Planet Zoo 2 is Frontier’s latest creative management sim and offers a huge menagerie of content where your creativity can run wild.
A direct sequel to 2024’s Planet Zoo Console Edition and a close cousin to Planet Coaster 2, the game delivers what I’ve come to expect from Frontier’s creative management games: a robust tycoon experience, ridiculously huge potential for custom building, and a warm, immersive experience that’s fun to play.
Once again, you’ll build and manage your own zoo (duh!), but there’s more here than just a typical tycoon gameplay loop. You will also focus on animal welfare, conservation and education.
There are two main areas you will play in: zoos and wildlife reserves.
Zoos are what you’d expect: build animal exhibits and arrange them for the visiting public. Wildlife sanctuaries are new to the series and are wild habitats that you can release your animals into from your zoos.
In wildlife reserves, you can explore on foot or by buggy to observe and photograph your animals released into their wild habitats. You can also fully customize your wildlife reserves, using terrain and vegetation editing controls, and you’ll need to design specific biomes to accommodate different species of animals.
Speaking of observing animals, I was amazed by the activities both in the reserves and in the zoos. Each animal responds to the environment they are in and it’s fun to watch them interact with the feeding trays and toys. In the reserve, I spent hours crawling over shy zebras trying to take the perfect group photo, and I was surprised at how engaging it was. However, I haven’t found a way to access this first person photography in current zoos.
When it comes to building your zoos, there are three main game modes available to you.
In campaign mode, you move between a variety of partially pre-made zoos to complete set objectives, the first of which serve as the game’s tutorial.
You don’t have to complete all of a park’s goals at once; you can revisit previous levels (saves) without going through the main menu using the game’s new hub mode, which made me feel like all the zoos were one interconnected organization.
Then there’s the highly customizable sandbox mode in which you start with the classic empty field and start building from scratch, either with unlimited funds in creative mode or as a classic tycoon experience in challenge mode.
You can build a zoo however you like here, the only limit being the complexity meter which, like in Planet Coaster, is the console version’s compromise to ensure good performance. Personally, I didn’t even come close to the limit.
The third mode is Franchise, an online experience where you can create an interconnected network of zoos and trade animals with other players around the world. I haven’t spent much time in this mode yet, but it will feature a vibrant pet market and regular community objectives to feel different from traditional sandbox mode.
Regardless of which mode you’re in, you build zoos essentially the same way. You lay out paths for visitors and staff to walk and connect all your attractions. You build enclosures for large animals and exhibits for small ones (think reptile house) to display to participants. You’ll also need zookeeper cabins and veterinary hospitals for your staff, food stands and toilets for your visitors, and electricity and water filtration systems to keep your zoo running.
As with other Planet games, each “thing” you can build can be highly customized. You have a base shell and you can attach what feels like thousands of possible decor options to it to create something completely custom or a real-life recreation.
You can build off-grid and slice the scenery through other objects, and new in Planet Zoo 2 you can also resize scenery objects, so a rock can be the size of a pebble or a double-decker bus to give you an unparalleled level of customization, at least if you’re willing to learn all the controls.
For players who just want to get something up and running quickly, or who, like me, prefer to focus on management, there are plenty of prefabs you can download to get started. The new terrain brush allows you to quickly fill areas with random, natural-looking vegetation, which is a godsend compared to placing each rock individually.
The hardest time I had with the game was the learning curve, especially its controls. The downside of having so many options is that the UI feels busy and cluttered with lots of nested menus, and I often found it frustrating to “click” on what I wanted. The tutorials help you by highlighting what you need to click, but after that you’re on your own and it can be a real headache until you get used to it.
I tested the mouse and keyboard support, and they work in the PS5 version, which is good.
Although not all of the animals from the previous game are available yet, Planet Zoo 2 now offers aquariums and for the first time you can have fish, turtles and sharks. There are also new aviaries that allow birds to fly fully. I think these long-requested features will entice players of the original to come check out Planet Zoo 2’s new offerings.
Conclusion
Planet Zoo 2 is a great addition to the “Planet” franchise and a must-have for fans of creative management games.
The game offers the extraordinary level of customization I’ve come to expect from Frontier, and the sheer number of additions over its predecessor offer plenty for existing fans and new players alike.
The game will undoubtedly continue to expand over the coming years with updates and DLC, but the core experience alone provides a solid foundation on which to build.
Gn tech
