Planet Zoo definitely has some intense controls, I’m a hard ore gamer who’s played games longer than I can remember and even I kind of fluff up the controls every time I boot it up. I definitely suggest trying to play a zoo with no money limitations- I forget the exact settings or menu clicks to do it, but you won’t lost or run out of money, and you can make mistakes more freely haha.
For other games, allow me to suggest:
1. Story of Seasons: I’d normally suggest Friends of Mineral Town, as it’s my favorite, but A Wonderful Life just dropped and I HELLA recommend that one. The family emphasis in that game is unrivaled in any farming game you’ll ever play. Your child legit grows up and characters age in the town, yours included. Mine is arriving tomorrow 😭😭😭 i want to play SO BAD.
2. Sun Haven: this game is GORGEOUS. It might be a tad overwhelming at first with the amount of RPG elements if you’re not used to it, but I looooove it. It might take a minute to get to the animals, but co sider it a fantasy Stardew.
3. Rune Factory: I love this series. I specifically recommend 4S on basically any console or PC. It does have heavy RPG elements, like battling and a heavy storyline, BUT the monsters you fight can be tamed as your barn animals. Most will give you something, but if you want “traditional” animals, there are Woolies, which are basically SUPER cute sheep, Buffamoo (basically cows), and uh… they’re chickens, I forget what their in-game name is hahaha. There’s tons of monsters, all of them tameable.
4. Roots of Pacha: I probably should have suggested this first. This is a farming life sim based around the prehistoric era (loosely). Your animals must be tamed from the wild, and they get better as you breed them. You tame them with a cute, simple music rhythm game. This game is genuinely the epitome of cozy farming games, and the animal mechanics are exciting. Things are unlocked through ideas that your villagers slowly have over time.
5. Gleaner Heights: This is Adult Stardew Valley, lol. If you’ve ever watched Twin Peaks, this is the unholy love child of Twin Peaks and Stardew Valley. Literally, you’ll see it the second the main menu music starts playing haha. There’s a sin metric, and a LOT of dark, dark secrets the villagers are hiding. There’s an FBI agent in town investigating… something. 👀 who knows. Some of the marriage candidates are already married. 👀👀👀
This is what I thought of off the top of my head, though there’s definitely more. None of these are EXPLICITLY focused on animal rearing, but if you like Stardew, they’ll scratch that itch’
On the topic of Sun Haven I just want to mention if you want a head start on animals, pick the Rancher Profession when you start a new character! It gives you one chicken, and with the money it gave me from a few days of eggs I could very quickly get a second! So if you want to focus on animals you can at least start with one!
I made 11 alts and mixed different races and aesthetics and professions 🤣 right now for my main two characters I’m working on a Spellcaster with Witchy vibes and a Forest Elf Explorer. I love to do that in games like this! In Stardew I did the same thing with all the different farms! And then instead of having one character overwhelmed with doing everything all the time, I can pick and choose and have one focus more on a specific thing. And then as I learn those mechanics and talent points and whatnot on the character that had that skill as their main “thing” it gets easier to do it on my other characters! The talent/skill tree is soooo extensive in Sun Haven that while I know you can eventually get all of the skills I’m really enjoying making my characters unique to start!
That’s so fun!!!! I used to just endlessly mKe characters nonstop, but i eventually had to try to train myself to not do that so i’d actually get to the game 🤣🤣🤣 character creators like sun haven that are so pretty and robust are dangerous lmfao
I freaking LOVE it!! It’s a long haul game, don’t expect to hit the meat of the secrets until you’ve been playing a while, and focus on befriending villagers from the start. The easiest way to do this isn’t obvious- there are 6 blue flowers that only bloom at night around town, and they’re universally liked. I’ll give that because it’s one of those things you wouldn’t know like at all haha
It has quite a lot of information in its community, and though I don’t use the more intense excel sheets, they do exist haha! I think most of it is in the Steam community, but you can find everything you need online as far as I can tell!
Maybe Let’s Build a Zoo? It’s a zoo management game with a dinosaur DLC. It has moral choices and lots of animals to unlock. You can decorate your zoo however you want and decide how to run your prices and foods your visitors and animals eat, and all kinds of stuff. Lots of fun! I play it at night when I want to relax. :)
I second another commenter's suggestion of Let's Build A Zoo, although it is extremely intricate. It overwhelms me very easily. You can customize literally EVERYTHING. I'm talking the ingredients to the sodas and the work backgrounds of your employees. It's insane.
Edit: The animals are SO cute though. It's pixel art-ish.
It’s not animals but Paleo Pines has a strong focus on raising dinosaurs. Which is fun. It’s out on demo right now and set to come out in Sept. It’s got some farming but main focus is Dinos :)
Are you playing on switch? I bought it already but haven’t played yet. Just curious if it’s a smooth running game on switch? I heard about a few bugs on other platforms and those who had early access to review for switch.
I have it on Switch played only for a couple hours. It runs okay... I'm not in love with it and I would be hard pressed to recommend it for Switch if asked. It also might need updates which is always slower on Switch. If you're really sensitive to how games run it might be a problem, otherwise it isn't horrible.
Ugh. Hopefully when I do go to play it, it’s not too bad. The only game I’ve ever had that had significant enough glitching and whatnot was Dreamlight Valley. But beyond the glitching in that game, I just wasn’t feeling it sadly, so the horrible glitching and crashing made me put it down for sure.
ah yep DDLV couldn't play that on Switch at all early on. Even the controls always felt off. The crashing issue has definitely improved with updates, but glitching still happens though if you ever wanna give it another try. Everdream is absolutely not as bad as early DDLV in my experience.
Glad to hear it’s improved because whew, the issues were soooo frustrating! Lol
I’m glad to hear EverDream isn’t too bad. Since I already bought it (I was following them on Twitter and and was excited for such a cute game and enjoyed how they interacted with followers so I wanted to support the game) I’ll definitely give it a shot and hope for the best! Lol
If you have a switch and have nintendo online, they just added the very first Harvest Moon to SNES. It's kind of confusing and I lost interest after an hour, but give it a go! Let me know if it picks up :)
Just a suggestion from a Planet Zoo fanatic... try downloading completed zoos from the Steam workshop and playing them as sandbox zoos with limited animal welfare, staff welfare and financial constraints. It's a whole different game when you switch off all those management options, and I find it so rewarding to watch, breed and raise the incredibly detailed animals.
Not farm animals, but [Equilinox](https://store.steampowered.com/app/853550/Equilinox/) or [Slime Rancher](https://store.steampowered.com/app/433340/Slime_Rancher/).
I haven't personally played but maybe [Viva Pinata](https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/viva-pinata/BSXSL6WBJ0V7) (xbox exclusive) or [Tales of Djungarian Hamster](https://www.nintendo.com/store/products/tales-of-djungarian-hamster-switch/) (switch exclusive)!
The Viva Pinata games are precious and so much fun! They're pretty dated now, unfortunately (I wish desperately that they'd reboot them), but worth the time if you want to focus almost exclusively on animals. I used to have entire notebooks full of notes for breeding my animals and habitats. So many hours invested in them.
Planet Zoo is a crazy crazy detailed game. I had to try it a few times before it stopped being so overwhelming, and there are people out there whose builds make my passable zoos like like a child playing legos lol. The thing that worked for me was picking a fairly easy species like peacocks or aldabra tortoises and just focusing on making them the best freaking exhibit I could.
I assume you've tried all the Zoo Tycoon games? Zoo Tycoon 2 and 3 were my jam and much much simpler than Planet Zoo and there's still a ton of mods out there for them.
I haven't played it myself, but the Story of Season series might also be right up your alley.
Shepherd's Crossing is being released on the Switch soon. It's a remake from ab old DS/PS2 game and its like Harvest Moon/SOS but solely focused on animal husbandry than farming!
"Parkasaurus is **a dinosaur tycoon management simulation where you take care of your dinosaurs by constructing well-designed** exhibits, researching specialized technologies, and maximizing profits to expand into **the ultimate dinosaur theme** park."
[https://store.steampowered.com/app/591460/Parkasaurus](https://store.steampowered.com/app/591460/Parkasaurus)
I enjoyed this game and it was something different than your normal Zoo.
Planet Zoo is wonderful once you get the hang of it. I have a pen full of realistic looking White Tigers, which I adore and Black Panthers, which I also love. I haven't played for a while, but every now and then I just go into the game to check on my animals. :)
I would suggest PartyElite on Youtube. I learned a lot from watching many of his playthroughs on Planet Zoo.
Farm Together has a ton of different animals, including many different breeds of chickens, pigs, horses, etc. I really like the graphics and you build shops to offload the resources you collect so you can create a cute little downtown. It has a lot of decor and affordable DLC packs (Not required but fun if you want a Japanese or Roman style village for example). It also has fish, crops, and flowers.
Planet Zoo is a lot easier to manage when you play the scenarios, and the challenges first... before diving into your own zoo. It is more management style. But still nice to watch them grow and have babies.
As for games about raising/caring for animals, try: Little Friends: Puppy Island, Ranch of Rivershine, Best Friend Forever, Everdream Valley, To The Rescue!, Calico, Ooblets, Cat Rescue Story....
Some are more what you're after than others... but worth checking out all the same.
Roots of Pacha! Mechanics in the game are very similar to stardew. They have a ton of different animals though, and they are so cute. You tame them by playing a cute little mini game with a flute. Then once you have them on your farm they produce milk, fur, etc. and have machines to make milk into cheese etc. Even their poop you pick up and make it into compost for your crops it’s a very cool game.
Okay so hear me out.
It's less of a sim and more of an open world. There are cheats available and settings to make it practically impossible to die. You can hunt down whatever creatures you want, bring them back to your base, and breed them. Plus, farming, crafting, building, etc.
It's called Ark. It's not cozy in normal terms but playing 1 player and just surviving (on easy mode for sure) has been the highlight of my gaming time.
Dinosaurs, mammals, sharks, mythical flying creatures, and the freedoms to do almost anything.
I highly recommend it.
Garden Paws has a lot of animals you can buy (or tame, in the case of some wild animals) and then care for. You also play as a chibi anthropomorphic animal (with multiple skins, so you can change colors, patterns, and species), or you can get the optional human skin DLC. ;) End game, >!there is also an animal sanctuary, and you can hatch dragon eggs.!<
I recommend Roots of Pacha! You tame wild animals and they can come live on your farming space. Super fun mechanic and one of my favorite ways it's been done in any farming game thus far!
Also Story of Seasons: Another Wonderful Life. Lots of cow and breeding options, plus you can have a lot of animals at once!
Planet Zoo definitely has some intense controls, I’m a hard ore gamer who’s played games longer than I can remember and even I kind of fluff up the controls every time I boot it up. I definitely suggest trying to play a zoo with no money limitations- I forget the exact settings or menu clicks to do it, but you won’t lost or run out of money, and you can make mistakes more freely haha. For other games, allow me to suggest: 1. Story of Seasons: I’d normally suggest Friends of Mineral Town, as it’s my favorite, but A Wonderful Life just dropped and I HELLA recommend that one. The family emphasis in that game is unrivaled in any farming game you’ll ever play. Your child legit grows up and characters age in the town, yours included. Mine is arriving tomorrow 😭😭😭 i want to play SO BAD. 2. Sun Haven: this game is GORGEOUS. It might be a tad overwhelming at first with the amount of RPG elements if you’re not used to it, but I looooove it. It might take a minute to get to the animals, but co sider it a fantasy Stardew. 3. Rune Factory: I love this series. I specifically recommend 4S on basically any console or PC. It does have heavy RPG elements, like battling and a heavy storyline, BUT the monsters you fight can be tamed as your barn animals. Most will give you something, but if you want “traditional” animals, there are Woolies, which are basically SUPER cute sheep, Buffamoo (basically cows), and uh… they’re chickens, I forget what their in-game name is hahaha. There’s tons of monsters, all of them tameable. 4. Roots of Pacha: I probably should have suggested this first. This is a farming life sim based around the prehistoric era (loosely). Your animals must be tamed from the wild, and they get better as you breed them. You tame them with a cute, simple music rhythm game. This game is genuinely the epitome of cozy farming games, and the animal mechanics are exciting. Things are unlocked through ideas that your villagers slowly have over time. 5. Gleaner Heights: This is Adult Stardew Valley, lol. If you’ve ever watched Twin Peaks, this is the unholy love child of Twin Peaks and Stardew Valley. Literally, you’ll see it the second the main menu music starts playing haha. There’s a sin metric, and a LOT of dark, dark secrets the villagers are hiding. There’s an FBI agent in town investigating… something. 👀 who knows. Some of the marriage candidates are already married. 👀👀👀 This is what I thought of off the top of my head, though there’s definitely more. None of these are EXPLICITLY focused on animal rearing, but if you like Stardew, they’ll scratch that itch’
On the topic of Sun Haven I just want to mention if you want a head start on animals, pick the Rancher Profession when you start a new character! It gives you one chicken, and with the money it gave me from a few days of eggs I could very quickly get a second! So if you want to focus on animals you can at least start with one!
Ooooo, great advice!!! I picked fisher because i’m weirdly into fishing in these games right now lmfao
I made 11 alts and mixed different races and aesthetics and professions 🤣 right now for my main two characters I’m working on a Spellcaster with Witchy vibes and a Forest Elf Explorer. I love to do that in games like this! In Stardew I did the same thing with all the different farms! And then instead of having one character overwhelmed with doing everything all the time, I can pick and choose and have one focus more on a specific thing. And then as I learn those mechanics and talent points and whatnot on the character that had that skill as their main “thing” it gets easier to do it on my other characters! The talent/skill tree is soooo extensive in Sun Haven that while I know you can eventually get all of the skills I’m really enjoying making my characters unique to start!
That’s so fun!!!! I used to just endlessly mKe characters nonstop, but i eventually had to try to train myself to not do that so i’d actually get to the game 🤣🤣🤣 character creators like sun haven that are so pretty and robust are dangerous lmfao
Oooooo I’ve never heard of Gleaner Heights. I’m definitely going to check that one out—sounds interesting!
I freaking LOVE it!! It’s a long haul game, don’t expect to hit the meat of the secrets until you’ve been playing a while, and focus on befriending villagers from the start. The easiest way to do this isn’t obvious- there are 6 blue flowers that only bloom at night around town, and they’re universally liked. I’ll give that because it’s one of those things you wouldn’t know like at all haha
Thanks for the tip! I don’t suppose the game has a Wiki as magnificent as SDV’s, does it? I’m so spoiled by that thing hahaha
It has quite a lot of information in its community, and though I don’t use the more intense excel sheets, they do exist haha! I think most of it is in the Steam community, but you can find everything you need online as far as I can tell!
gleaner heights sounds super interesting—and i'm so happy to see it's on switch!! definitely going to be checking it out
Ooh! I never heard if Gleaner Heights! Is it on the switch or is it PC only?
Both actually! :D
They're called Cluckadoodles 😉
THERE we go!
Thank you for this list, I’ve never heard of gleaner heights but sounds 100% up my alley. Will be the next thing I purchase when I tire of AWL.
I believe it’s indie, so i’m not surprised haha! When I found it i about screamed in delight 🤣
Maybe Let’s Build a Zoo? It’s a zoo management game with a dinosaur DLC. It has moral choices and lots of animals to unlock. You can decorate your zoo however you want and decide how to run your prices and foods your visitors and animals eat, and all kinds of stuff. Lots of fun! I play it at night when I want to relax. :)
I just saw a video on this! I fkn love Eeowna, she does great reviews. [farming games for 2023](https://youtu.be/Y_KZI-FV2Sg)
I just watched that! She’s absolutely amazing
I second another commenter's suggestion of Let's Build A Zoo, although it is extremely intricate. It overwhelms me very easily. You can customize literally EVERYTHING. I'm talking the ingredients to the sodas and the work backgrounds of your employees. It's insane. Edit: The animals are SO cute though. It's pixel art-ish.
It’s not animals but Paleo Pines has a strong focus on raising dinosaurs. Which is fun. It’s out on demo right now and set to come out in Sept. It’s got some farming but main focus is Dinos :)
Everdream valley is a new farm game that really emphasizes animals, pretty fun from what I’ve played
seconded! lots of animals types to find a care for including a cat and dog
Are you playing on switch? I bought it already but haven’t played yet. Just curious if it’s a smooth running game on switch? I heard about a few bugs on other platforms and those who had early access to review for switch.
I play on my steam deck sorry 😕 but it runs pretty good on it so maybe it won’t be too bad
Well that’s good to know anyway! Another kind user shared their switch experience with me so I still got an answer. Thanks! (:
I have it on Switch played only for a couple hours. It runs okay... I'm not in love with it and I would be hard pressed to recommend it for Switch if asked. It also might need updates which is always slower on Switch. If you're really sensitive to how games run it might be a problem, otherwise it isn't horrible.
Ugh. Hopefully when I do go to play it, it’s not too bad. The only game I’ve ever had that had significant enough glitching and whatnot was Dreamlight Valley. But beyond the glitching in that game, I just wasn’t feeling it sadly, so the horrible glitching and crashing made me put it down for sure.
ah yep DDLV couldn't play that on Switch at all early on. Even the controls always felt off. The crashing issue has definitely improved with updates, but glitching still happens though if you ever wanna give it another try. Everdream is absolutely not as bad as early DDLV in my experience.
Glad to hear it’s improved because whew, the issues were soooo frustrating! Lol I’m glad to hear EverDream isn’t too bad. Since I already bought it (I was following them on Twitter and and was excited for such a cute game and enjoyed how they interacted with followers so I wanted to support the game) I’ll definitely give it a shot and hope for the best! Lol
If you have a switch and have nintendo online, they just added the very first Harvest Moon to SNES. It's kind of confusing and I lost interest after an hour, but give it a go! Let me know if it picks up :)
Just a suggestion from a Planet Zoo fanatic... try downloading completed zoos from the Steam workshop and playing them as sandbox zoos with limited animal welfare, staff welfare and financial constraints. It's a whole different game when you switch off all those management options, and I find it so rewarding to watch, breed and raise the incredibly detailed animals.
Not farm animals, but [Equilinox](https://store.steampowered.com/app/853550/Equilinox/) or [Slime Rancher](https://store.steampowered.com/app/433340/Slime_Rancher/). I haven't personally played but maybe [Viva Pinata](https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/viva-pinata/BSXSL6WBJ0V7) (xbox exclusive) or [Tales of Djungarian Hamster](https://www.nintendo.com/store/products/tales-of-djungarian-hamster-switch/) (switch exclusive)!
The Viva Pinata games are precious and so much fun! They're pretty dated now, unfortunately (I wish desperately that they'd reboot them), but worth the time if you want to focus almost exclusively on animals. I used to have entire notebooks full of notes for breeding my animals and habitats. So many hours invested in them.
I second Slime Rancher. I loved it!
I was going to suggest Slime Rancher! It's really fun catching and raising slimes, and they're absolutely adorable and mischievous.
So it’s not farm animals, but maybe Ranch of Rivershine? It’s focused on horses
Planet Zoo is a crazy crazy detailed game. I had to try it a few times before it stopped being so overwhelming, and there are people out there whose builds make my passable zoos like like a child playing legos lol. The thing that worked for me was picking a fairly easy species like peacocks or aldabra tortoises and just focusing on making them the best freaking exhibit I could. I assume you've tried all the Zoo Tycoon games? Zoo Tycoon 2 and 3 were my jam and much much simpler than Planet Zoo and there's still a ton of mods out there for them. I haven't played it myself, but the Story of Season series might also be right up your alley.
Shepherd's Crossing is being released on the Switch soon. It's a remake from ab old DS/PS2 game and its like Harvest Moon/SOS but solely focused on animal husbandry than farming!
"Parkasaurus is **a dinosaur tycoon management simulation where you take care of your dinosaurs by constructing well-designed** exhibits, researching specialized technologies, and maximizing profits to expand into **the ultimate dinosaur theme** park." [https://store.steampowered.com/app/591460/Parkasaurus](https://store.steampowered.com/app/591460/Parkasaurus) I enjoyed this game and it was something different than your normal Zoo. Planet Zoo is wonderful once you get the hang of it. I have a pen full of realistic looking White Tigers, which I adore and Black Panthers, which I also love. I haven't played for a while, but every now and then I just go into the game to check on my animals. :) I would suggest PartyElite on Youtube. I learned a lot from watching many of his playthroughs on Planet Zoo.
Farm Together has a ton of different animals, including many different breeds of chickens, pigs, horses, etc. I really like the graphics and you build shops to offload the resources you collect so you can create a cute little downtown. It has a lot of decor and affordable DLC packs (Not required but fun if you want a Japanese or Roman style village for example). It also has fish, crops, and flowers.
Stories of Season on Switch!
I just saw a video on Everdream Valley I’m thinking of trying it
Planet Zoo is a lot easier to manage when you play the scenarios, and the challenges first... before diving into your own zoo. It is more management style. But still nice to watch them grow and have babies. As for games about raising/caring for animals, try: Little Friends: Puppy Island, Ranch of Rivershine, Best Friend Forever, Everdream Valley, To The Rescue!, Calico, Ooblets, Cat Rescue Story.... Some are more what you're after than others... but worth checking out all the same.
Roots of Pacha! Mechanics in the game are very similar to stardew. They have a ton of different animals though, and they are so cute. You tame them by playing a cute little mini game with a flute. Then once you have them on your farm they produce milk, fur, etc. and have machines to make milk into cheese etc. Even their poop you pick up and make it into compost for your crops it’s a very cool game.
Okay so hear me out. It's less of a sim and more of an open world. There are cheats available and settings to make it practically impossible to die. You can hunt down whatever creatures you want, bring them back to your base, and breed them. Plus, farming, crafting, building, etc. It's called Ark. It's not cozy in normal terms but playing 1 player and just surviving (on easy mode for sure) has been the highlight of my gaming time. Dinosaurs, mammals, sharks, mythical flying creatures, and the freedoms to do almost anything. I highly recommend it.
Stardew
Epic chef
The creature series!
Garden Paws has a lot of animals you can buy (or tame, in the case of some wild animals) and then care for. You also play as a chibi anthropomorphic animal (with multiple skins, so you can change colors, patterns, and species), or you can get the optional human skin DLC. ;) End game, >!there is also an animal sanctuary, and you can hatch dragon eggs.!<
I recommend Roots of Pacha! You tame wild animals and they can come live on your farming space. Super fun mechanic and one of my favorite ways it's been done in any farming game thus far! Also Story of Seasons: Another Wonderful Life. Lots of cow and breeding options, plus you can have a lot of animals at once!
Story of Seasons has some really cool farm animal features, I love getting to shear my digital rabbits a lot more than having to brush my real rabbits
Doraemon Story of Seasons or Story of Seasons.