Planet Zoo Planet Zoo!

I mean, now that we know that this pack will have a broader Asian theme. I suppose it is necessary to express my feelings towards the two leaked species:

Regarding the Bornean Elephant, my thoughts on their inclusion have already been shared elsewhere; it’s just I didn’t expect it to be this particular subspecies… At the very least, I suppose it would be interesting to create a mini-complex dedicated to the jungles of Borneo, but even by itself, it’s kind of a stretch.

On the flip side, however, I’m very looking forward to the Père David’s Deer, even if it wasn’t the most requested. Therefore, I’m just glad that we’re getting a species of Asian deer that isn’t from the Arctic Circle (Moose, Reindeer).

As for what else we can expect, I suspect it will probably be one other carnivoran (perhaps, some sort of cat or the Tanuki); another ungulate like the highly-requested Blackbuck; and perhaps even, an Asian crocodilian (I’m thinking either the Chinese Alligator or the Tomistoma / False Gharial).

Of course, the animal types I’ve listed above are not guaranteed, nor confirmed; but are options Frontier would develop more easily than say, a habitat snake or another bird.
 
Frankly, I don't think the issue here is Frontier reusing rigs continuously as of late, because that's something that's plagued virtually every single zoo game - Zoo Tycoon and Zoo Empire had a very heavy emphasis on reusing rigs, and the XBox Zoo Tycoon was infamously nothing but reused rigs. Of course, I can cut the former two some slack for being amongst the first of their genre, that was inevitable, but it's also something that's never really gone away.

Nor do I think the issue is Frontier simply not listening to "what the fans want", because frankly I think that's really disrespectful towards what they have done before, when many of the animals were fan favourites and they even went and redid rigs that were off in the first place.

No, the issue here, as far as I'm concerned, is that Frontier doesn't seem to know when to actually stop. I almost feel like the Zookeepers Collection should have been the very last pack before they moved on to something new, but since the fans keep asking, they feel like they have to keep adding more animals in, and at this stage it's just easier to reuse rigs. The fact there's so long between these packs now almost makes me think Frontier is only doing this because they feel they have to, rather than they actually want to.
 
CrashMegaraptor said:
Like, you're complaining about the fact we didn't get the Black Howler when we literally got the White-Faced Saki? "We need more monkeys, add more monkeys... NO, I didn't mean THAT monkey!"
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To be fair, saki is more of a niche pick when Squirrel, Spider, Howler, and tamarins/marmosets are all still absent. Not saying the saki is bad, but it was a tad disappointing.

CrashMegaraptor said:
No, the issue here, as far as I'm concerned, is that Frontier doesn't seem to know when to actually stop. I almost feel like the Zookeepers Collection should have been the very last pack before they moved on to something new, but since the fans keep asking, they feel like they have to keep adding more animals in, and at this stage it's just easier to reuse rigs. The fact there's so long between these packs now almost makes me think Frontier is only doing this because they feel they have to, rather than they actually want to.
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I'm not so sure it's as much the fans asking as it is their financials - I've heard PZ remains their biggest cash flow currently after a mediocre result with Planet Coaster 2. It's a way to keep things going for them. Equally if they really wanted to please fans, there's some much higher priority species than anything in this pack so far...
 
CrashMegaraptor said:
No, the issue here, as far as I'm concerned, is that Frontier doesn't seem to know when to actually stop. I almost feel like the Zookeepers Collection should have been the very last pack before they moved on to something new, but since the fans keep asking, they feel like they have to keep adding more animals in, and at this stage it's just easier to reuse rigs. The fact there's so long between these packs now almost makes me think Frontier is only doing this because they feel they have to, rather than they actually want to.
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The Frontier fell into financial hardship in 2023 due to the commercial failure of the F1 Manager and Warhammer: the Realm of Ruin. On the other hand, some staff from PZ teams were moved to work on Planet Coaster 2 last year. The sales of Planet Coaster 2 were just moderately successful, and Frontier realized that they still heavily rely on Planet Zoo as a source of revenue and need to keep updating it. That's why the Frontier has made two DLCs just in the first half of this year, compared to last year when just 2 DLCs were released for the entire year.
PossumRoach said:
Frontier failing to provide what people want isn’t new. I recall people complaining about red fox and striped skunk when twilight pack came out, or how the arid animal pack had too much ungulates instead of hamadryas baboon or secretary bird. Or spectacled caiman making it despite being in the bottom of the barrel of the community meta wishlist. So frontier not caring what the community wants and picking animals no one asked for isn’t really new.
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I mean, even though Frontier always has odd picks, at least one top-demanded species could be included in each pack released before 2024 — like the Arid Animal Pack, which featured the African Crested Porcupine, ranked as the second most requested species in the Frontier Forum's Meta Wishlist, same to the Twilight Pack that featured the Wombat. But the last pack, the American Animal Pack, none of the 7 species are top requested, the Frontier just ignores all of Coati, Mara, Walrus, Black Howler, Spider Monkey and Musk Ox. Based on the meta wishlist, currently the highest-demanded Asian species are Blackbuck and Great White Pelican (not exclusively Asian), hopefully we can have at least one of these two through the coming DLC
 
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StellarChaser said:
the Frontier just ignores all of Coati, Mara, Black Howler, Spider Monkey and Musk Ox
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Again, why are you hating on the pack because it didn't have the Howler Monkey or Spider Monkey, when we literally GOT a monkey? You're just proving my point right now - moving the goalposts.
 
CrashMegaraptor said:
Again, why are you hating on the pack because it didn't have the Howler Monkey or Spider Monkey, when we literally GOT a monkey? You're just proving my point right now - moving the goalposts.
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I don't dislike the monkey selection of the American Animal Pack, I'm personally fine with the Saki. I just mentioned the Howler and Spider Monkeys as examples to show that Frontier doesn't really care about the players' wishes. I am personally disappointed with the non-selection of any of Coati, Mara, Walrus and Sea Otter (I am not expecting all of them are offered, about one or two offered are great enough), and I don't like the pick of Bighorn Sheep b/c it is almost identical to Dall Sheep (except different color) and represents same continent, if the Frontier really wants another easy copy&paste, American Black Bear or Elk would defintively be better choice.
 
StellarChaser said:
I don't like the choices of the American Animal Pack not because of the Monkey selection, I am fine with Saki, I am disappointed with the non-selection of any of Coati, Mara, Walrus and Sea Otter (not top-demanded, but it is my personal like), and I don't like the pick of Bighorn Sheep b/c it is almost identical to Dall Sheep (except different color) and represents same continent, if the Frontier really wants another easy copy&paste, American Black Bear or Elk would defintively be better choice.
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Look, we wanted more American animals and more birds, and we got an American animal pack with two birds in it. I'm not saying I'd rather have those over something like a coati, but it just feels really disrespectful to act like Frontier has never given us any of what we wanted when they've worked so hard with prior packs.

We probably need to accept at this point that most of the animals we'll get from here on out are likely reused rigs, but also not act like this is all they do.
 
The new DLC is officially announced, it is the Asian Animal pack with 7 habitat species and about 100 scenery pieces, the roster includes:
Honey Badger, Lion-tailed Macaque, Pere David's Deer, Bornean Pygmy Elephant, Tanuki, Blackbuck and Nilgai. Without the Bornean Elephant, this is decent roster, much better than the previous American pack
 
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StellarChaser said:
The new DLC is officially announced, it is the Asian Animal pack with 7 habitat species and about 100 scenery pieces, the roster includes:
Honey Badger, Lion-tailed Macaque, Pere David's Deer, Bornean Pygmy Elephant, Tanuki, Blackbuck and Nilgai. Without the Bornean Elephant, this is decent roster, much better than the previous American pack
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Yeah, I could definitely live without the elephant, but the rest is very solid stuff indeed. Blackbuck and Nilgai in one hit is great, and Pere David's is the first deer not found in Europe to be added to the game..!
 
StellarChaser said:
The new DLC is officially announced, it is the Asian Animal pack with 7 habitat species and about 100 scenery pieces, the roster includes:
Honey Badger, Lion-tailed Macaque, Pere David's Deer, Bornean Pygmy Elephant, Tanuki, Blackbuck and Nilgai. Without the Bornean Elephant, this is decent roster, much better than the previous American pack
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In terms of how much I wanted these: Lion-tailed Macque, Honey Badger, Blackbuck, Tanuki, Nilgai, Pere David's Deer, and finally the Bornean Elephant.

I still think the Bornean Elephant is interesting, but I'm not sure how much it's really needed.
 
Not a bad roster for the new animal pack and I am very excited to be finally adding in Blackbuck, Nilgai, Pere David's Deer and Lion-tailed Macaques to my zoos.

I would have liked to have seen the Fishing Cat and Sarus Crane added but sadly not to be.
 
As someone who usually associates honey badgers with Africa I do think the inclusion of honey badger is weird, a fishing cat, leopard cat, or yellow throated marten would have been a better carnivore to represent Asia.

Now this is a silly rant, but I want to list what frontier gave up in order to add a subspecies to the dlc. My hands were previously tied bc people were speculating on an India pack instead of a generic Asia pack. But now that we know that there’s a greater number of species to choose from, making the addition of an elephant much more irritating :

Any species of langur (Hanuman, Francois’, red-shanked douc)
A Nomascus gibbon
Zebu
Visayan warty pig
Gaur
Banteng
Any species of Asian civet (masked palm, spotted palm)
Himalayan tahr
Yak
Bharal
Japanese serow
A second Asian crane (white-naped, Siberian, Sarus)
Fishing cat
Leopard cat
Yellow-throated marten

and this is not including taxa that would be considered redundant within the pack such as macaques (crab-eating, Sulawesi crested, rhesus) and deer (Sambar, Axis, sika, Chinese muntjac)


I can come up with species that are objectively useless, but still tolerable for me, because at least they aren’t subspecies.
 
Maguari said:
Yeah, I could definitely live without the elephant, but the rest is very solid stuff indeed. Blackbuck and Nilgai in one hit is great, and Pere David's is the first deer not found in Europe to be added to the game..!
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Yea pretty much my thoughts as well, huge boost for anyone wanting to make an Indian themed area.
 
Didn't expect we'd get nilgai and raccoon dog, but both are nice additions! The only one I'm iffy on is the pygmy elephant; I would've picked lowland anoa instead.

Glad that the butterfly's added as a free update animal too.
 
The new pack looks amazing as usual, but the worst thing is the elephant, like wasn't the indian elephant enough? Why did we need another asian subspecies? I bet this elephant will be the new Himalayan brown bear, I already love this pack, but I hate the elephant
 
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