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Is the Zoo Tycoon 2 Community Dead?
Topic Started: Jun 2 2018, 02:42 PM (2,820 Views)
HENDRIX
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-retired-

Megraptor
Jun 19 2018, 06:58 PM
Why don't you think it looks like a viable alternative? And it's no longer on hiatus, as they canceled their other project.
Short answer: Is it being developed by a professional studio? Long answer: Plenty of reasons. First of all, the graphics - last time I checked, seemed to be a step back from vanilla ZT2. Of course, you can pull off stylized and painty looks (look at Parkasaurus for a successful example), but many of the ZM animals were just plain goofy and odd-looking for no good reason. Worse, the behaviors shown were primitive. The whole thing looked like people fiddling around in Unity for a few weeks. Essentially the team fell victim to the great indie game problem: content first, coding & AI second. That's not how you make zoo games great again.

The fact that they abandoned projectQ is not exactly good news in my eyes, because that one was supposed to be a proof of concept "if we can develop a simple game, we can do a big one"-thing. So the decision to stop with projectQ does not shed a good light on their team's power of endurance and/or skills. Gotta hand it to them, ZM still seems much more viable than Mesozoica ever was, though...
Edited by HENDRIX, Jun 19 2018, 07:22 PM.
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Harlequinz eg0
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Community ain't really gonna fully die IMO since there hasn't been a big zoo game that is decent since zoo tycoon 2. Modding community is much smaller though since new people have a bigger barrier to entry than before in terms of skills required to make stuff of the modern expected quality. Lot of us veterans are around but really busy with real life. Been working on CC again last few days so it's not like I've retired, just less time.
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magpiealamode
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No good hero is a one-trick phony.

Honestly I think having less time is the biggest reason as to why we don't have the same amount of designers as we once did. Most of us are growing up... who here is going to say they have nothing more important that ZT2 in their lives? Personally, I would enjoy learning how to create quality mods but I'm a student and I need to earn money on top of that. There's a million other things that take priority in my life before this game, and I think most of us can say the same. Even in my free time I'm usually doing other things. The people who do design can't be expected to always put their back into it, considering that they're getting very little back; they see to only so for their own enjoyment and as a courtesy, not a service, to us. If their standards aren't pushing the ceiling there's no reason to ask them to try harder. Now if we could find a way to make money from ZT2 I guarantee you the amount of quality designs would increase a hundredfold but... that's never going to happen...
However I do mess around with the game from time to time and I recently started looking into the possibility of creating new maps (though I haven't found many resources for this, I've mostly just been looking at the game itself. So if you know anything message me :P ) Hence we still have casual designers. Honestly I'd see it as an auxiliary fuel reserve for the community. Things aren't going full throttle anymore, but we're still moving and we will be for a long time.
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Megraptor
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Keep in mind, there is no legal way to get ZT2 anymore. You have to find a disc on eBay, find your old copy if you had one, or torrent it. That's another benefit to Steam- it's there and easily accessed. That could be a HUGE reason this community is "dying"- there are only a few new people, ones who are brave enough and have the knowledge to torrent or the lucky ones who have a CD laying around.

Also, Zoo Manager is in the early development stage, and those criticism feel rather harsh for a game that is just beginning. Behaviors and graphics can completely change in development or even be updated as the game goes on- heck ZT2 added more behaviors later on even.

Perhaps they abandoned their other game because most people contacting them wanted to know about Zoo Manager. There is a demand for a new zoo game, but no one has made it yet. Who knows why, but they are the only ones trying to fill the "modern animal park" niche.

The only way that they can improve and develop a game that you and the community here wants is by communicating with them, not disparaging them.
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Makaio
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Megraptor
Jun 20 2018, 04:13 PM
Keep in mind, there is no legal way to get ZT2 anymore. You have to find a disc on eBay, find your old copy if you had one, or torrent it. That's another benefit to Steam- it's there and easily accessed. That could be a HUGE reason this community is "dying"- there are only a few new people, ones who are brave enough and have the knowledge to torrent or the lucky ones who have a CD laying around.
It's actually available on Amazon as a digital download:

https://www.amazon.com/Zoo-Tycoon-Ultimate-Collection-Download/dp/B075QNZ1HM/

Although it certainly would be quite beneficial if they added it to Steam, as well.
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HENDRIX
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-retired-

Megraptor
Jun 20 2018, 04:13 PM
Also, Zoo Manager is in the early development stage, and those criticism feel rather harsh for a game that is just beginning. Behaviors and graphics can completely change in development or even be updated as the game goes on- heck ZT2 added more behaviors later on even.
Sure it is harsh, but that's reality. Is the game getting any better from not mentioning the elephant in the room? Flaws have to be recognized and talked about, only then can you improve.
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Ecnd
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Ecnd

This is a topic that would interest me very much to leave my opinion, I have read a good amount of comments and although they vary in some ways many coincide in "the community is falling for lack of designers"

First of all I think that the community of zt2 was never completely stable, it was always like a kind of zigzag, sometimes being very high and sometimes desolate, although the numbers nowadays are more than low

Regarding the issue of quantity, I think it is much more important quality or rather the participation of users, the ZT2 community is probably one of the cleanest and organized in comparison of the knowledge of it, and probably the time e dedication to the same community that transform it into what it is, either because of pride or a convoluted need to call attention (Believe it or not this happens because at the beginning it did too xD) people showed their creations, and they inspired others to do the same and create their own version, either S & T or design.

Personally I think that the pillar of the community is the relationship "creator-user", the creators made a good content and people liked to see it. However, for this to be maintained, the creator-user relationship would have to be exchanged, many users refrained from sharing content and only cared about the downloads, which I do not consider bad but also not good, however I emphasize that the community would move twice as much. of fast if the creators are as much as users and viciversa.

To do this is not only to find the right users, because the truth is not only the user's time itself, but also the user's motivation, it is true that we should not treat users like babies, but for a user becomes a creator should be put a motivation, If we want to give an important value of "Give and receive" the best way is the reward

As the best form of possible reward that is healthy and clean that can be given in this community is self-satisfaction, which can be achieved by teaching a person to do something, that person replicates your techniques and to achieve the same realizes that he has done something fabulous.

Another way to achieve self-satisfaction would be with contests, for many contests is the opportunity to win something, although it is something imaginary to win is to win, although winning is not the most important thing is that people recognize tullo as something good is great .

Now going back to the question of why we are and trying to interpret what I'm trying to say, it's really not the lack of designers that caused this, but the lack of motivation from the community, design is one of the pillars, but not I think it's the main one

the ZT2 community from which I came ZooHispania was a really quality community, friendly and in its active moment, I arrived at the end of 2013 when the forum began to rearm and in its decline of its golden age, now the community is almost dead complete and I came here I decided to try to revive her so to speak, because I owe a lot, because personally it was a tough time for me, my parents had separated, I left school neither had friends, even so I found a feeling of friendship with the users What I liked in common, the downloads for me were not the most important (in fact most of the zt2 downloads were obtained from the ZTABC and AD page), I was there to have fun.

Although design is important, it is not everything, a community that is based on one thing is not really all for it, the lack of designers is a problem because it is one of the main pyramids, that is why I am here to start designing and becoming one. and if there is one thing that I guarantee is that if the ZT2 community had not given me the happiness that the real world could not give me, I guarantee you that I would not even be commenting on this.


Finally congratulations to the one who has read all this xD
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JohnVM
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I'm going to say this more bluntly than before - just because some individuals' interest in the game has lost doesn't mean the entire community is dying. The Zoo Tycoon community is not 'dying' any more than it was ten years ago. It's on a low ebb - just like it was after ZT2 was first released, and when EA came out, and before Caldera opened, and so forth.

It's perfectly okay to say that you don't like Zoo Tycoon anymore, that you've lost interest in it, that you don't enjoy the game - that's valid, and for most people, our interests change and mature as we age. Your personal sentiments are valid. What is important to remember though, is just because your interests changed does not alter the state of the interest or how others feel about it.

SilesianTomcat, Martin 1990, Penguinman, Mikaboshi, Kangorilaphant, Octavio, Dannybob, King Hoopla... they all left the community, some up to ten years ago. Most of you probably have no idea who I'm talking about, but some of these people were as huge then as Hendrix has been for the last five years. Some of them were good friends of mine. They moved on from the fandom, and then the unthinkable happened - the world didn't end, the wheels kept turning, and new people who were still passionate about the game stepped in and filled that void. The Zoo Tycoon fandom, as it turns out, did not die there.

So maybe you're not happy here anymore - and that's okay. I've not been happy in the fandom lately myself and that's part of why I drew back my involvement. That didn't mean the game and fandom collapsed because John wasn't around to make another blue stokesosaurus - because a ton more people came in who had no idea this game existed, and enjoyed it, and wanted to do something more for it, and found other people who enjoyed it. And some of the people who showed up when I became less active five years ago have already gone through their motions and moved on, too - and more new people filled the void. There are always going to be kids discovering this game for the first time and older kids rediscovering it through nostalgia.

So, it's okay if your time in the community is done and over, but that maybe doesn't mean the whole rest of the world has to give up, too.
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HENDRIX
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-retired-

All correct - the community is more than the sum of its members. People come and people go. The thing is, as the game is getting older, fewer and fewer new people are going to be introduced to the game. For roughly 5 years now, there hasn't been an equilibrium state in the community; the gradual loss has outweighed the sparse influx. It is undeniably a downhill spiral, it may be a slow one, but essentially it is only a matter of terminology when you call the state "dying".
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Posted Image Azrael
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I know that we're talking about the community here, specifically revolved around Zoo Tycoon 2 at that, but has anyone thought of making the site's focus more than just ZT2?

There might not be other zoo building simulators on the market, but there are some "park builders" or management games that we could try to branch into and maybe bring ZT2 to more people's attention?
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magpiealamode
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No good hero is a one-trick phony.

Well one thing I've noticed is this site is home to a semi-active paleontology section. I've always found that interesting. Some days it's more active than others, and sometimes it hosts somewhat stressful discussions but whenever there's a big paleontological discovery it's one of the first places I check because there's always someone to weigh in. A few members I've actually never seen posting outside of paleontology conversations, I highly doubt they play ZT2.

But beyond just that, we have at least some appeal beyond the game. After all, ZT2 is directly related to wildlife. It only follows that most of the community here is interested in animals in some way. Now practically, I'm not sure how this relates to site activity. But Kayla brought it up so I figured I'd point out that in some ways our site already focuses on more than ZT2.
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Hundezahn
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As someone who just stumbled upon this community, I'd like to add a perspective:
While I played ZT 1 & 2 since their release, I just now had the idea to google "Zoo Tycoon 2 mods" and expected nothing, because the game is so old and mods & co. tend to get lost. Preserving stuff on the internet needs effort.
I was delighted to find the ZT2 Download Library Wiki and astonished that all those download links still worked. But I also had to register in 5? 6? 99? different seemingly dead forums, which all house different projects.
Driven by dissatisfaction with some remakes, I started to play around with them. Went looking for tutorials to find, again, they're pretty scattered around several platforms. I'm old and lazy and almost wanted to stop looking into designing because I don't really want to unravel the mysteries of "where IS the community at".
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Burns
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King of Lemurs

You know despite the usual lack of people, I found this as a sign of hope today.

Posted Image

I haven't seen this many people online in a while.
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Denomon3144
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Pick a god and pray!

Azrael
Jun 22 2018, 07:50 AM
I know that we're talking about the community here, specifically revolved around Zoo Tycoon 2 at that, but has anyone thought of making the site's focus more than just ZT2?

There might not be other zoo building simulators on the market, but there are some "park builders" or management games that we could try to branch into and maybe bring ZT2 to more people's attention?
I'm pretty sure expanding its scope is what caused ZTV to ultimately become a ghost town.
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stargatedalek
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I'm not slow! That's just my moe!

Denomon3144
Jun 24 2018, 12:41 PM
Azrael
Jun 22 2018, 07:50 AM
I know that we're talking about the community here, specifically revolved around Zoo Tycoon 2 at that, but has anyone thought of making the site's focus more than just ZT2?

There might not be other zoo building simulators on the market, but there are some "park builders" or management games that we could try to branch into and maybe bring ZT2 to more people's attention?
I'm pretty sure expanding its scope is what caused ZTV to ultimately become a ghost town.
ZTV was a ghost town long before then, expanding its scope is what caused its resurgence to be so brief as it was, not what caused its actual downfall.
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