Frontier Developments has announced on Twitter that Planet Zoo is coming to consoles. What consoles? I don’t know. When? I don’t know that, either.
It’s happening, though! Frontier Developments dropped a teaser that shows a controller sitting on a breakroom coffee table (I think) while something unrelated goes on in the background. That’s it. You now know everything that I know.
That is unless you haven’t played Planet Zoo. Initially released in 2019 as a companion (spin-off?) of 2016’s Planet Coaster, it’s a management sim about building and running your own zoo. The Planet games are all about filling the gap left by games like Roller Coaster Tycoon and Zoo Tycoon. However, I feel they have their own distinct flavor.
What I mean by that is that Planet Zoo feels like it’s more about customization and building your dream zoo than it is about challenging you to keep it profitable and successful. Don’t get me wrong, there’s still some of that. You do need to keep your zoo profitable and successful, but it just feels so easy. Or maybe it’s just easy for me because I grew up on a hearty diet of tycoon games. I can’t tell anymore.
However, to me, it felt more like it gave you a tonne of tools and assets to allow you to customize your habitats at a very granular level. This would have really appealed to young Zoey, but old Zoey doesn’t have the same free time or attention span. I do have to wonder how the UI and all those tools will translate to a controller, but we’ll have to wait and see.
For now, you can grab Planet Zoo on PC. Having spent a few paragraphs talking about it, I think I’m going to reinstall.
