Planet Zoo News

Hayo Zookeepers,

We hope you've enjoyed our magical winter tale experience, but of course, every fairytale needs a good ending - and what better way to end than with releasing the Pack? The Europe Pack and Update 1.8 are officially out now, so you can update your game now to enjoy!

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The Planet Zoo: Europe Pack introduces 5 new animal friends to create your own winter magic with! If you loved the Planet Zoo winter tale, you can now have your very own Lumi with the new Eurasian Lynx. Not only this, you can welcome his musical friends - the Fallow Deer with their soft brown fur, the short and sturdy European Badger, the mountainous Alpine Ibex, and the slender Fire Salamander.

For those of you who love building, this pack is definitely one you don't want to miss - with over 250 new scenery pieces inspired by various European countries and cultures, you'll be spoilt for choice! This includes items that capture our magical winter theming, as well as inspirations from Italy, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Switzerland! We've also included a lot of water and bridge elements, so you can create your very own Magical Wishing Bridge!

Lastly, see if you can handle the cold in an all-new Timed Scenario set at the foot of an alpine mountain. Challenge yourself to complete 3 distinct areas, each inspired by a different European location, to create a wonderful multicultural experience - we know you can do it!

The Planet Zoo: Europe Pack is available now on Steam for £7.99 ($9.99, 9.99€). You must have the base Planet Zoo game to be able to play this content.



Update 1.8 is free for all players who own the Planet Zoo base game, and brings with it several new features we know you're all excited for such as Restaurants, a brand-new inclusion that allows you to create dining experiences for your guests! You can create restaurants with up to 20 tables connected, and they can even be made in walkthrough animal habitats. For a deep-dive on restaurants and how they work, check out this forum post.

Alongside this, you'll be able to give your guests even more new consumer experiences with all new Shop Counters! These give you a standalone, counter-only version of shops that allow you to create your very own, fully-customised shop fronts. Only a selection of shops will be available in this format for now, and you can find a full list of what's available here. 

Prepare yourself for the winter cold with all-new animal burrows! Place these items on your terrain and they will automatically align themselves with an underground chamber that animals can seek shelter in, sleep, give birth, and adjust temperatures - perfect for chilly winter nights. Burrowing will be available for both the base game Aardvark and the new European Badger that comes with the Europe Pack!

Pay tribute to your beloved animals with Animal Memorials. This is a two-part feature, consisting of a UI screen that tracks information of the animals that pass away in your zoo such as their name, death date, and cause of death, and then also new memorial items that you can place in your zoos. There will be 3 options available - a Screen display option, and plaques in either Limestone or Brass. All memorial dedications can be autofilled with information from the UI screen, or customised individually, allowing you to write your own dedication lines or even create memorials for real-life animals (perfect for pets, or animals from your favourite zoos).

These features come alongside various other tweaks and fixes. For full information, check out this forum post and the update notes below.

Don't forget that Planet Zoo is also available on NVIDIA's GeForceNOW service, which gives you instant access to GeForce PC performance on nearly any PC, Mac, SHIELD TV, Android, iOS device or Chromebook without any downloads! This will let anyone dive into Planet Zoo and join the PlanZo fam.

Thank you all for your love and support in the run-up to this release! Your warm reaction to our stream and reveals has kept the cozy vibes strong throughout, and we're sure you'll be able to continue them with all this new content. We can't wait to see what you build! Keep an eye on our social media for future news and announcements, and for highlights from the Europe Pack. Also, be sure to tune in soon for a special launch live stream at 11:30AM GMT on Youtube and Twitch!

Happy holidays everyone!

PS: Our patch notes for Update 1.8 are quite substantial, and can be found here.

Hayo Zookeepers,
It's time for a deep dive into what you can expect to see in the next Planet Zoo free update! We're happy to announce that Update 1.8 will be available for you to dig into from 14 December 

Restaurants
Restaurants are making their way to Planet Zoo! From fine dining to fast food, serve your guests a unique culinary experience with this new feature. With up to 20 tables able to be connected per restaurant, flexicolour table options, and table placement even being available in safe habitats, you've got the freedom to let your creativity run wild. For a full rundown of what you can expect, take a look at this forum post.

Shop Counters
Restaurants aren't the only new way your guests will be able to enjoy their time at your zoos - introducing shop counters! This alternate option of creating stores will provide you with a counter-only version for an assortment of shops, allowing you to create your own custom shop designs. Check out this list of what shop counters will be available:

• Bernie's Bakes
• Chief Beef
• Cosmic Cow Milkshakes
• Gulpee Energy
• Gulpee Slush
• Hot Dog Squad
• Pipshot Smoothies
• Streetfox Coffee

On top of this, there will be new small signs of the shop logos for you to place on your builds. What theme are you going to do for your first custom shop?



Burrows
Dig down deep with our new animal burrowing behaviour, just in time for winter! This will allow certain animals to explore burrows that can be freely placed in your zoos, giving them a place to seek shelter, sleep, adjust to the correct temperature, or even give birth! The entrance to the burrow will always align with the terrain, which leads to an underground chamber that will position itself below the entrance.

But that's not all! The burrows will come with internal habitat cameras that you can access through the burrow info panels, so you can see exactly what's happening underground! Plus, with the ability to link them to billboard screens, this means your guests won't miss out either!

Animal Memorials
Lastly, we know losing your animals is never easy, and that's why we're adding animal memorials into the game. Give your beloved inhabitants a proper dedication to ensure that while they may be gone, they're never forgotten, and will always be part of your zoo This will be split into two parts: a new UI section to keep track of the animals that have passed away in your zoos, and physical memorials that you can place as a tribute to specific animals.

The memorials UI will be added as a new screen to the Zoo overview UI, and will contain two lists: one to track habitat animal deaths, and one for exhibit animals. Here you will find info on each animal that has passed, including their name, age, date of death, and cause of death. This will have a max entry level of 200, so if you have a particularly busy zoo with several generations of animals, your oldest animals may end up overwritten. Don't worry though! If you have animals you want to ensure stay on the list, we've added the ability to mark entries as "favourites" which protects them from being deleted. (Please note: this UI will be backdated to include existing animal data but cause of death was not previously stored, so this field may be empty for deaths prior to the 1.8 update).

From this menu, you can select an animal and then choose a memorial asset to place into the world. When creating a memorial you will be given two tabs of options. The first, "Overview", will show you a summary of all content on the memorial and will let you adjust the custom image or font colour (depending on asset). The second tab, "Animal Information", will let you adjust animal-specific information, such as what information is shown, or adding a dedication line.

When choosing what dedication to make, you'll be able to choose from 3 memorial assets:

• Memorial Plaque Screen - a screen asset with custom image functionality, similar to the billboards already in-game
• Memorial Plaque Editable Sign Brass - a dedicated plaque featuring the animals' name and other information in brass
• Memorial Plaque Editable Sign Limestone - a dedicated plaque featuring the animals' name and other information in limestone

On top of this, should you wish to create an animal memorial for an animal outside of your zoo (such as a real-world pet), you can do this too. Simply place a blank memorial and edit it manually to include the right information.

Guests in your zoos will interact with your memorials by viewing them if they are close by, stopping to read the dedication, and then receiving a small mood boost due to appreciation of fond memories with the animal.

We hope these various memorial features allow you to create meaningful dedications to your beloved animals, both from within and outside of Planet Zoo.



Of course, as always, these features come alongside various tweaks and fixes that will be included in the patch notes upon release. We hope you're excited for this new content, as we're certainly excited to bring it to you and see what new dimension it brings to your Zoo builds!

Hayo Zookeepers! 

Pack your warmest coat as you get ready to discover the charms of Europe. Travel across alpine mountain tops and through dense forests in a European winter tale like no other with the latest Planet Zoo pack! 

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We're thrilled to announce the Planet Zoo: Europe Pack will be available to buy on 14 December, 2021 releasing alongside free update 1.8.

Excited to find out which wonderful animals you'll be meeting in this pack? Look no further! We'll be introducing you to the Eurasian Lynx, the Alpine Ibex, the European Badger, the European Fallow Deer, and a hot new exhibit animal, the Fire Salamander, all of which will have their own requirements and challenges as you incorporate them into your zoos. Plus you'll get to see the European Badger resting in its burrows! We can't wait to see what kind of incredible habitats you're able to create for these new additions.



All the avid builders out there are in for a real treat, too: the addition of over 250 new scenery pieces, inspired by various European countries and cultures. You'll discover pieces influenced by Italy, France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Switzerland, as well as winter-themed scenery that will leave your zoo feeling super cosy. Plus, you'll notice lots of water and bridge theming throughout the new pieces, as well as some new foliage.

You'll also be able to challenge yourself with a brand new Timed Scenario, set in the foothills of an imposing alpine mountain. This zoo has three distinctly themed areas inspired by Italy, France, and Switzerland, which you'll need to successfully build across to complete the challenge. We're sure you can handle this, zookeepers! 



The Planet Zoo: Europe Pack will be available for purchase for £7.99 ($9.99, 9.99€) on Steam from 14 December. Want to be notified when the game is available? You can head over to Steam to wishlist it right now! Please remember that you'll need to own the base game of Planet Zoo to be able to enjoy the Planet Zoo: Europe Pack, though.

Is there an animal or a scenery piece you are particularly excited about in the Planet Zoo: Europe Pack? Let us know, below!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1726150/Planet_Zoo_Europe_Pack/

Hayo Zookeepers!

It's an exciting time of year for the Steam Community - the 2021 Steam Awards nominations are now open!

Having just celebrated the 2nd Anniversary of Planet Zoo, we're incredibly proud of the hard work and care that goes into the game! With regular Free Updates which incorporate some incredible new features (Bernie's Bakes cake shop, anyone?), and a great variety of DLCs which provide a mixture of new animals and decorative pieces for your zoos, the Planet Zoo team are constantly working to give this incredible community the best possible zoo building experience. We think it shows in just how much you're able to let your imagination run wild with every new build!

That's why, for this years' Steam Awards, we'd be endlessly grateful if you'd consider nominating Planet Zoo for the Steam Awards Labour of Love category, in celebration of the ongoing care and support that our wonderful developers continue to shower upon the PlanZo community!

If you are considering nominating us, you can do so above or on our Store Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/703080/Planet_Zoo/

Planet Zoo is celebrating its two-year anniversary with a free update that adds black and white ruffed lemurs, and a new cake shop. I'm very excited, lemurs are my favourites! I went to the IRL zoo last month and the lemur walkthrough was closed, which was absolutely gutting. But if I can't have real lemurs, you can be damn sure I'm adding some of these fluffy fellas to my virtual enclosures.

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