Zoo Tycoon 2 is a video game in which the player may create and operate a zoo by managing its finances, employees and animal exhibits. The goal is to become a "zoo tycoon". Originally released for Windows, Zoo Tycoon 2 is now available for Windows Mobile, PDA, Mac OS X and Nintendo DS. It is the sequel of the 2001 game Zoo Tycoon.
Gameplay
There are a number of
gameplay modes in the game, and each (with the exception of
Freeform) has differing limitations. A Freeform game in
Zoo Tycoon 2 allows you to create the zoo of your choice, the only restrictions being space, animals and objects. The player's money supply is unlimited, and all items are available from the beginning of the game (except those that can only be unlocked in Scenario and Challenge games). Freeform games begin with an empty zoo, to which the player adds animal exhibits and guest facilities (such as restaurants and bathrooms), hiring employees to staff and maintain them. The player chooses a plot of land for their zoo to be built upon at the start of a new Freeform game, and each plot of land represents a different
biome (
alpine,
boreal forest,
desert,
grassland,
savannah,
scrubland,
temperate forest,
tropical rainforest,
tundra,
wetlands). Each plot of land is also a different size (large, small or medium). The player must accommodate their animals with spacious
enclosures, adequate food and water, animal enrichment objects (toys or items that otherwise encourage the animals to use their
natural abilities and behaviors), shelters for them to sleep or gain privacy in, which can be found under zookeeper recommendations, and environments that suit them (for example,
tigers are best suited to rainforest environments, and
lions to savanna ones). The player must also provide for the guests, which is done by placing food and drink stands, bathrooms, picnic areas, seating, trash and recycling bins and playgrounds around the zoo. The player can create a range of elevated and lowered terrain types, including
hills,
valleys,
cliffs and
ditches. In addition to Freeform mode, there is also a Campaign mode in which the player chooses a campaign to play through and is placed in the shoes of an average zoo owner and is assigned different goals to complete; these goals may include having to breed
tapirs, train
dolphins, rescuing abused animals and more. As well, there is a Challenge mode in which the player has a limited amount of money (although the player can choose their starting amount) with which goals must be completed.
Animals
Zoo Tycoon 2 content
There are a total of 30 species of animals available in original version.
Main
African Elephant (Loxodonta africana) - Savannah
American Beaver (Castor canadensis) - Wetlands
Bengal Tiger (Panthera tigris) - Tropical Rainforest
Black Rhinoceros (Diceros bicomis) - Savannah
Cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) - Savannah
Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) - Tropical Rainforest
Common Peafowl (Pavo cristatus) - Temperate Forest
Common Zebra (Equus burchelli boehmi) - Savannah
Dromedary Camel (Camelus dromedarius) - Desert
Emperor Penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) - Tundra
Gemsbok (Oryx gazella) - Scrub
Giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) - Temperate Forest
Greater Flamingo (Phoenicopterus ruber) - Wetlands
Grizzly Bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) - Boreal Forest
Hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius) - Wetlands
Ibex (Capra ibex) - Alpine
Jaguar (Panthera onca) - Tropical Rainforest
Lion (Panthera leo) - Savannah
Moose (Alces alces americana) - Boreal Forest
Mountain Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla beringei) - Tropical Rainforest
Nile Crocodile (Crocodylus niloticus) - Wetlands
Okapi (Okapia johnstoni) - Tropical Rainforest
Ostrich (Struthio camelus australus) - Savannah
Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus) - Tundra
Red Kangaroo (Macropus rufus) - Scrub
Red Panda (Ailurus fulgens) - Temperate Forest
Reticulated Giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) - Savannah
Ring-tailed Lemur (Lemur catta) - Tropical Rainforest
Snow Leopard (Uncia uncia) - Alpine
Thomson's Gazelle (Gazella thomsonii) Savannah
Downloadable content
Addax (Addax nasomaculatus) - Desert
Asian Elephant (Elephas maximus) - Scrub
Black Leopard (Panthera pardus) - Tropical Rainforest
Musk Ox (Ovibos moschatus) - Tundra
Other
Shetland pony - There is a building called "Shetland Pony walk", in which visitors can ride on the animal and walk around.
Squirrel - Appears walking through the zoo. Has no information, and can not be controlled. At one point, he disappears. There are also other non-controllable animals that roam the zoo in different biomes.
Tarantula - One of the animals inside the insect house building.
Beetle - Another animal from the insect house.
Scorpion - A third animal from the insect house.
Chameleon - An animal from the reptile house building.
Cobra - Also appears inside the reptile house.
Turtle - Once again inside the reptile house.
Expansion packs
Endangered Species
In October 2005,
Microsoft released the
Zoo Tycoon 2: Endangered Species expansion pack. This expansion pack adds more rare animals, including the
komodo dragon,
scimitar-horned oryx, and
orangutan, as well as a number of new forms of transportation, including sky trams, jeep tours and elevated paths. The expansion also has a feature called "variant skins", which means that when the player adopts an animal, it may look different from normal members of its species (such as a
White Bengal tiger and
King Cheetah).
African Adventure
Zoo Tycoon 2: African Adventure, released May 2006, adds various new African animals such as the
bongo,
secretary bird,
Ratel and the
meerkat, allows the player to drive through exhibits with African-themed jeep tours to get closer to them. The expansion pack also includes new maps based on well-known African locations, as well as new desert-themed buildings and lizard live food, and a new set of challenges and campaigns. The Jeep vehicle tours originally included in
Endangered Species are featured in this expansion, with the addition of the new
Jeep Liberty.
Dino Danger Pack (premium download)
The
Dino Danger Pack was released at the end of July 2006. The pack could only be downloaded from the
Zoo Tycoon website via credit card. It added four new animals to the game,
Tyrannosaurus,
Triceratops,
Carnotaurus, and
Styracosaurus, as well as new objects to be used for them and a campaign game. The
Dino Danger Pack could be purchased for US$4.99 and downloaded at
Zoo Tycoon premium downloads. Since the release of
, which includes more updated versions of all of the animals included in the pack,
Dino Danger was taken offline from the
Zoo Tycoon website and can no longer be downloaded from zootycoon.com however other sites still offer this pack.
Zookeeper Collection
The
Zookeeper Collection was released on October 17, 2006. Rather than being an expansion, it's more of a large standalone pack featuring the
and
expansions, as well as all animals and content from
Zoo Tycoon 2. It includes some
features, such as the new mode of biome layout.
Marine Mania
Released on October 17, 2006,
Zoo Tycoon 2: Marine Mania features 20 new aquatic animals, new marine options, marine shows and several other brand new gaming features. The expansion also includes marine plants, the ability to build tanks, animal shows, minigames to teach some of your marine animals behaviors,and 4 new
aquatic biomes (
reef,
coastal,
pelagic,and
benthic), and new scenarios and challenges. Changes have been made to the original method of biome layout allowing the ability to turn off rocks , flowers and/or trees. New animals range from the giant Whale Sharks to the tiny Rockhopper Penguins.
Extinct Animals
Zoo Tycoon 2: Extinct Animals, was released on October 17, 2007. It is the largest and latest expansion in the
Zoo Tycoon series, with 34 adoptable animals, plus two bonus animals.
You also can find fossils or get staff to find them for you, stop rampaging Dinosaurs, put together the fossils and even create a normal or a "Super" extinct animal in an extinct research lab.
Ultimate Collection
Zoo Tycoon 2: Ultimate Collection contains the original game, all four official expansions and a new menu theme exclusive to it, similar to Zoo Tycoon: Complete Collection. This title was released on September 30, 2008. Some users have reported disk problems in December 2008, whereby the third disk was the same as the second one. Microsoft sent free disk replacements at their support site.
System requirements
Microsoft Windows 98SE or higher
PC with 733 MHz equivalent or higher processor
256 MB of system RAM*
900 MB available hard disk space
32x speed or faster CD-ROM drive
16 MB 3D video card required
DirectX 9.0 or later
Sound card, speakers or headphones required for audio
A mouse or compatible pointing device
On 64-bit operating systems, the base game will install but not run if the system has 4 GB or more of system RAM.
Reception
The release of
Zoo Tycoon 2 in 2004 received mixed views. Many parents played the game with their children, which resulted in the numerous awards for the sequel. Although the game is aimed at children and teenagers, the educational side of the game was the rise to popularity. However, the numerous bugs for the sequel were a major turning point. Reviews on sites like
GameSpot and
IGN complain of poor performance of lower-res computers, unimpressive sound system and acceptable graphics.
Competition
Since the release of
Zoo Tycoon in 2001, many other companies have imitated the gameplay, and the concept of running a zoo. The followers since include
RollerCoaster Tycoon 3: Wild!,
World of Zoo,
Wildlife Park 2, its expansion packs
Crazy Zoo and
Marine World,
Zoo Empire and its platinum pack
Marine Park Empire. All of these have different gameplay and content, but all have the same basic concept.
However, Zoo Tycoon seems to have become more popular and better known. RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 has recently stopped producing expansion packs, and Zoo Empire was a relative failure, while the Zoo Tycoon franchise has continued to expand due to user creation of downloads since it first came out. Thanks to this The franchise is still expanding, with more content coming out by users even with the game's producer, Blue fang, stopping production of the game. The largest competition at the moment is Deep Silver's Wildlife Park 2, originated in Germany, which has produced two expansions in two years.
Third-party creations
The game files can be edited and expanded using no more than a file compression software and a simple text editor. This lead to the creation of new animals and objects for
Zoo Tycoon 2. There have been numerous websites created for this purpose and many "designers" will upload the animals or objects for download. Unlike
Zoo Tycoon, where an official program designed to help users create animals,
Zoo Tycoon 2 has no such program. Object and animal "skins" can be made with a
DDS converter and a
paint program, whilst object and animal models can be changed with
Blender or other
NIF program. The animal model files in
,
, and
have been compressed into protected, uneditable files, precluding any model editing for marine and extinct animals. Certain groups have editable versions of Marine Mania models as the original beta version of the game use nif files.
Shortly before the release of , a method for editing files was found. This Zoo Tycoon 2 "designing" allowed a larger variety of animals to be made. It is now possible for a player to create complete unofficial expansion packs, known as User Made Expansions.
Some third party groups will release a large pack of user created content, these are commonly called UXP's, or User Expansion Packs. One of the most famous is Radical Remake by a designing group named Aurora Designs (See User-made expansion packs).
References
External links
Zoo Tycoon 2
Category:2004 video games
Category:Blue Fang Games
Category:Games for Windows certified games
Category:Interactive Achievement Award winners
Category:Mac OS X games
Category:Microsoft games
Category:Mobile phone games
Category:Video game sequels
Category:Video games with expansion packs
Category:Windows games
Category:Zoo Tycoon
