How do you play this game?

[Jimmytwohand]

Sound weird but i haven't worked out how to sustainably play. As soon as my zoo gets about 8 species it becomes a pause fest as i constantly struggle to keep everything from inbreeding/ carting off the dead animals.

I also sometimes just make a very small tweak and then start hemorrhaging money for no discernible reason and have to restart. I enjoy the building but i can't build it up into one cohesive park like roller coaster tycoon and i'm reluctant to invest a lot of time building when it could suddenly have to be abandoned because my aardvark suddenly decides it needs 500k of food every year. I've ended up with a dozen zoos that i constantly need to restart/abandon. Is that intended?

While generally happy I can't see what i'm missing here to make an actual, functional zoo that i can build up over time without it becoming either a financial black hole or a micromanagement nightmare.

[wpegg]

For finance you should be absolutely raking it in when you're at 8 species. There are a few basic steps to follow for a profitable zoo

1) Put the right number (see zoopedia for the correct number of animals) of animals into a habitat that has enough space
2) Add water (piped or a pond with water treatment in range), food tray (optional), and enrichment items to bring their food and toy enrichment to 100% (not initially available but you will research these pretty fast).
3) bring the terrain requirements inline and add a shelter if needed simply by building something using construction items (don't use the stock shelters, they're usually too short). I just build them a 4m tall hut (8m for elephants).

Your animals should now be at 95%-98% enrichment even on lvl1 feed, don't bother with lvl3 feed unless you're really trying to breed the very best animals. At this point you need to ensure there is a window for guests to view the animals (get 1-way glass asap).

4) Add a donation box about every 8 meters along the viewing area. More if you want.
5) Add Education signs and speakers along the viewing area.
6) Add a small keeper hut per 1 or 2 habitats, or 1 large keeper hut for 4.
7) Add a keeper
8 Repeat 1 - 7 for 4 habitats
9) Add 2 drink shops, 1 food shop, 1 gift shop, 1 toilet. Initially also add an information shop. Add bins about every 16 metres.
10) Add a large staff room
11) Repeat so you build up blocks of 4 habitats, shops, staff facilities. You'll need to put power and water treatment down as needed.
12) increase your Zoo price by 33% whenever it tells you it's too low.
13) Add security cameras to ensure your zoo paths are fully covered, this means you'll only need 1 security guard, and nobody will be getting pickpocketted which decreases their happiness and requests a refund (I assume you're playing on hard if you're struggling for cash).

And that's it, all the money you could need even on hard mode the key things are donation boxes, zoo price, and the right shop ratio. You'll need to tweak the shops ratio, maybe add more drinks shops, check the guest needs to see.

Now you need to manage the animals. To stop the inbreeding ensure that each time an animal reaches maturation you make a decision - is this animal going to be my new breeder or is it to be release to wild. If it's going to be your new breeder then release the parents and different gender siblings to wild and buy a new mate.

[Jimmytwohand]

Thanks, that's a great crib sheet! Cheers for adding all of that. I've just been trying to work out what happened with my previous zoo which now seems unrecoverable. For some reason my food costs went up by 40k from the previous year taking me from +10k to -30k per year (i've just checked and it's all level 1 food). I've tried getting rid of some of the animals to bring that down but now donations have fallen off a cliff too!

I'll abandon another one and rebuild from scratch according to your advice. I generally seem to have been adding a lot more shops than you, a lot less security and bins.

[wpegg]

Originally posted by Jimmytwohand:

Thanks, that's a great crib sheet! Cheers for adding all of that. I've just been trying to work out what happened with my previous zoo which now seems unrecoverable. For some reason my food costs went up by 40k from the previous year taking me from +10k to -30k per year (i've just checked and it's all level 1 food). I've tried getting rid of some of the animals to bring that down but now donations have fallen off a cliff too!

I'll abandon another one and rebuild from scratch according to your advice. I generally seem to have been adding a lot more shops than you, a lot less security and bins.

That's a lot of feed. I forgot one thing - don't get any big animals initially, Lions, Elephants, Bears, etc. They are a crowd puller but they don't justify their cost.

First just get a basic grid zoo working with some buffalo, bison, antelopes, springboks, aardvark, pangolin, tapir, and warthogs. Later you can mix those species up, but for now just put them in one habitat each

[grampers62]

Indeed the key for cash is donation boxes. A few exhibit species will also be a low cost way to boost guest count and income. And don't forget to add some education things. educated and happy guest do donate more. Do not try to build up too quickly, it often results in unmanageable expenses for novice players. If you want to be more precise on ticket cost, sample the guests by clicking on a few and reading what they say as they enter the zoo. Keep raising the price till they say the price is fair. Once you get the hang of what it takes for your style of play you will have no more problems. Also note that you can turn animal ageing down which actually slows the entire life cycle. That means they breed less often age out less often and even eat less. Ideal for a player that wants to build but still manage a zoo. especially in franchise.

[Jimmytwohand]

Thanks both, I had lions, rhino, hippo, giraffe so maybe that's what caused it, the income seemed stable for 5 years before the crash though.

I had no idea about animal ageing options! That sounds like what i need. I'll also look and see if there is a pause on animal maturation option so i don't miss it.

[grampers62]

Worth while to peruse the settings and get a grasp of what the options are for game play.

[Just Kevin]

As your zoo becomes more popular you can slowly increase ticket price. Click on people passing the ticket gate and increase the price until they think it's Fair, you should check that almost every time you add a habitat. They also expect kiosks all over the place, and you can slowly increase the charges in them too. The heat maps are handy to see where the guests are hungry, thirsty, want a pee, and if they are happy. As said above, don't start with big expensive, and costly to feed either, animals. Guests like walkthrough habitats, and they like to look at offspring, so donate more cash. Oh, also, the feed costs are not just for the habitat, it doubles with every creature you have in it, including offspring. Best to sell them as soon as they mature. Don't assume that all species are popular, so attract many people donating cash, they are not.