One experience most people will do in their lifetime is a trip to the Zoo. In the UK we don’t have the luxury of seeing some of the wildlife that prowls around in other countries. That leaves two options to survey them in real life: go on a Safari in another country or nip down your local Zoo to see some rare endangered species. If that doesn’t float your boat then it’s a bit of David Attenborough on the telly box. When it comes to video games, there has been a sprinkling of Zoo-related titles over the last few decades. With Zoo Tycoon and Planet Zoo being perhaps the most memorable ones, there is always some wriggle room to bring more across. Let’s Build A Zoo is available on the Xbox family of consoles and also in the Xbox Game Pass catalogue to download and enjoy.

Introduction

I’m a big fan of publisher No More Robots and when I saw Let’s Build A Zoo officially announced for Windows PC back in 2021, my first question was “Is it coming to consoles?”. The answer was yes and that it was coming soon, but there was no concrete date laid out for it. Developed by Springloaded and launched on Xbox back at the tail end of September 2022 after very positive reviews across the board on Steam, I was excited to finally get hands-on almost a year down the line.

Let’s Build A Zoo takes inspiration from games such as Theme Park and Two Point Hospital and puts you in charge of the construction, management and control of your own personal animal empire. It isn’t just your standard cut-and-shut park management sim though. There are many unique features throughout with over 500 different animals to select from and the opportunity to breed and create over 300,000 random concoctions of first-time species of animal. Attempt to attract as many visitors as possible, create revenue, observe the treatment and happiness of your park and work within or against the laws.

Gameplay

The game starts off with a blank canvas which is just as well as you can ease in gently. You’ll be directed to the management office which is the hub for the tasks you’ll be following, although later on during the game you don’t have to religiously follow these. As with most games of this nature, you’ll set off discovering what you can build, place and if you’re like me you won’t care much for the park’s appearance at first. To draw in guests you’re actually going to need a few enclosures with some animals first.

Look After Your Animal Family

You’ll need to be mindful of their nourishment, hydration and entertainment factor. Simply penning them in and leaving them there just won’t do and will make for a bad park and a health decline for your animals. Visitors will come in their droves if you have rare animals and an attractive park, so it is important to keep animals and staff happy and healthy. You also want to be mindful that you don’t overpopulate as some species can be randier than others, the animal keepers will assist with this when things get a little hectic across the park.

Wheeling & Dealing

There are only so many animals you can cram into one place and you may choose to import and export some from other zoos. Along with this there will be some offers from exotic animal dealers that may tempt you with offers or you may choose to report them to the authorities. There are risks for or against your business and whether you choose to take them is your gamble.

How Will You Run Things?

As you gain research points you’ll be able to access new features in order to grow your park. How you go about it along the way is up to you. You could go down the clean route and set your park up for guaranteed success with renewable energy sources, recycling schemes and cutting costs on water or you could be a completely dodgy dealer and try and save money in other ways such as burning rubbish and running a seedy abbatoir.

I could continue to divulge how much involvement there is in this game, the amount of content on offer in this core package is huge and it simply isn’t something you can speed through in a few hours. I love how you actually have to think about every aspect of the park rather than mindlessly slapping everything down and letting it do its own thing.

How Are The Controls?

It is really difficult to criticise anything in Let’s Build A Zoo, but I will go on record to say that the controls are a little fiddly and this is perhaps down to the port from PC. That said, they are hardly game-breaking and after an hour or two you become used to them. That said, it must be difficult to adapt some games to a controller when there are so many menus and options to flick through, so you can forgive it here.

Graphics & Audio

I make no apology for the repeated reference to the original Theme Park. It is a game that I spent endless amounts of time on it as a kid and loved the art style and the behaviour of the NPC’s in that game. I love that the team at Springloaded have gone for the pixel-art design with a cascade of colour. It works really well and even though it’s displayed like this it doesn’t hamper anything else throughout the entire game. The way the animals have been animated and their movements actually give each of them their own character and personality.

As the park evolves you literally see everything come to life and having the tools to create the Zoo exactly how you want it adds an extra layer to the overall presentation. The background music is relaxing and really compliments a calm and casual gaming session if you just want to kick back and chill out. Sound effects tick the boxes and whilst minimal across the board, they do the job.

In Conclusion

Let’s Build A Zoo is exactly the kind of game that is required to sit amongst some others in the genre such as Two Point Hospital and Campus along with Planet Coaster. 2013’s Zoo Tycoon was lacklustre when it came to the gameplay element and became more of an interactive simulation rather than the deep and intricate running of a business. The development team have done fantastically here with ensuring the game echoes those nostalgic Theme Park vibes whilst creating a potentially never-ending addictive gameplay loop. Whilst the controls could be slightly better tuned, you do become accustomed to them fairly quickly and the rest of the package makes up for this slight shortfall.

Not only does Let’s Build A Zoo look pretty with its gorgeous pixel-art style presentation, it consistently gives you stuff to do and brings spontaneous moments with its unique animal spawns. The opportunities are endless and with a quite hefty research tree to work through, it is genuinely a game that will keep you smashing the hours in if you’re into the genre. Whilst it is part of the Xbox Game Pass lineup at the time of writing, it is well worth the £16.74 asking price and is one of my indie highlights of 2022.