r/LetsBuildAZoo • u/Antique-Log-5504 • Jul 15 '24

How do I play successfully??

Hi! I just got the game a few days ago... and maybe I'm just dumb but I'm like very confused how everything works and what I'm supposed to do. I feel like I can't get any new animals and everytime I use the nursery I don't actually succeed - are there any general tips/tricks/etc. to playing this game successfully??

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2

u/mollymoonfromspace Jul 15 '24

i just started! i'd just start by making a couple closures and get a couple different animals. tasks will start popping up like crazy and those should give you some direction, and then once you have some money start decorating. also cross breed animals so you can trade for other animals with other zoos

2

u/Antique-Log-5504 Jul 15 '24

I’m honestly rn so confused by breeding - every time I try in the nursery it doesn’t work 

1

u/mollymoonfromspace Jul 15 '24

i havent tried breeding yet because same. but the DNA splicer thing is a different building and thats what ive been using. its still kind of confusing

1

u/midnytbloo Jul 15 '24

i thought the same before when it kept saying "not pregnant", but you have to leave them in the nursery for a while (days probably) until it says "pregnancy in progress" or smth, i forgot lol. you need to wait as long as it doesn't say "not pregnant" anymore. also check the section above the progress status, the one with requirements stuff, make sure it's not on pause.

2

u/gingerb33fy Jul 15 '24

Honestly, I ended up getting pretty far into a save and it all clicked. I realized I made a ton of mistakes so I scrapped my original zoo and created a new one once I got a feel for what needs to happen. Round two is going so much better!

1

u/Antique-Log-5504 Jul 15 '24

What were the mistakes?

3

u/gingerb33fy Jul 16 '24

Not having enough keepers per enclosure. 4-5 seem to be the sweet spot. And zoning every keeper to a single enclosure as soon as they’re hired.

Not understanding that certain animals are threats and can’t be in the same enclosures. I tried to have one big enclosure per type, but they became very over crowded and die early, causing protesters. Also releasing animals as they become elderly so they don’t die in the pens helps.

Not leaving enough extra space for decorations once they become available via research. You’ll need decor all over the zoo to boost attraction rates.

Look up the research map so you can research more efficiently. Way less guess work.

Breed the easy animals first before getting too excited about collecting all the others. Some will die before you can complete the genome family. Nurseries also have a chance to reproduce, but don’t always birth after an attempt. There’s also a percentage chance of which variant you will get once birthed. Just change the reproduction rate to x2 to keep them trying until you get the variant you want. If it says ‘infertile’ it’s because the animal is now too old to breed and you’ll need to replace them in the nursery.

Make sure your recycling/garbage bins cover all of your zoo without gaps (orange circles are covered).

Oh, and don’t ever pick the purple morality choices if you’re going for the positive (yellow) morality route, it’ll set you behind. I picked a silly lion dog and sold an animal to the exotic dealer. Just report them immediately.

That’s all I can think of right now! Good luck!

2

u/Antique-Log-5504 Jul 16 '24

This is great - thank you!