Things are getting wild — Planet Zoo at E3

Planet Coaster was a roaring success in terms of an amusement park simulator and the fun factor and Planet Zoo is shaping up to be along the same path. With several quality of life enhancements and an articulate attention to detail, Frontier Development’s Zoo themed Sim is going to be wild.

First, the animals themselves look incredible. When zoomed in, you can really see each strand of fur on the animals, with the light illuminating them in a realistic way. Their behaviors are mostly random, but they act just as you’d expect real animals to act in a zoo, and it’s even better if you have enrichments such as a scratching post for any big cats hanging around.

As guests are craving more cognitive enrichment in their lives, it’s up to park creators to put up education boards. These boards raise the education level and players can improve these boards by researching animals.

As you take care of the animals, you can put them in mixed habitats. For example, zebra and wildebeests can be held together as they are herding animals. Interestingly enough, in each of these groups is an alpha.

Each aspect of the park is customizable and this includes the caretakers buildings. In order to feed the animals and clean after them, you need someone to do all of the nitty gritty jobs. New to Planet Zoo is the ability to place employee only paths, leaving the caretakers huts out of sight from the rest of the park.

Even the animals’ attractions are customizable. Instead of purchasing a pre-built jungle-gym for the monkey exhibit, you build each piece for them to interact with. This will no doubt lead to some interesting designs by players. More enrichment items can be unlocked later through research as well.

The main Park type I got to check out was the Safari. Here, each animal exhibit is large with a car path through them for guests to check out the animals more closely. I didn’t get to see how crazy you can get with the track, but having the option to build a safari is nice on its own.

Frontier Development’s Planet Zoo is going to be released on November 5th for PC. Want to see more of our E3 coverage? Check out our E3 section here.

See below for our list of partners and affiliates: