Zoo Park Story

Genre: Management Simulation

Players: 1

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Review:

Without a doubt the most prolific developer and publisher of Management Simulation games on Nintendo Switch is Kairosoft, who specializes in games with a retro-style isometric pixel art style, often with the word “Story” in the title. As of this writing, Kairosoft has released 62 games on Nintendo Switch, most of them Management Simulations.

After their earlier games, Kairosoft had established a few templates for their Simulation games that later games would largely follow. Game Dev Story established a Simulation-style game more focused on managing employee time and focus, Hot Springs Story established a Simulation style in line with Theme Park Simulators where you try to cater to guests’ tastes to maximize attendance and income, and Epic Astro Story established a Simulation style akin to games like Sim City, where you’re building out a town or settlement. And then there’s a template that has you managing not employees but members of a sports team, something we first saw in Grand Prix Story.

Zoo Park Story originally released on mobile devices in 2023, then received a port to PC and Nintendo Switch later that same year, then to PlayStation 4 in 2024. This is a game that fits in that second “cater to guests” category, with players building their zoo up to attract visitors.

At its core, the gameplay here is decent, but it all feels too restrictive. You’re also drip-fed things like the types of structures you can build. Expanding your list of animals also involves an odd minigame where you have to entice the animal to you with bribes of food, play, or a higher food budget, and must do enough to convince the animal within a limited time span, pushing you to just button-mash bribes as your time starts to dwindle. It feels out-of-place here, and combined with the slow pace and lack of choice makes for unsatisfying gameplay.

As for the presentation, this is in line with what we’re used to from Kairosoft. As I mentioned above, this game makes use of Kairosoft’s signature presentation style using simple retro-styled pixel art visuals (here presented in an isometric overhead view perspective), paired with upbeat synthesized music that’s largely forgettable. For the most part, everything about this presentation is really endearing, though by this point we’ve seen more or less the same thing in numerous other Kairosoft games.

Overall, Zoo Park Story is a game that’s too slow-paced, offers too little choice, and the one area it tries something unique is a bizarre “bribe the animal” minigame that just doesn’t work. The result is a game that I feel is one of Kairosoft’s weaker Management Simulation titles, and if you’re looking for a zoo-themed Management Simulation, I strongly encourage you to spend just $6 more and get the far superior Let’s Build a Zoo instead.

tl;dr – Zoo Park Story is a Management Simulation where players manage a zoo, and this game suffers from slow pacing, a lack of choice, and questionable design choices like its odd “bribe the animal” minigame. If you’re looking for a zoo-themed Management Simulation on Nintendo Switch, you have much better choices than this.

Grade: C-

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