Planet Zoo News

Hayo Zookeepers,

Pack your bags and get ready to embark on an unforgettable journey along the coastal islands. Introducing the Planet Zoo: Oceania Pack which will be sailing its way to you on 19 September alongside Free Update 1.15. 

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Abundant in rich fauna and flora, you'll discover some iconic species in various locations on the Oceanian continent. 

Through the lush forests of New Zealand you may encounter the curious Kiwi, or set sail further along the islands to meet with the energetic Tasmanian Devil. Keep rowing along the South Coast of Australia to discover a Little Penguin colony huddled together, or if you'd prefer, take a hike to Rottnest Island to discover the lovable Quokka giving you their best smile. Oh, Look up there! It's the striking Spectacled Flying Fox, spreading its wings in its Walkthrough Exhibit! 



Alongside these stunning animals, you'll also be getting over 200 scenery pieces inspired by the rich traditions of Polynesia. Decorate your Zoos with intricately carved Tiki Statues, straw huts and colourful Flower Leis, in celebration of the captivating culture of the region. You can even admire the diversity of the islands with the addition of impressive glow-in-the-dark faux lava, along with distinctive foliage that inhabit the islands, such as the beautiful Nīkau Palm and the radiant Silver Fern, emblematic of New Zealand.

It's time to also welcome back Emma Goodwin, Bernie's daughter in another Planet Zoo Career Scenario! This time you'll be supporting Emma as she works on a very special project in the Oceanic region, focusing on conservation. Of course, you'll be helping her fix up the place, add some infrastructure and making sure plant diversity is on point! Can't forget about the animals too, you'll take part in establishing a breeding program to make sure all the wonderful species that are unique to the region are around for generations to come. Can you help Emma make the project a success? We can't wait to see how you tackle this one!

Keep an eye on our social channels as we help Emma and her dad kick-start this special project early! 👀



That's not all though, we've also got some extra additions that are coming your way in Free Update 1.15.

Viewing Domes

Give your Zoo visitors a whole new viewing experience with Viewing Domes. Guests will be able to enter these Viewing Domes in the habitat via an underground network without any need for a path or tunnel, so they can enjoy an extra closeup view of your wonderful animals through the safety of the glass. To activate this feature, just place a Viewing Dome entrance on the habitat barrier and then place your Viewing Dome anywhere inside the habitat. They will automatically be connected to your dome gate and you can even place multiple domes in one habitat. Why not place them underwater to create an even more breathtaking view? Just make sure you add water to your terrain after you place the dome in the desired location.  You can find your dome entrance in the barriers menu and the glass viewing dome in your guest facilities and habitats tab. We're excited to see all the creative ways you utilise this new feature for your Zoos! 



As always, we've added some quality of life updates in the game for you to enjoy.

We've now added the brachiation behaviour for the Bornean Orangutan. They will be able to brachiate using the 1m, 2m, 4m, and 6m Climbable Logs, so you'll be seeing them swinging around in your Zoos in ways you've not seen before!

There are also new colour morphs for the King Penguin from the Aquatic Pack, which are Melanistic, Leucistic, Brown, and Xanthic!  We've also added a new Temperate Oceania biome for you to enjoy in all modes. 

Free Update 1.15 will also come with various fixes alongside all of this content, which will be included in the Update Notes upon release on 19 September.

Also some more exciting news - We are officially on TikTok! We'll be posting exclusive content over on our Planet Zoo official TikTok channel in the lead up to the launch of the Oceania Pack and update 1.15, so make sure to follow us over there so you don't miss out on all the fun! 

The Planet Zoo: Oceania Pack will be available for purchase for £7.99 ($9.99, 9.99€) on Steam from 19 September. If you want to be notified when the game is available, then head on over to Steam and wishlist it now! Please remember that you'll only be able to enjoy the Planet Zoo: Oceania Pack if you already own the base game of Planet Zoo.

Follow along on our social media channels in the run-up to the Pack launch to join Bernie and Emma to scout out the islands before they start their big conservation project, you may spot some animal reveals along the way 👀. You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and now on TikTok! If you missed our ✨special livestream✨ yesterday you can also check it out here.

We hope you are as excited as we are for this announcement, and we look forward to seeing how you get involved with the Goodwin Family's special project! Tell us what you're more excited for below ⬇️

Hayo Zookeepers,

Update 1.14.1 is available now for you all to enjoy! Simply update your game to play. For full patch notes, see below:

Planet Zoo - 1.14.1 Update Notes This update contains bug fixes

New Content - Free Update 1.14.0 - These great features were not captured in our last set of patch notes, here's some more info on them now!

• NEW - New Colourmorphs and Colour Variations for the Bactrian Camel
  • Piebald
  • Leucistic
  • Brown colour morph

• NEW - Widget speed controller
  • Added an advanced widget speed multiplier control. Which can affect the rate of your movement and rotation widgets for precision or speed

Planet Zoo - 1.14.1 Update Notes General Bug Fixes and Adjustments

• Animals
  • Adjusted the Black Rhinoceros' head position
  • Adjusted the Black Rhinoceros walking animations
  • Fixed a bug where the incorrect icons for quarantined animals were being displayed
  • Fixed Planco and scientific names being inverted on the TV screen display for the Common Wombat
  • Melon Feeder will now appear under Food Enrichments in the Somali Wild Ass' Zoopedia page
  • Fixed a bug where Timber Wolves could walk through barriers
  • Added Sand Cat tag to all the smaller climbing frames
  • Adjusted the animation of the Sand Cat adults and juvenile entering the burrow
  • Adjusted the animation of the Fennec Fox juvenile exiting the burrow
  • Adjusted the animation of the Sand Cat adults while drinking from a lake
  • Adjusted Dromedary Camel idle animation
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the Somali Wild Ass from using the Water Jet Rock
  • Added audio to Dama Gazelle while using Scarecrow Feeder enrichment
  • Fixed a bug where the Black Rhinoceros Female was getting stuck on the spot
• Habitats
  • Fixed a bug that caused animals to be marked as escaped while they are inside a habitat.
• Scenery
  • Fixed a bug where scenery items looked low quality close to the camera
• Stability
  • Fixed various crashes improving game stability

Hayo Zookeepers!

It's time to break out the sun cream, put on your sunglasses, find a shady spot, and drink plenty of water, because the Planet Zoo: Arid Animal pack is out now! There's plenty of time to grab it on Steam while free Update 1.14 downloads.

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It's time to welcome 8 new animal friends to your zoos that are all especially adapted to life in harsh arid climates: the hardy Dromedary Camel, the elegant Addax and Dama Gazelle, the prickly African Crested Porcupine, the shy and elusive Sand Cat, the sturdy Black Rhino, and the striped Somali Wild Ass. Rounding out the cast is the pack's Exhibit animal: the sleek and rattling Desert Horned Viper.

The Arid Animal Pack is a celebration of the fauna living in the arid lands, with 8 impressive animals that all have ways to overcome the hardships of the heat.



Alongside these new creatures you'll be able to put your zoo management skills to the test in a new Career Scenario set in the Middle East. Socialite turned conservationist Tiffany Summers is trying to build a new zoo, but she needs your help making sure things run as smoothly as possible. Let's make sure the zoo is ready for the big party to celebrate its opening! Expect several animals from the Arid Animal Pack to show up in this new narrative scenario, so this is the perfect way to learn how to best take care of these wonderful creatures.



Free Update 1.14 brings several new and exciting features to Planet Zoo, including Staff Flexicolour options for your zoo staff! With this new feature you'll be able to customise the colours of your staff's uniforms, so they'll always look their very best. You can create custom colour schemes for your favourite members of staff through their individual info panel, or select different colourways for each staff type through the Staff Overview screen. The choice is yours!

Also coming in the free update are new spitting behaviours for your Bactrian Camels, Llamas, and the new Dromedary Camel introduced in this pack! Guests might be in for a surprise if they get too close to the animals' habitats, but luckily it won't have a negative impact on your guests' happiness.

Last, but certainly not least, we want to highlight both of our new camera modes, the Scenic Mode and the Cinematic Route Editor. Both these features will let you create amazing looking vista shots and cinematic videos of your Zoos! The Scenic Mode lets you record footage from one vantage point and allows you to further customise this with pre-defined camera behaviours such as spin, ellipse, zoom, spiral in and spiral out. The Cinematic Route Editor is a more intricate tool that will allow you to create animated routes of your zoos by giving you the opportunity to manually add key frames to areas of your choice. These key frames can all be connected or cut separately, still moving through a sequence to create a unique and defined path for the camera to transition through. Each key frame you add can also be individually customised and there are also route settings available, so definitely give it a go and play around with it! We're looking forward to seeing how you use this new tool, Zookeepers!

Read more about Free Update 1.14 here.

You can also enjoy these stunning new animals and unleash your building creativity with 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! Enjoy the Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack as well as Update 1.14, no matter what device you're on!

Check out the full Update Notes below for all you need to know about various bug fixes, improvements, and changes in Update 1.14! Don't forget to also join us for a launch livestream later today, on Twitch or YouTube, at 17:00 BST.

Now let's take a look at the Update Notes:

Planet Zoo - 1.14.0 Update Notes

This update contains bug fixes, updates and some new content.

New Content - Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack

• NEW - Animals
  • New animals in the Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack:
    • Dromedary Camel
    • Addax
    • Dama Gazelle
    • African Crested Porcupine
    • Sand Cat
    • Black Rhinoceros
    • Somali Wild Ass
    • Desert Horned Viper
• NEW - Career Scenario 
  • Tiffany's paradise park is a new, up and coming, tourist destination; proudly showcasing Saudi Arabia’s beauty and wildlife through the use of modern education, retail and dining.... That is, if you and Tiffany are up to the challenge!
• NEW - Scenery Pieces
  • Arid Animal Sign Addax
  • Arid Animal Sign Crested Porcupine
  • Arid Animal Sign Black Rhinoceros
  • Arid Animal Sign Dromedary Camel
  • Arid Animal Sign Dama Gazelle 01
  • Arid Animal Sign Dama Gazelle 02
  • Arid Animal Sign Sand Cat
  • Arid Animal Sign Somali Wild Ass
  • Reward Statue Dromedary Camel Stone
  • Reward Statue Dromedary Camel Bronze
  • Reward Statue Dromedary Camel Silver
  • Reward Statue Dromedary Camel Gold

• NEW - Avatar Costume 
  • Dromedary Camel Hat and Avatar costume

New Content - Free Update 1.14.0

• NEW - Staff Flexi colour
  • Staff members' uniform colours can now be customised on an individual or staff type level
  • Select a staff member to apply flexicolour to all four channels of their uniform to make them stand out from their peers
  • Go to the new Zoo → Staff → Staff Uniforms tab in the zoo management UI to set and change uniform colours for an entire staff type
• NEW - New animal behaviour: Spitting at guests 
  • All camelids, that is, Bactrian Camels, Llamas, and Dromedary Camels, now have a chance to perform a spitting interaction with guests
  • If guests are visible and near to the animal, the interaction becomes available. Keep barriers high or block the view to keep your guests safe
  • Guests will not be harmed by this interaction but will leave the habitat to look at something more friendly
• NEW - Scenic Camera Mode 
  • A new camera mode is available from the camera modes widget in the bottom right of the HUD
  • Place the camera location anywhere in the world by clicking. Vertical position can be adjusted holding the standard vertical height key (Default: Shift)
  • Camera behaviour can be adjusted from the selection panel in the bottom right while in Scenic Camera Mode: select between spin, ellipsis, spiral in, spiral out, and adjust speed to get the perfect view
• NEW - Cinematic Route Editor 
  • Create detailed videos with the Cinematic Route Editor, available in the camera modes widget in the bottom right of the HUD
  • Routes are calculated along keyframes, which are positions you set for your camera to create a route using as many or few as you like
  • Any keyframe can be individually moved and customised with different settings such as
    • Using the camera target instead of the camera to calculate the route, which create wide curves around the view
    • Jumping to the next keyframe, which creates cinematic cuts between parts of a route
    • Editing the speed of the route on the segments around individual keyframes
  • Routes are saved for each zoo, meaning they can be shared and viewed with your builds on the steam workshop when uploading a zoo
• NEW - Foliage
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush Dry 01
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush Dry 02
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush Dry 03
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush 04
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush 05
  • Nitraria Retusa Bush 06
  • Creosote Bush Dry 01
  • Creosote Bush Dry 02
  • Creosote Bush Dry 03
  • Creosote Bush 04
  • Creosote Bush 05
  • Creosote Bush 06
• NEW - Music Tracks
  • Listen to the soothing sounds of the sands around your zoo with 4 new music tracks accessible through the in game speakers:
    
    • Saharan Sands
    • Red Sea Hills
    • Tuwaiq Canyons
    • Al-Dahna Caravan

General Bug Fixes and Improvements

• Animals
  • Added Taiga Biome icon missing on the Polar Bear's TV screen display
  • Added Grassland Biome icon missing on Red River Hog's Education Board
  • Added Aquatic Biome icon missing on Asian Water Monitor's Education Board
  • Fixed Planco and scientific names being inverted on the TV screen display for the Red Deer, Striped Skunk, Egyptian Fruit Bat
  • Fixed incorrect Planco names on the Eurasian Lynx's Education Boards
  • Changed 'North America' to 'Central America' in Colombian White-Faced Capuchin Monkey's Zoopedia page
  • Added Central America tag to California Sea Lion's Zoopedia page
  • Fixed a bug preventing Dall Sheep from escaping while using a Goat Climbing Mountain too close to the habitat barrier
  • Fixed a bug preventing Japanese Macaque from using Hot Water taps in shallow water
  • Fixed a bug preventing Lar Gibbon from sliding for a moment after climbing off from Tangled Liana
  • Added a sound when any member of the Nine-Banded Armadillo family dies due to predation
  • Polished Cougar bite animation
  • Polished Juvenile West African Lion sleeping animation
  • Fixed both Chinese Pangolin male and female animations when using the Artificial Termite Mound
  • Fixed Lar Gibbon Conservation Status on Education Board to match the Conservation Status in Zoopedia
  • Chinese Pangolins and Fennec Foxes can now use the Small Burrow
• Game Modes
  • Balanced the animal market in Challenge Mode to take into account the amount of DLCs owned by players
  • Updated Desert South America Sculpted opening times to 05.00-23.00 and ticket prices set to 3.00 to match other maps in both Franchise and Challenge modes
• Guests
  • Fixed a bug where the guests were fleeing from non-escaped animals
• Scenario
  • Fixed a bug blocking players from completing Career Scenario 'The Ape-renticeship' due to Animal Market being empty
  • In 'Goodwin House' scenario, fixed a bug preventing the Hippopotamus from being stuck while swimming
  • Fixed a rare bug in 'Myers Castle' scenario preventing the 'Keep Crime rate Low' objective being completed due to the wrong inspector type being spawned
  • Fixed a rare bug in the Purmamarca Educational Reserve scenario preventing both the objectives 'Build an Animal trade centre' and 'Build a research centre' from being completed by players
• Habitats
  • Herb Scent Marker Enrichment is now accessible from multiple sides
• Scenery
  • Added flexicolour tag to several base game assets
• Facilities
  • Fixed Twilight Pack Blueprints being gated by non-Twilight mechanic research
    
  • Fixed a bug preventing players to place specific habitat blueprints due to a dynamic enrichment being placed too close
    
• Staff
  • Fixed a bug preventing Keepers from teleporting outside of the habitat
  • Fixed a bug where staff members end up stuck
• UI
  • Fixed a bug impacting font sizes in Japanese, Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese
• Stability
  • Fixed a crash when players select a European Fallow Deer and click on the "Filter Habitat Items by Species" button in the Enrichment tab
  • Fixed a rare crash when players start editing climbable objects in a habitat
  • Fixed various save loading crashes



Hayo Zookeepers!

Things are heating up in Planet Zoo with the new Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack, coming to a Steam Store near you on 20 June alongside Free Update 1.14!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Under the harsh heat of the desert, life still arises and persists. Look out over the dunes and through the sands to discover some miraculous creatures who have adapted to the difficult conditions of these scorching lands. 

Be on the lookout for a Dromedary Camel wandering across the desert, while the elegant Addax and Dama Gazelle hunt for edible shrubs, grasses and leaves to snack on. Peer a little closer to the ground and you might catch a glimpse of the prickly African Crested Porcupine, or the shy and elusive Sand Cat. The Black Rhino can also be found munching on leafy plants, branches and fruit, while the well-adapted Somali Wild Ass rests in the shade to get some refuge from the scorching sun. Rounding out the cast is the sleek and impressive Desert Horned Viper, our Exhibit animal for this pack.

The Arid Animal Pack is a celebration of the fauna living in the arid lands, with 8 impressive animals that all have ways to overcome the hardships of the heat.


The story of socialite turned conservationist Tiffany Summers continues in a ✨brand new narrative scenario✨ included in the DLC. You'll be joining Tiffany in her next adventure: building a zoo in the Middle East and throwing a big party for when it officially opens, celebrating all the wonderful animals you've taken care of throughout her journey. You can expect several animals from the Arid Animal Pack to show up in this new narrative scenario.


The Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack will be available for purchase for £7.99 ($9.99, 9.99€) on Steam from 20 June. If you want to be notified when the game is available, then head on over to Steam and wishlist it now! Please remember that you'll only be able to enjoy the Planet Zoo: Arid Animal Pack if you already own the base game of Planet Zoo.

Head over to our social media in the run-up to the release for the return of Zookeeper Steve! This time he's off on another research trip and has set up camp in an arid landscape to observe the animals living there. He'll need your help to document them all, so keep an eye out for the animal reveals as they come by his hidey-hole. You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Also, if you missed our ✨special livestream✨ yesterday you can check it out here.

Don't forget to also join our launch celebration livestream on 20 June, where we'll be checking out the Arid Animal Pack in even greater detail, and check in with all the different animals. We're kicking things off at 5pm BST on 20 June on both Twitch and Youtube, and we'll be joined by some friends from the Planet Zoo dev team. See you there!

We look forward to exploring with you and Zookeeper Steve! Tell us what you're more excited for below 

Hayo Zookeepers! 

Summer is fast approaching, and alongside the longer days and warmer nights, it's also bringing with it a new Planet Zoo update! Free update 1.14 will be making its way to you on 20 June - keep reading to find out exactly what's coming your way!

Staff Flexicolour
New season, new wardrobe! With the addition of Staff Flexicolour options for your Zoos, you'll be able to customise the colour combinations of your staff's uniforms, allowing for a whole new range of possibilities. These options will allow you to create custom colour schemes for your favourite members of staff through their individual info panel, or select different colourways for each staff type through the Staff Overview screen so you can get an at-a-glance overview of where they are in your zoo. The decision is yours! 



Spitting Behaviours
Guests might be in for a surprise next time they're a little too close to your habitats...some animals will now exhibit spitting at guests as a new behaviour! They'll be able to spit through some of the fences, and you might even be able to spot them attempting to spit through the glass walls of their habitats (eye emoji) Both the Bactrian Camel and Llama are capable of spitting at your guests in-game, so you'll want to keep an eye out to spot this behaviour in-action. Luckily, guests who experience spitting behaviours first-hand won't have their happiness impacted - how understanding! 

Scenic Camera Mode
Lights, camera, action! With the new Scenic Camera Mode, you'll be able to create smooth vista shots throughout your Zoos. 

Just place the camera in your desired location and select from a few predefined camera behaviours like spin, ellipse, spiral in, spiral out, then further adjust the zoom and movement speed of the camera to experience cinematic views of just parts of your zoo or your whole zoo if you'd like!

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Cinematic Route Editor
That's not all, for our nifty Planet Zoo community who love creating more intricate and compelling videos and views of your park, we've added a new Cinematic Route Editor! This tool will put you into digital animation mode, allowing you to add specific key frames to any area of your park that can all be connected or separated in sequence to create a unique and defined path for the camera to transition through.

You can add as many key frames as you like and each key frame can be customised by changing camera position, rotation, focus, zoom or cutting directly to the next key frame. There are also some route settings you can add once you've created your key frame animation that include: hiding the UI whilst your route is being played, looping the route or changing the speed of the animation as a whole. It's a truly dynamic way to show off all your hard work to the world, so make sure you have a play around with it! 



You will be able to access both these new modes in the Camera Modes button on your UI and routes you have created will also be unique to the space you initially created them in. We can't wait to see what you do with these new tools, Zookeepers! 👀

As always, these exciting new features will come alongside a range of fixes and quality-of-life improvements, which you can read in the patch notes after release.

There's definitely more news coming for you soon, so keep your eyes peeled! Make sure to join us later today for a ✨special livestream✨ where we'll be taking a closer look at everything coming your way in free Update 1.14. Catch us on Twitch and Youtube at 17:00 BST - see you there!