Zoo Story strategy guide.
There is a basic strategy to this game and it revolves around managing your energy.
Managing your energy
It's crucial you make as many neighbors as you can in this game because you can replenish
energy by visiting them. Early on its +1 energy and later its +2 energy per neighbor
visited. As far as I have seen there is no limit to how much energy you can replenish this
way, so put your storm ID everywhere and invite as many players as you can!
The Energy, Money, Food Chain
Energy is the key, you need it to collect your money and harvest your food. But as
important as it is, sending your friends energy packs is a waste of a gift. Using the
strategy above, you wouldnt need an energy pack ever again.
Anyway, you need money to purchase everything including food. And you need food to feed
your animals and keep them earning you money. On a side note, Zoo Story doesn't have a
system that keeps you earning money while you are out of the game, so it requires more
"hands on" time than most other Story games.
Collecting your tours
You can't collect the tours (tips) people give you until your animal/crops/attraction pay
out. So don't get confused, like I first did, when you can't collect them right away. When
you see the coin stack icon show up on top of it, you will collect your "tips" too.
Gifting
Gifting is a very useful mechanic in this game. For the first time in a "Story" game, its
not about what gift nets you the most profit. Different neighbors may require different
materials depending on what buildings they may be working on.
Some advice:
Don't just send one gift to all your neighbors and call it a day. It's best to wait for
your neighbor to send you a material request that way you can send them exactly what they
need. If you can't do that, another thing would be to visit them and see if they have any
buildings under construction and try sending them a material that goes into that building.
Once again don't waste a gift by sending energy pks.
FIRST AID
1 concrete, 1 bricks, 1 tiles, 1 welcome mat, 1 roof shingles, 1 work gloves
GIFT SHOP
5 wooden boards, 5 welcome mats
RESTROOMS
3 concrete, 3 wiring, 3 bricks, 3 welcome mat
RECYCLE CENTER
5 work gloves, 5 welcome mats
The Strategy
First things first, visit community members, make neighbors and put your ID everywhere.
The more neighbors the easier it is to manage your energy. Remember, you only get an
energy boost the FIRST time you visit a given neighbor each day.
I mentioned that Zoo Story is more hands on than other Story games because you don't get
any money unless you are collecting from your animals and attractions. If you don't have a
lot of time to dedicate to the game, you will progress slowly because of that, but if you
have time:
Put your animals and start growing carrots early on. It only takes 2 mins for carrots to
be ready and your animals don't require that much food in the beginning. Also, you get an
xp every time you harvest a carrot, so your level will grow faster.
If you run low on energy, visit a few neighbors to build it back up. You can put as many
plots of land to grow as you like, but save around 10 or 12 for growing your carrots. The
others you can use to stagger your crops so you don't have to harvest them all at the same
time.
Let's say you have 40 plots of farm land:
Save 10 for making quick carrots.
Plant 10 Corn for 4 hrs
Plant 10 Lettuce for 8 hrs
Plant 10 Potato for 12 hrs
By saving slots for quick carrots, you can keep your xp moving allowing you to level
faster and raise your max energy allotment. The idea is to not have to waste all your
energy to harvest your crops, then you can't do much else. You can always visit more
neighbors to refill your energy, but it all depends on your individual amount of patience.
It can get tedious doing it over and over again. Also, keep in mind that your energy
refills to max whenever you level up so that should be taken into consideration.
I noticed that at first it took me 5 mins to replenish 1 energy. Then that number dropped
to 2 mins somewhere in the late teen levels. Finally at my current level (29) its at 3
mins per +1 energy. I think the time changes according to level OR team lava was adjusting
the times still at this point.
As far as which animals yield the most profits according to the time they take to pay out,
that's a lot of math I'm not interested in doing. I'm sure someone else could chime in
with those numbers, but if you follow the formula, you will find it an easy trip to the
upper levels.
Hope this is helpful to some.
Zoo 1 Master Box List
magic Box
Common (4th Prize, 54%)
Street Lamp
Flowering Cactus
Silly Silo
Bear
Uncommon (3rd Prize, 35%)
Bouncy Castle
Observation Deck
Zebra
Rare (2nd Prize, 10%)
Fishing Pond
Pizza Stand
Elephant
Exceptional (1st Prize, 1%)
Unicorn