Is Zoo Tycoon Ultimate Animal Collection Worth It

Zoo Tycoon: Ultimate Animal Collection Review

Release Date

October 31, 2017.

It'south hard not to smile while feeding or playing with the animals in this game. In fact, the mere ability to run around your zoo every bit you created zookeeper is probably the smartest decision developer Blue Fang Games could have made when making a game like this. Likewise ofttimes these park-edifice games focus on the management overview, forgetting that sometimes players might want to take in their creations from ground level. And what kind of unfeeling monster doesn't like zoos?

If you've never heard of Zoo Tycoon before, it's a series that began on PC in 2001 and it tasked you with building and maintaining a zoo, like to games like Theme Park and the before Tycoon game, Rollercoaster Tycoon. This new game, an enhanced version of 2013's Zoo Tycoon, aims to add together a little more variety and claiming to it by giving y'all objectives and time limits that continue yous on your toes. Fear not, those of you who enjoyed the slower step of the original PC games, because y'all tin still play the aforementioned way y'all did before; concentrating on the edifice and management of the zoo.

New players volition want to leap into the tutorials first, in order to get to know the gameplay mechanics and come across a full general overview of how to manage their zoos. At that place are ten in full, each probably taking around 5 minutes or less and they walk you through everything from building exhibits and adopting animals, to more avant-garde techniques like encouraging convenance and eventually releasing animals into the wild. It even teaches you lot almost wandering around your zoo, either on human foot or by calling in and driving a little buggy; "don't worry almost the visitors," the game explains, "they'll motility out of the manner!" That'due south kind of true, although I'd say it'south closer to existence shoved bated as yous drive through the crowds. It's daft, just it adds to the amuse of the game.

Once you're prepare, the challenges look. These come up in three difficulties, the usual like shooting fish in a barrel, normal and hard; across three divide campaigns that bridge the original game'southward content, plus 2 new locations in South America and Australia. These challenges are timed, giving you a borderline to complete a set up of objectives as you manage your zoo. Sometimes it's but a case of levelling up your zoo, which happens as you ameliorate it via adopting new animals or building new facilities; more hard challenges might ask you lot to foster breeding within a specific species or they simply throw more and more objectives at you, increasing the pressure level as the timer counts down to cypher. Luckily, the difficulty curve is very forgiving, considering this game is clearly geared toward encouraging a more fun experience for all players.

On that annotation of fun, the Sandbox mode is designed to let players loose without boundaries or objectives, every bit it gives you unlimited funds and starts you off at the all-time level yous've accomplished in the challenges. Fifty-fifty if you first at the lowest level, y'all tin still build well beyond that as you lot research new species and larger exhibits. This more relaxed arroyo allows players to just go at their own pace, although don't think it means you lot won't exist cleaning upward the poop (no really, you have to clean upwards the animals' poop yourself) and micromanaging the enclosures. That extreme level of management detail actually reminded me of the start games in The Sims series, wherein yous could never just go out them to take care of themselves for a while. You've all seen the results of disastrous cooking incidents in those games. While the elephants aren't going to burn themselves alive in the kitchen, they'll still use up all the food and water from time to time; and while you can employ people to deal with these things, inevitably you'll find yourself called upon to fix major problems. Sometimes these volition take null to do with the animals; burger confined and other facilities tin suspension down, requiring a fix (although if they break down three times, you'll have to replace them). Very "videogamey", just information technology works in keeping the actor engaged.

This Ultimate Animal Collection may not be a new game, simply enhancing the visuals a bit and adding Southward American and Australian animals and challenge scenarios, simply it does offering a fun and colourful experience nonetheless. The animals are all realistically blithe and the crowds of people interact with the zoo's attractions equally you would look, but there'south a cartoony flair to the visuals that get in a bit more than appealing to look at. When y'all get in shut to feed and interact with the animals, it actually is as sweet as you would want; playing the sensory minigame with a baby monkey is just the best, every bit the picayune guy/gal attempts to mimic your imagined gestures (via various counterpart stick combinations). Kids will love this part of the game. But while information technology does look good and is fun to play, the standard Xbox One version framerate is quite poor at times. I started off in that location, before using the Play Anywhere feature to simply continue my game on the PC. While it may not exist fair to compare the two, my PC is comparable to the Xbox One in terms of power, however it runs Zoo Tycoon with a higher detail level at 60fps flawlessly, instead of the 30fps of the Xbox version, that oftentimes dips beneath that when yous're at ground level.

Building and maintaining exhibits and facilities is incredibly uncomplicated with a controller, so much so that I connected using it on the PC version. It feels similar it was built from the footing up with the controller in mind, especially every bit yous're able to control your keeper directly equally you run around the zoo, taking pictures and interacting with the animals. It just means that anyone can leap in and enjoy Zoo Tycoon, and that returning players have more content to explore in this Ultimate Beast Collection. Information technology'southward rare that a tycoon/management game interests me, but I actually enjoyed this 1. You will also.

Elementary gameplay
Sandbox mode is not bad for everyone
Plenty of extra content

Runs quite poorly on standard Xbox 1
Micromanagement is sometimes a flake much

Basically a 'complete edition' of the original release, Zoo Tycoon: Ultimate Animal Collection adds enough to go along both fans and newcomers happy, providing challenge for those who desire it and a sandbox mode for those wanting a more laid back experience.

Source: https://www.godisageek.com/reviews/zoo-tycoon-ultimate-animal-collection-review/

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