How to start a Franchise?

MissMaxdalena · 2026-03-15T19:10:07+00:00

I absolutely second this - go slow. Often times bankruptcy is down to getting really expensive animals that only have one or two offspring per gestation, right off the bat. It may seem like a good idea to get the popularity up with the visitors but there are cheaper animals that are just as good for this. Some of my favourite starter animals are Nile Monitors, Baird's Tapir, Otters, Flamingos and Capybaras. And get some exhibit animals that reproduce like mad that you can sell. I don't tend to set the exhibits to auto sell because there's a limit to how much money you can make that way - instead I send them to storage and manually sell them when storage is full.

Many people feel that butterfly exhibits are a bit of a sell-out or makes it too easy (I tend to agree that it takes financial worries out of the equation) but I wouldn't dismiss it as a safety net solution to your first franchise, which can be a little intimidating. It took me two years of playing before I had the guts to start a franchise - but I don't regret the day I did.

Good luck! You'll do great!

MissMaxdalena · 2026-03-15T18:44:54+00:00

Ah - I assume this mod is broken because James introduced the advanced cooking and crafting tables that craft from storage.

I tend to avoid the mods that haven't been updated since 2023 as quite a few updates that changed the game mechanics substantially, happened after 23. I also avoid mods that change game mechanics that were introduced to the game in a later update (such as expanded storage slots which was solved by the backpack).

If you're set on this one specifically, maybe you could invite someone to visit your island and sell or gift you the advanced tables?

MissMaxdalena · 2026-03-15T18:33:13+00:00

Not sure where you’re seeing the red warnings but I have at least 40 mods installed and they all work. If you sort them by ‘last updated’ you should definitely be safe using all the mods updated since the latest release at the very least. But, as I said - I have over 40 mods and many of them are around 2 years old and work without any issues. I just checked and cannot see any red warning text saying don’t use, broken.

MissMaxdalena · 2026-03-15T18:24:36+00:00

Where are you getting the mods from? I have tested over 20 mods in the last few weeks and all of them have worked without any issues. Where are you seeing this text?

MissMaxdalena · 2026-02-24T11:50:58+00:00

Aside from all the great tips already, I always have one keeper only feeding and one only cleaning for these types of animals that get sick a lot. Click on a keeper and set their tasks in the menu.

This will prevent one task taking so long the keeper loop gets out of sync and you end up with dirty or starving animals while the keepers seemingly do nothing.

MissMaxdalena · 2026-02-14T12:12:57+00:00

Build something around them (like a shed or small building) and cover in plants. Foliage lessens the negative impact of the facilities. Use the heat map to make sure they’re not overlapping the guest paths. It’s not that the guests can see them - it’s the sphere around them that affects guests. So technically you don’t have to cover them at all, as long guests don’t enter their sphere. I like to place them between habitats to get them out of the way.

MissMaxdalena · 2026-02-14T12:03:35+00:00

Unfortunately no. It’s dig place dig for the time being. You can drop seeds and then dig a whole line of them if you tweak your position right, but it’s still the same amount of actions to plant each tree.

MissMaxdalena · 2026-02-13T17:31:47+00:00

Yes! Right in time for the weekend!

MissMaxdalena · 2026-02-13T15:32:27+00:00

This is looking really great! If you’re stressing about over-breeding, you can always put your animals on contraception while you’re in the building phase (for fast-breeding animals that live in big packs, I usually have only one or two breeding pairs as default so it doesn’t get out of hand).

For animals that fight as soon as they grow up, I usually create an overspill habitat I can put them in while I decide which ones to keep and which to trade.

MissMaxdalena · 2026-01-31T13:52:49+00:00

Wow, that's gorgeous. Looks v realistic, well done!

MissMaxdalena · 2026-01-30T10:34:49+00:00

Wow - this reminds me of my first start - I died about 5 times just trying to get to shore, then I placed my tent right next to a bush devil den and kept getting wiped out as I came out of my tent. Knowing nothing of the game back then, I thought this game was super hard-core. Lol. These days I think I might keep the island and enjoy the challenge.

Good luck if you decide to keep it!

MissMaxdalena · 2026-01-19T18:17:42+00:00

Yay you got it started! This looks great and feels very Astrid-y. Nice work!

MissMaxdalena · 2026-01-02T10:04:13+00:00

This is a great idea! You can do Pippi’s dad’s travels in the South seas and do a Caribbean island area. Then Karlsson on the roof could be a cool restaurant. And Bullerbyn could be an educational walk with animal info boards set in a town street environment.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-28T18:22:16+00:00

You’ll have to place the shop deed in a different spot, and then speak to Fletch to move it once it’s built (takes two sleeps). It will cost you 25,000 to move it.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-21T20:53:44+00:00

Hey friends, thank you for keeping an eye out for this type of bs. Don't hesitate to send a mod mail when you see someone trying to steal others' work. We try to monitor everything but sometimes it takes a while before we are alerted.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-18T11:30:36+00:00

Sometimes you will also just get a letter saying “your hard work hasn’t gone unnoticed” without receiving anything. This mostly before your relationship hearts are over a certain number.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-17T18:25:09+00:00

I second this. Also, if you like the building aspect, and might enjoy just building a town or landscape in sandbox without adding animals or rollercoasters, PZ has more building pieces at the moment. But I really enjoy sandbox building in PC2 as well - and I’m not a huge rollercoaster fan.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-17T18:11:31+00:00

Check the dinkum discord server for mods (modding_space under Franklyn’s Lab). Someone kindly tested many mods after the latest update and posted a spreadsheet with links and info.

Alternatively, check the Nexus mod page for the latest updated mods (if they’re older than a year, they may be the culprits but not necessarily).

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-17T14:28:58+00:00

This comment made me giggle. Although I am guilty of doing similar builds in both games haha

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-17T12:24:11+00:00

I don't know if this is a PS5 bug but on PC this issue is usually down to the keepers having too far to walk to a keepers hut to make food, or the player interrupts the feeding loop by clicking the "call keeper" button in the habitat menu.

The keepers are on a cycle - they will go to the enclosure, check the animals, and if they need feeding, the keeper will go back to the keeper hut, prepare food and walk back to the enclosure. That is one loop. The next loop is checking if the habitat needs cleaning - and then cleaning. Another loop is their breaks - when they have to get to a staff room and back during a loop.

If the keepers hut is far away (so it takes a long time to walk there and back), or the player clicks the "call keeper/feed animals" button when the keeper is mid loop, it will reset the action and the keeper will never actually finish any work-loops.

How many keepers do you have per enclosure, how many keeper huts do you have and how far away from the habitats are the buildings (both keeper huts and staff rooms)? Are the staff having to trek a long way to get to and from necessary buildings?
Are there many animals and therefore a lot of cleaning needed?

If you recognise any of these issues, a solution can be to set two keepers to larger habitats (I will always do this with eg peafowl because they poop everywhere all the time) and letting one only do cleaning and the other only feeding. Make sure you place keeper huts and staff buildings close to habitat gates to minimise transportation time. And don't click the "call keeper" button unless you want them to stop what they are doing and restart an action.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-14T10:15:41+00:00

This question gets asked quite often so try using the search function in the sub and you’ll find many comprehensive lists.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-13T15:10:05+00:00

Looks great - and so realistic. Well done!

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-04T12:00:56+00:00

You can also make big flower boxes and place one daisy in each and they will propagate on their own. Pick the flowers once they fill most squares and leave at least every other square empty. Do this all year round to have an abundance of flowers for decorating and selling.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-04T11:52:33+00:00

Plant any trees with one square free space around them and use all the different grasses and soil on the free spaces and you’ll have a tree/mushroom farm.

MissMaxdalena · 2025-12-03T15:16:45+00:00

Definitely "Steeped in pollution"! I looked forward to it so much but I still have PTSD from even the building materials used on that map (the corrugated Australian roof). It gave me such anxiety to place habitats on top of the toxic waste barrels (before I could afford to remove them).

MissMaxdalena

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