I love watching other people play ;)
Great review and video! My problem with the game is that I cannot play it enough 😂There's so much to do and I still feel like I have not accomplished much anything and I have so many ideas. I have had the game for 18 months and played 200 hours. That's about 2,5 hours a week, which is like a nice time to spend weekly on a good hobby. In reality though, I sometimes spend like one week playing way too much and neglecting the rest of my life. Then I gotta catch up with studies and people etc, and if I am not playing for a while, the bar to continue playing my previous project somehow rises. So the fault is definitely mostly in me. But maybe also coz the game is not so great for casual players. I think you've talked about that earlier too. I think this video made me realize, that the gameplay and management should be more "addictive" so I would always want to come back for those, instead of wanting to play only when I can build a barn or garden of my dreams. (Never gonna get a zoo of my dreams built. :D)
I'll give it a 7,5/10. Planet Zoo is indeed very beautiful and immensely creative. However, it's still too complex for a casual gamer like me, not to mention that some stuff are still missing. What are the missing elements? Birds with free flying, aquariums, as well as foliage brush. I hate having to place those plants individually.
My greatest suggestions for newbies is just find a building palette in steam workshop if they are overwhelmed the game can be both simple or complicated
It would be awesome if the final Planet Zoo DLC was a sort of Bird animal pack, with a a vulture, an owl species or two, couple more birds.. But I don't want to think about Planet Zoo DLC ending yet! :P As far as I know no announcements have been made regarding DLC development ending.. so let's hope it stays that way for a long while yet!
As far as we know, support runs through this year and then they will just evaluate again if the sales are still good enough to keep support up. But eventually Frontier would want to move on to other projects.
Yes the creativity might be a 11/10 but for new players to this system (like i was) is very, very overwhelming and not as easy to get a handle of the building system (specially with the scale of the objects in my case) so you can get 1000 great ideas in your head but if you are not used to the Planet games then and you don't have hours on end to spend learning and getting better at it with practice, it can be quite frustrating. So i don't think the system is as intuitive to the average player and that is the main issue i have with it. Other than that i love this game. I love how the animals look and the animations (although i think more social interaction between animals would be nice and will give a lot more of a lifelike feeling to them).
Would personally love to see either an update or a pack focused on the weather and impact on the game. Like you said, it doesnt seem to affect much. I do believe they prefer hot drinks in a cold environment and vice versa but other than that nothing I noticed. I was thinking how they could do this though because if your zoo is large, the visitors stay for so long it can go from hot to cold and then I'm guessing best solution is for them to sort of 'change clothes' - perhaps a toilet could be considered a changing room. Ah well, it would just make it a lot more realistic and engaging for me to not have visitors in shorts when its freezing.
Besides loving animals and building all kind of zoos, this game is my dream game for worldbuilding. Just terraforming, adjusting the landscape and building cozy villages for my characters and stories. Before Planet Zoo I tried Sims 3, but it was a bit meh and I even tried to get into Unreal Engine and Unity but they were too difficult for me. So Planet Zoo is one of my absolute favourite games on many levels and 100% worth my time and money.
Hey! I’m about to buy planet zoo (its currently on sale on steam), but I would like to buy 3 dlc’s. Which dlc’s should I buy? Can you also why those dlcs?
I agree with the cc and buying certain animals. I think a zoo/franchise should have to achieve a certain rating or something before they can buy high rated animals like monkeys, lions and tigers ect that would add a little more challenge to the franchise mode. It doesn't matter in sandbox mode obviously
Dieser man ist der beste Spiele-Kritiker auf diesem Planeten: er beschäftigt sich aus purer Selbstlosigkeit und selbstverständlich nur für uns, Jahre lang mit einem Spiel um im Endeffekt bewerten u können, ob sich ein Kauf lohnt. Wahrlich ein Gentlemen :D This man is the best game critic on this planet: he deals out of pure selflessness and of course only for us, for years with a game to be able to evaluate in the end whether a purchase is worthwhile. Truly a gentleman!
Und um einmal meine eigene Meinung hier zu nennen: ich persönlich finde das Spiel wirklich gut, und verfolge/besitze das Spiel auch schon seit der Beta. Als jemand der ebenfalls vor allem im sandbox-Modus spielt, gibt es jedoch, trotz der vielen Freiheiten die das spiel bietet einige Probleme, z.B. der riesige Zeitaufwand welcher es mir sehr schwierig macht große, Zusammenhängende Strukturen zu erbauen (wobei mir keine Lösung einfällt, die nicht die Freiheit des Spiels einschränken würde), oder die fehlende Struktur im Baumenü (warum gibt es von den rigibs-Wänden keine frei platzierbaren Varianten, aber eine mit loch hindurch? Warum gibt es eine afrikanische Wand, welche die Maße 4x4 hat, aber nur halb so dick ist wie die normalen Wände, während es bei den anderen Arten nur die 2x4 als Größte Variante gibt? Da wäre ein Einheitswert nicht schlecht!) trotz all dieser Fehler, ist die bereits benannte Freiheit die das Spiel bietet, einer der größten Pluspunkte, welcher es für mich persönlich zu einem der besten, wenn nicht sogar DEM besten sandbox-/bau-spiel macht. Viele Grüße aus Hamburg (Osterferien und so) :) And to give my own opinion here: I personally think the game is really good, and have been following/own the game since the beta. As someone who also plays mainly in sandbox mode, however, despite the many freedoms that the game offers, there are some problems, e.g. the huge amount of time that makes it very difficult for me to build large, coherent structures (although I can't think of a solution that would not limit the freedom of the game), or the missing structure in the construction menu (Why is there an African wall that has the dimensions 4x4, but is only half as thick as the normal walls, while in the other types there is only the 2x4 as the largest variant? A unit value would not be bad!) Despite all these mistakes, the already named freedom that the game offers is one of the biggest plus points, which makes it one of the best, if not the best sandbox/building games for me personally. Best regards from Hamburg (Easter holidays and so on)
That's the problem I have with this game and others similar to it. I'm not the creative person that meticulously places every road, tree and fence. I don't enjoy building all these antricate buildings and creations. I want to play a game for it's GAMEPLAY, and there's nearly none of it in here.. It feels like any fun to be had that isn't related to "Make this pretty" is entirely secondary, and well the fun evaporates quite quickly that way. I wanted to manage a Zoo, but other than the micromanagement of breeding and aging there's barely any of it there.
That’s not the problem with these games. It’s just not your style. Not every game can be made to your style cause then it wouldn’t be someone else’s. This and the coaster games are far beyond brilliant. If other companies would put the effort these guys did in these two games all games would be perfect. Sadly especially for someone like you and even me on other games most companies just want money for less work. This game isn’t your style and that sucks because it is beyond great for what it is….. I’m sorry you can’t enjoy it and wish you could find a game you enjoy with as much effort as these people put in.
interesting review, but i would suggest that if you say your going to talk about gameplay please talk about the actual gameplay, how is building an enclosure, how is managing your zoo actually like if it comes to macro and micro. You just continued talking about the graphics and animations.
Can you play it passively? Like a virtual pet or something that runs on its own and you just check it every now and then? I have a lot to do even at home, so I don't have time to sit in front of computer in a long time.
This planet game is like watching the movie the lion king, isn't it. The father and son, defending their kingdom. Amazing detail and beautiful image. Simba becomes the new king of pride rock, his new friends timone and pumba help him let loose and be happy. This game is fantastic, great to play a lion, or be a lion
I personally don't play Planet Zoo. I have to admit that I'm attracted to it, but the negatives I see so far outweigh why to buy this game. I play zoo tycoon 2 and I grew up on this game. I have downloaded mods such as remake or placehacks, so I have similar options (buildings, graphics...) as planet zoo (it's still not comparable and the building options in planet zoo are better), but what annoys me the most about planet zoo is that they are constantly coming out small DLC, there were 4 released in zoo tycoon 2 and each one had a lot of animals. For the zoo planets, each one only has a few animals, personally I know that only those animals from the DLCs would be enough for me, I don't need a lot of different objects. It kind of reminds me of the much criticized EA and the sims. In addition, so far I have much more mods for zoo tycoon 2 with animals that I adore than for zoo planets. Maybe when the game "dies" and they stop releasing new DLCs, I'll buy planet zoo as some sort of bundled edition with all the DLCs, but until then I'll probably give up on this game and stick to my zoo tycoon 2.
I see your points - but for a fair review, I simply can´t take Mods or the Game Industry from 20 years ago into account. Nowadays DLCs are common and a huge part of the reason why Games exist in the first place. We can thank EA for that. Also Mods are not a valid reason as to judge a "base" game. In this specific case it makes no difference if they are helpful or not - they are not made or intended by the creator. So you cant use them as element of the game. The only thing I don´t buy is your graphics/animations argument. You are making your ZT2 world brighter than it is ;) realistically PZ is so so so much better in any way. The mods of ZT2 have become insanely good but you can´t change shaders and engine.
As someone who was very exited to play a good upgraded version of Zoo Tycoon 2, I am very disapointed by the gameplay aspact and it's enough for me to not enjoy the game, yes it looks good and there is a lot of freedom and content, but the learning curve is so high already that it's painful to get started, and the fact that I can't learn by just thowing a bunch of money at things in a sandbox mode is making me go back to Zoo Tycoon 2
100% agree, always buy every single dlc because the game is just too good! The only thing keeping me from playing a lot is my own creativity and inspiration. ~Sprinkels
i personally don't buy the dlcs in steam, i prefer buying them in instant gaming or eneba cause it's way cheaper and i haven't had any issue with the codes, and i also bought the deluxe version base game there as well, so i don't consider it to be expensive at all tho, i truly love this game and wish i had more time to play with it
Honestly I'd love to play this game, but the path system is to frustrating to make it worth it. It's too finicky for no reason and despite watching all the tutorials, I feel like I'm fighting the game every time I try to use it. There's no reason why they can't fix the path system. There's already a mod that fixes most of the issues (which I can't use since my computer seems to hate mods). IMO if you need a mod to make a key mechanic workable, the developers need to address it. I also wish they'd have better UI organization. Right now it's just okay, but with the ever increasing object count it gets a little hard to keep track of all the pieces you want to use. I wish you could save pieces to different project folders so I'm not spending a lot of the time unfavoriting and refavoriting things. I also wish you can scale objects like walls and rocks (not scaling trees I get), but I get if the current system might be too baked in the game for them to change it easily. Prehistoric Kingdom seems to have learned from all this and implemented a much better organization system. I still think it's a great game from the limited hours I've played it, but I just can't play in-depth building games like this for hours. But when I do have an hour to spare, I'd rather be spending that hour building exhibits than fighting the path tool. And I know I'm not the only one frustrated by it lol.
For me, it wasn't worth it... I played 1 hour in total, until I freezed. I restarted my PC, it freezed once again after 5 minutes. I tried to fix it, wasn't able to. I changed computer, still the same issue. And I'm using a RTX 3060. Instead I resorted to Prehistoric Planet, quite enjoyable to be able to play it! But there goes 60€...
how can this game be purchased without needing steam? and did this game make an expansion pack with dinosaurs yet? like Zoo Tycoon did? the game isn't complete until it does.
For me the game hasn't gotten any deepness regarding its gameplay. The gameplay experience is not meaningfully different/diverse/better then 3 years ago. Just adding more objects and animals does not change the game per si. It just gives you a bigger and bigger IKEA tour. I believe the only game changing moment were the addition of diving animals. but just that.
I really believe that Planet Zoo is more of a simulation game than a management game. That being said, I do really enjoy the management elements that are in Planet Zoo, and they are deeper than you'd think. The issue is that the game is not very good at drawing your attention to them. For instance, you might run into a problem where you constantly have animals that have low welfare due to stress. This is because it is important to not place low confidence animals near the busy areas of your zoo. However, does the game ever warn you about that? Or provide a pop-up to let you know that your animals don't have anywhere to hide? Nope. The problem can be mitigated by adding speakers, one-way glass, and "do not disturb" signs, but does the game ever teach you how to do that? Also nope. There are so many neat systems in this game, this is just one example, but the game itself doesn't do a very good job of onboarding players or explaining its own mechanics. It expects that players will explore as they go, which works for me, but I understand why it doesn't for many.
@@alexaliss8233 I look at games like zoo tycoon 2, cities skylines or others and I see that after 3 years planet zoo remains the same. Nothing considerably new. And the examples you provided I do not consider them very deep. And the issues you highlight are called "quality of life" improvements. Which is different from enhanced or deeper gameplay. Rudy highlighted a few things. The conservation credits is so shallow. Diseases and animal reproduction is so shallow. I can make a whole text about if you want.
Planet Zoo is everything I want in a management game, but it's been sat in my Steam library for over a year because content creators and my ADHD ruin it for me. When I see the types of enclosures you guys can create, I just end up feeling bad about my own designs and exiting. It's definitely a game that people with 9-5's and families struggle with. You really need to dedicate hours to each build.
What helps for me is using parts of buildings found in the steam workshop and making it my own by changing it to work w the enclosure or just havibg it as a centerpiece
ich würde sagen PZ ist nur wirklich empfehlenswert für Leute, die hauptsächlich Bock auf bauen haben. Es ist ja eigentlich ein Zoo-Simulator, wo auch unteranderem mit dem Managementaspekt geworben wird. Die Tiere benehmen sich nicht sonderlich natürlich, weder Zoo-Natürlich noch Wildnis-Natürlich und wirklich Managen muss man auch nicht. Selbst die Gäste sind nicht sonderlich realistisch was die AI angeht. Am Ende bleibt also nur der Bauaspekt, der wirklich viele Möglichkeiten bringt.
thanks for the review. Gameplay is a big deal for me since it's not that great, not going to buy it, was about to, but thanks to your review I don't need to anymore.
late but I got this game for like 10 quid as a steam key + the aquatic dlc and its so much fun! Personally I'm not into building games and I struggle with the building aspect in this game but I only really play for the animals so its worth it imo
5:20 ou yeah 3 000 000 conservation credit and still no new mechanic for it... i personaly have a issue with content and creativity... specifically in lot of inconsintency that frontier created... we have animals with lot of sign and statues... and then we have animals with absolutely nothing or only with some hideous signs (yes i'm looking especially at you North American DLC)...
I love Planet Zoo, there is little I would change, but I would love if they added egg laying in the game, we have so much focus on all kinds of animals, but birds and reptiles dont lay eggs.. pls egg updates when.. 😢
Ingenuity; 8, they hyped up the 'uniqueness' so much pre-launch that when the game finally came out with all the bugs and glitches, and the missing "every animal will have it's own individual personality" it was just a little disappointing. Graphics; 7.5 the base game animals and guests are far too cartoonish for the semi-realistic build items, not to mention that with every new DLC the cartoonishness of the OG animals and guests get even more out of place. Gameplay; 6, it's a bit basic and unbalanced, but it's functional enough. Replayability; 8.5, you can replay the game as much as you want in any mode as long as you have an idea, with the exception of career mode. And timed scenarios.....they just don't exist to me. Content; 6; the base game is good, but with all the DLCs it's better. I can't go higher because the walkthrough exhibit and the underwater herbivore feeder are base game items, but they require DLC animals to have a function. Also no brachiation behaviors in base game either. Creativity; 10; you're basically only limited by your imagination and your skills to bring your idea to life.
@@RudiRennkamel What's going on here is that i like Planet Zoo, but i'm just disappointed by the execution of it and frustrated by my lack of skills to be good at the game.
I genuinely think this is the best realisation of guest in any management game. The animation, the overall design, the interactivity. Name one better, I'll wait. It's incredibly hard to make realistic crowds without slipping in stereotypes, insane performance issues or other bumpy terrain. They're ofc not flawless, but I can deal with these flaws over all the others in other games
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Great video Rudi! I stand by everything you've said 🙏
My biggest complain would be that we still dont have flying birds and aquariums in the game.. ugh! 😂
hehe thanks Lady! what a surprise that we agree ;)
i am a big fan of your builds Lady!
I agree! Planet Zoo is honestly an amazing game. I'm constantly blown away by the graphics, and the things the game lets me do. It can be overwhelming at times, because the game gives you almost absolute creative freedom, but it still manages to be accessible to most playstyles, with a sandbox mode, and a career mode. The scenery pieces, plants and animals are so well done, I can literally just watch the animals go about their day, or make botanical gardens if I wanted to with the sheer variety of plants. Also the roadmap for the way the game works, with a sturdy, fleshed out and already very solid basegame, with not very in depth, mostly thematic DLC that are actually fairly inexpensive, feels very considerate to the player base. Yes, the DLC comes with many animals and things to add, but as someone who played for a long time with the base game only before adding the DLC, I can honestly say I never felt like I absolutely needed to get DLC to make the game interesting. Nothing about the game feels sloppy, rushed or cash-grabby, each pack comes with a well thought out, cohesive theme. Trailers are not unrealistic, and usually show things you can 100% do or recreate, and the game actually does have some educational value, which is incredible. Quality of Life updates also show thoughtfulness for the user experience and as a player, and there's just a lot of goodwill amongst the community to the devs. Which is also incredible and so refreshing. Thanks for the video, Rudi, you are spot on, more people should really get into this game!
Short answer: YES!!!
I bought the base game on sale and several of the dlcs so far. It was so worth it. Such a fun and creative game, I love animals so this was a shoe-in! I just need a better computer so it runs better!
NGL, one of the reasons i bought a new pc was to play planet zoo well 😅
My computer is so bad, I didn't even realize there was animal poop in the game until I saw it on TH-cam. 😂 I am basically playing with PlayStation One level graphics and loading times and I still love it.
Im waiting for it to come on Sale so I can buy it
Guy who makes a ton of Planet Zoo videos: "Let's see after three years if this is even worth your time"
Love ya, Rudi. Keep on being a great lad!
😂
I mean....its fair to ask every now and then? :D
Imagine if Rudi was like "I just realized I have wasted all this time in these years! But at least luckily for you guys I have the Palm zoo pre-recorded and just gave the Zoo Sicily tour, so that's enough of that. Other than that, have a good time, thank you for watching and see you in the next one!! 😊"
@@RudiRennkamel absolutely true
@@brandybottlepond that would be absolutely hilarious
I've been wanting to play it, but it is very time consuming. It's hard to just sit down and play for 20 minutes lol. Love this game, though
I bought the game on launch but I had a hard time getting into it in the beginning with not much time to play. After countless youtube videos, practice and the desire to want to build nice zoos now I'm at the point where I really enjoy it (also have more time to play). I'm only 300 hours in but I really love it and feel so inspired to build! It is veeery time consuming though that's for sure. Aquatics and birds are the only thing really missing and it would be a 10/10 game for me. Fingers crossed Frontier listens to the community🤞
300 hours is a lot😭
Absolutely tons of replay in this game. The free updates are really generous! My favorite games are usually "Sims" types (I have been a Simmer since 2000). But we know how bad EA has become so when Frontier gives people free stuff I just can't believe it. I bought the base game on Steam on sale (be patient). I have several DLC packs but only highly rated ones. I don't do franchise mode AT ALL. I just make my poor pathing and square, boring exhibits but it's still so fun. I appreciate all you wonderful builders and reviewers out there--I've learned a lot from you all. I actually HATE the idea of zoos and keeping captive wild animals (I know I'm a contradiction) but this game is amazing. Thanks for the review. It was spot on.
I had a friend who didn’t like Jurassic world evolution because it was too complex, so he tried planet zoo because he knew I played it… he refunded it pretty quickly😂 Planet Zoo is not a game for everyone. That being said, if you enjoy any type of creative building, be it video games, legos, whatever, this is the game for you. I would’ve given replayability 10/10 because I’m never gonna quit this game❤️
Lol yeah that's a difference haha
Well 150h in and still loving all the cute animals in franchise and sandbox modus thanx to the amazing sharing community that offers beautiful blue prints so I havent to spent that much time.
I still love the idea of the game, but I did stop playing it. To me, it was not beginner friendly/casual friendly. Making ANYTHING half decent takes hours.
But I love watching other people play ;)
Great review and video! My problem with the game is that I cannot play it enough 😂There's so much to do and I still feel like I have not accomplished much anything and I have so many ideas. I have had the game for 18 months and played 200 hours. That's about 2,5 hours a week, which is like a nice time to spend weekly on a good hobby. In reality though, I sometimes spend like one week playing way too much and neglecting the rest of my life. Then I gotta catch up with studies and people etc, and if I am not playing for a while, the bar to continue playing my previous project somehow rises. So the fault is definitely mostly in me. But maybe also coz the game is not so great for casual players. I think you've talked about that earlier too. I think this video made me realize, that the gameplay and management should be more "addictive" so I would always want to come back for those, instead of wanting to play only when I can build a barn or garden of my dreams. (Never gonna get a zoo of my dreams built. :D)
I'll give it a 7,5/10. Planet Zoo is indeed very beautiful and immensely creative. However, it's still too complex for a casual gamer like me, not to mention that some stuff are still missing.
What are the missing elements? Birds with free flying, aquariums, as well as foliage brush. I hate having to place those plants individually.
My greatest suggestions for newbies is just find a building palette in steam workshop if they are overwhelmed the game can be both simple or complicated
It would be awesome if the final Planet Zoo DLC was a sort of Bird animal pack, with a a vulture, an owl species or two, couple more birds..
But I don't want to think about Planet Zoo DLC ending yet! :P As far as I know no announcements have been made regarding DLC development ending.. so let's hope it stays that way for a long while yet!
As far as we know, support runs through this year and then they will just evaluate again if the sales are still good enough to keep support up. But eventually Frontier would want to move on to other projects.
Thanks for the honest review. I haven’t truly played the game, so I love this information ❤
Yes the creativity might be a 11/10 but for new players to this system (like i was) is very, very overwhelming and not as easy to get a handle of the building system (specially with the scale of the objects in my case) so you can get 1000 great ideas in your head but if you are not used to the Planet games then and you don't have hours on end to spend learning and getting better at it with practice, it can be quite frustrating. So i don't think the system is as intuitive to the average player and that is the main issue i have with it.
Other than that i love this game. I love how the animals look and the animations (although i think more social interaction between animals would be nice and will give a lot more of a lifelike feeling to them).
Would personally love to see either an update or a pack focused on the weather and impact on the game. Like you said, it doesnt seem to affect much. I do believe they prefer hot drinks in a cold environment and vice versa but other than that nothing I noticed. I was thinking how they could do this though because if your zoo is large, the visitors stay for so long it can go from hot to cold and then I'm guessing best solution is for them to sort of 'change clothes' - perhaps a toilet could be considered a changing room. Ah well, it would just make it a lot more realistic and engaging for me to not have visitors in shorts when its freezing.
Besides loving animals and building all kind of zoos, this game is my dream game for worldbuilding. Just terraforming, adjusting the landscape and building cozy villages for my characters and stories. Before Planet Zoo I tried Sims 3, but it was a bit meh and I even tried to get into Unreal Engine and Unity but they were too difficult for me. So Planet Zoo is one of my absolute favourite games on many levels and 100% worth my time and money.
Hey! I’m about to buy planet zoo (its currently on sale on steam), but I would like to buy 3 dlc’s. Which dlc’s should I buy? Can you also why those dlcs?
I agree with the cc and buying certain animals. I think a zoo/franchise should have to achieve a certain rating or something before they can buy high rated animals like monkeys, lions and tigers ect that would add a little more challenge to the franchise mode. It doesn't matter in sandbox mode obviously
Dieser man ist der beste Spiele-Kritiker auf diesem Planeten: er beschäftigt sich aus purer Selbstlosigkeit und selbstverständlich nur für uns, Jahre lang mit einem Spiel um im Endeffekt bewerten u können, ob sich ein Kauf lohnt. Wahrlich ein Gentlemen :D
This man is the best game critic on this planet: he deals out of pure selflessness and of course only for us, for years with a game to be able to evaluate in the end whether a purchase is worthwhile. Truly a gentleman!
Und um einmal meine eigene Meinung hier zu nennen: ich persönlich finde das Spiel wirklich gut, und verfolge/besitze das Spiel auch schon seit der Beta. Als jemand der ebenfalls vor allem im sandbox-Modus spielt, gibt es jedoch, trotz der vielen Freiheiten die das spiel bietet einige Probleme, z.B. der riesige Zeitaufwand welcher es mir sehr schwierig macht große, Zusammenhängende Strukturen zu erbauen (wobei mir keine Lösung einfällt, die nicht die Freiheit des Spiels einschränken würde), oder die fehlende Struktur im Baumenü (warum gibt es von den rigibs-Wänden keine frei platzierbaren Varianten, aber eine mit loch hindurch? Warum gibt es eine afrikanische Wand, welche die Maße 4x4 hat, aber nur halb so dick ist wie die normalen Wände, während es bei den anderen Arten nur die 2x4 als Größte Variante gibt? Da wäre ein Einheitswert nicht schlecht!) trotz all dieser Fehler, ist die bereits benannte Freiheit die das Spiel bietet, einer der größten Pluspunkte, welcher es für mich persönlich zu einem der besten, wenn nicht sogar DEM besten sandbox-/bau-spiel macht. Viele Grüße aus Hamburg (Osterferien und so) :)
And to give my own opinion here: I personally think the game is really good, and have been following/own the game since the beta. As someone who also plays mainly in sandbox mode, however, despite the many freedoms that the game offers, there are some problems, e.g. the huge amount of time that makes it very difficult for me to build large, coherent structures (although I can't think of a solution that would not limit the freedom of the game), or the missing structure in the construction menu (Why is there an African wall that has the dimensions 4x4, but is only half as thick as the normal walls, while in the other types there is only the 2x4 as the largest variant? A unit value would not be bad!) Despite all these mistakes, the already named freedom that the game offers is one of the biggest plus points, which makes it one of the best, if not the best sandbox/building games for me personally. Best regards from Hamburg (Easter holidays and so on)
From where you get this making videos ?? Any documentary there
It's on their channel. These were the Dev videos before launch
That's the problem I have with this game and others similar to it.
I'm not the creative person that meticulously places every road, tree and fence. I don't enjoy building all these antricate buildings and creations.
I want to play a game for it's GAMEPLAY, and there's nearly none of it in here.. It feels like any fun to be had that isn't related to "Make this pretty" is entirely secondary, and well the fun evaporates quite quickly that way. I wanted to manage a Zoo, but other than the micromanagement of breeding and aging there's barely any of it there.
That’s not the problem with these games. It’s just not your style. Not every game can be made to your style cause then it wouldn’t be someone else’s. This and the coaster games are far beyond brilliant. If other companies would put the effort these guys did in these two games all games would be perfect. Sadly especially for someone like you and even me on other games most companies just want money for less work. This game isn’t your style and that sucks because it is beyond great for what it is….. I’m sorry you can’t enjoy it and wish you could find a game you enjoy with as much effort as these people put in.
interesting review, but i would suggest that if you say your going to talk about gameplay please talk about the actual gameplay, how is building an enclosure, how is managing your zoo actually like if it comes to macro and micro. You just continued talking about the graphics and animations.
Can you play it passively? Like a virtual pet or something that runs on its own and you just check it every now and then? I have a lot to do even at home, so I don't have time to sit in front of computer in a long time.
I couldn't have summed it up better😊
Just a fenomenal Game. I can only recommend it to everyone😇
Oh man, i just love planet zoo!! Just the only thing i want is birds or aquactic!
This planet game is like watching the movie the lion king, isn't it. The father and son, defending their kingdom. Amazing detail and beautiful image. Simba becomes the new king of pride rock, his new friends timone and pumba help him let loose and be happy. This game is fantastic, great to play a lion, or be a lion
I personally don't play Planet Zoo. I have to admit that I'm attracted to it, but the negatives I see so far outweigh why to buy this game. I play zoo tycoon 2 and I grew up on this game. I have downloaded mods such as remake or placehacks, so I have similar options (buildings, graphics...) as planet zoo (it's still not comparable and the building options in planet zoo are better), but what annoys me the most about planet zoo is that they are constantly coming out small DLC, there were 4 released in zoo tycoon 2 and each one had a lot of animals. For the zoo planets, each one only has a few animals, personally I know that only those animals from the DLCs would be enough for me, I don't need a lot of different objects. It kind of reminds me of the much criticized EA and the sims. In addition, so far I have much more mods for zoo tycoon 2 with animals that I adore than for zoo planets. Maybe when the game "dies" and they stop releasing new DLCs, I'll buy planet zoo as some sort of bundled edition with all the DLCs, but until then I'll probably give up on this game and stick to my zoo tycoon 2.
I see your points - but for a fair review, I simply can´t take Mods or the Game Industry from 20 years ago into account.
Nowadays DLCs are common and a huge part of the reason why Games exist in the first place. We can thank EA for that.
Also Mods are not a valid reason as to judge a "base" game. In this specific case it makes no difference if they are helpful or not - they are not made or intended by the creator. So you cant use them as element of the game.
The only thing I don´t buy is your graphics/animations argument. You are making your ZT2 world brighter than it is ;) realistically PZ is so so so much better in any way. The mods of ZT2 have become insanely good but you can´t change shaders and engine.
As someone who was very exited to play a good upgraded version of Zoo Tycoon 2, I am very disapointed by the gameplay aspact and it's enough for me to not enjoy the game, yes it looks good and there is a lot of freedom and content, but the learning curve is so high already that it's painful to get started, and the fact that I can't learn by just thowing a bunch of money at things in a sandbox mode is making me go back to Zoo Tycoon 2
100% agree, always buy every single dlc because the game is just too good!
The only thing keeping me from playing a lot is my own creativity and inspiration.
~Sprinkels
i personally don't buy the dlcs in steam, i prefer buying them in instant gaming or eneba cause it's way cheaper and i haven't had any issue with the codes, and i also bought the deluxe version base game there as well, so i don't consider it to be expensive at all tho, i truly love this game and wish i had more time to play with it
Honestly I'd love to play this game, but the path system is to frustrating to make it worth it. It's too finicky for no reason and despite watching all the tutorials, I feel like I'm fighting the game every time I try to use it. There's no reason why they can't fix the path system. There's already a mod that fixes most of the issues (which I can't use since my computer seems to hate mods). IMO if you need a mod to make a key mechanic workable, the developers need to address it.
I also wish they'd have better UI organization. Right now it's just okay, but with the ever increasing object count it gets a little hard to keep track of all the pieces you want to use. I wish you could save pieces to different project folders so I'm not spending a lot of the time unfavoriting and refavoriting things. I also wish you can scale objects like walls and rocks (not scaling trees I get), but I get if the current system might be too baked in the game for them to change it easily. Prehistoric Kingdom seems to have learned from all this and implemented a much better organization system.
I still think it's a great game from the limited hours I've played it, but I just can't play in-depth building games like this for hours. But when I do have an hour to spare, I'd rather be spending that hour building exhibits than fighting the path tool. And I know I'm not the only one frustrated by it lol.
Hey, you can add tags to building items and then search those tags, so it's basically like project folder.
Thank you for this great review! Very balanced and fair!
My biggest complaint is how the cheetah is getting beaten in a race by many animals in the game, which I think should be fixed 🐆
For me, it wasn't worth it...
I played 1 hour in total, until I freezed. I restarted my PC, it freezed once again after 5 minutes. I tried to fix it, wasn't able to.
I changed computer, still the same issue.
And I'm using a RTX 3060.
Instead I resorted to Prehistoric Planet, quite enjoyable to be able to play it!
But there goes 60€...
how can this game be purchased without needing steam?
and did this game make an expansion pack with dinosaurs yet? like Zoo Tycoon did? the game isn't complete until it does.
For me the game hasn't gotten any deepness regarding its gameplay. The gameplay experience is not meaningfully different/diverse/better then 3 years ago. Just adding more objects and animals does not change the game per si. It just gives you a bigger and bigger IKEA tour. I believe the only game changing moment were the addition of diving animals. but just that.
I really believe that Planet Zoo is more of a simulation game than a management game. That being said, I do really enjoy the management elements that are in Planet Zoo, and they are deeper than you'd think. The issue is that the game is not very good at drawing your attention to them. For instance, you might run into a problem where you constantly have animals that have low welfare due to stress. This is because it is important to not place low confidence animals near the busy areas of your zoo. However, does the game ever warn you about that? Or provide a pop-up to let you know that your animals don't have anywhere to hide? Nope. The problem can be mitigated by adding speakers, one-way glass, and "do not disturb" signs, but does the game ever teach you how to do that? Also nope. There are so many neat systems in this game, this is just one example, but the game itself doesn't do a very good job of onboarding players or explaining its own mechanics. It expects that players will explore as they go, which works for me, but I understand why it doesn't for many.
@@alexaliss8233 I look at games like zoo tycoon 2, cities skylines or others and I see that after 3 years planet zoo remains the same. Nothing considerably new. And the examples you provided I do not consider them very deep. And the issues you highlight are called "quality of life" improvements. Which is different from enhanced or deeper gameplay. Rudy highlighted a few things. The conservation credits is so shallow. Diseases and animal reproduction is so shallow. I can make a whole text about if you want.
Thank you for the 3-year summary.
Planet Zoo is everything I want in a management game, but it's been sat in my Steam library for over a year because content creators and my ADHD ruin it for me. When I see the types of enclosures you guys can create, I just end up feeling bad about my own designs and exiting. It's definitely a game that people with 9-5's and families struggle with. You really need to dedicate hours to each build.
What helps for me is using parts of buildings found in the steam workshop and making it my own by changing it to work w the enclosure or just havibg it as a centerpiece
While the earlier animals are less realistic than now, they still look beautiful and pretty accurate, just not as accuratw
ich würde sagen PZ ist nur wirklich empfehlenswert für Leute, die hauptsächlich Bock auf bauen haben.
Es ist ja eigentlich ein Zoo-Simulator, wo auch unteranderem mit dem Managementaspekt geworben wird.
Die Tiere benehmen sich nicht sonderlich natürlich, weder Zoo-Natürlich noch Wildnis-Natürlich und wirklich Managen muss man auch nicht. Selbst die Gäste sind nicht sonderlich realistisch was die AI angeht.
Am Ende bleibt also nur der Bauaspekt, der wirklich viele Möglichkeiten bringt.
thanks for the review. Gameplay is a big deal for me since it's not that great, not going to buy it, was about to, but thanks to your review I don't need to anymore.
late but I got this game for like 10 quid as a steam key + the aquatic dlc and its so much fun! Personally I'm not into building games and I struggle with the building aspect in this game but I only really play for the animals so its worth it imo
Yes.
yes!
Will you review the new game "Terra nil"? :)
5:20 ou yeah 3 000 000 conservation credit and still no new mechanic for it...
i personaly have a issue with content and creativity... specifically in lot of inconsintency that frontier created... we have animals with lot of sign and statues... and then we have animals with absolutely nothing or only with some hideous signs (yes i'm looking especially at you North American DLC)...
For me its a 9/10
I love Planet Zoo, there is little I would change, but I would love if they added egg laying in the game, we have so much focus on all kinds of animals, but birds and reptiles dont lay eggs.. pls egg updates when.. 😢
10/10 for me.
If you have beefy pc I don't I wasted 50 dollars on it and can't play😢.
Ingenuity; 8, they hyped up the 'uniqueness' so much pre-launch that when the game finally came out with all the bugs and glitches, and the missing "every animal will have it's own individual personality" it was just a little disappointing.
Graphics; 7.5 the base game animals and guests are far too cartoonish for the semi-realistic build items, not to mention that with every new DLC the cartoonishness of the OG animals and guests get even more out of place.
Gameplay; 6, it's a bit basic and unbalanced, but it's functional enough.
Replayability; 8.5, you can replay the game as much as you want in any mode as long as you have an idea, with the exception of career mode. And timed scenarios.....they just don't exist to me.
Content; 6; the base game is good, but with all the DLCs it's better. I can't go higher because the walkthrough exhibit and the underwater herbivore feeder are base game items, but they require DLC animals to have a function. Also no brachiation behaviors in base game either.
Creativity; 10; you're basically only limited by your imagination and your skills to bring your idea to life.
what is going on kane? you are way to close to my opinion :D:D
@@RudiRennkamel What's going on here is that i like Planet Zoo, but i'm just disappointed by the execution of it and frustrated by my lack of skills to be good at the game.
Graphics look cartoonish in the best way.
I realy desliked the building tools. Should be grinded. The building experiênce is terrible. Refunded it.
Why do they always make the NPC'S look dumb as Fk? Why can't they make them look halfway Decent
I genuinely think this is the best realisation of guest in any management game. The animation, the overall design, the interactivity.
Name one better, I'll wait.
It's incredibly hard to make realistic crowds without slipping in stereotypes, insane performance issues or other bumpy terrain.
They're ofc not flawless, but I can deal with these flaws over all the others in other games