Zoo Planner

Zoo Planner is a management sim about the small decisions that make a good day out. You draw the footpaths yourself, dragging them across the grass tile by tile, and visitors will only walk where you have put a path and only look at a pen that touches one. Enclosures are dragged out as rectangles and given a biome — savanna grass, jungle leaf litter, arctic snow, desert sand or a reedy wetland — and then filled with fourteen species that each want something slightly different. Zebras want company, penguins want a pool, a panda wants space and something to climb, and an elephant wants all three.

An animal with everything it needs is content, and a content animal pulls a crowd. Unmet needs pop up as a bubble over its head: not enough room, the wrong ground, no water, nobody to talk to, an empty feed trough or nothing to play with. Keepers refill the food and muck out, cleaners sweep up the wrappers that appear wherever you forgot a bin, and a vet looks after anyone who gets poorly. Your visitors have their own list: they get hungry and thirsty, they need a bench, a bin and a toilet, and they go home either delighted or grumpy. That verdict is your reputation, and reputation is what unlocks the rarer animals and the smarter decorations.

A day lasts about two minutes. The gate opens in the morning, the crowd builds through the middle of the day and the zoo closes at dusk, which is when the building is easiest. Along the way a monkey may get over a low fence, a heatwave may make shade and water suddenly matter, a school trip may arrive all at once or the rain may keep everyone at home. Twelve goals walk you from your first path to a five-star zoo, and after that it is a sandbox with a running score. Everything is saved in your browser as you go, so the zoo is still there tomorrow.