batty-251/zt1-engine

By Batty 251 (@batty-251) · Licence: MIT · 3 published versions · 19217 files · 515 MB of source · Last published 2026-11-01

A public project on CodeRook. Browse it at https://coderook.com/batty-251/zt1-engine.

Versions

• v2026.11.1 (2026-11-01): v2026.11.1: Everything since v2026.10.30.
• v2026.10.30 (2026-10-29): Clarify the 2026.10.30 release notes (431627c) — Everything since v2026.10.20. # What's new ## Marine shows - **Show tanks:** Connect an animal's home tank to a show tank, add show equipment and grandstands, then choose the tricks for its performance. - **Show schedules:** Set how often a show runs, choose continuous performances, or use Never to stop scheduled shows. - **Marine specialists:** An available specialist is assigned automatically when a show is ready to start. - **Show animals:** Eligible adults travel to the show through the connecting gate, perform their tricks and return to their home tank afterwards. - **Shared show tanks:** Several home tanks can connect to one show tank so animals from different exhibits can use it. - **Trick selection:** The show menu checks whether a trick's research, equipment and water-depth requirements are met. - **Show species:** Scheduled programs support orcas, dolphins, great white sharks, jellyfish, sea lions and sea otters. - **Grandstands:** Guests choose a show and sit in individual seats. Each stand links to the show tank it faces. - **Show admission:** Changing a show's ticket price updates the grandstands linked to that show. ## Saved games - **Original save import:** Load saved zoos from the original Zoo Tycoon, including more of their animals, guests, workers, exhibits and zoo-management information. - **Shared zoo files:** The default Save Game option is now Shared zoo (.zoo). One file keeps the full ZT1-Engine zoo and a compatible version that the original game can load. - **Engine-only saves:** The save dialog also offers Engine-only save (.zt1save) when you only need to continue in ZT1-Engine. - **Current zoo export:** Shared saves include the zoo as it is now, including compatible animals and objects added after loading an original save. - **Custom content:** Custom animals, buildings, staff, scenery, filters, food and elevated paths stay in the engine's part of a shared save. The original loads the supported stock content instead. - **Custom paths and fences:** Shared saves provide stock equivalents for supported custom paths and boundaries when opened in the original game. - **Animal records:** Original imports restore more information about animal identities, age, young animals, eggs, crates, health and needs. - **Guest records:** Original imports restore names, appearance, inventory, favourite species, arrival information, needs and thoughts about animals and exhibits. - **Staff records:** Original imports restore worker appearance, duties and supported exhibit assignments. - **Research and zoo management:** Imports restore research funding and progress, enabled research categories, awards and marketing settings. - **Finance history:** More of the original zoo's monthly finances, running totals, cash, date and admission settings are restored. - **Saved show programs:** Original trick lists, animal species, frequency and admission settings load into the engine. Compatible programs created in the engine can also be saved for the original. - **Save formats:** The dialog changes the file extension to match the selected format. Keep a separate engine copy before resaving in the original, because the original removes engine-only content from its copy. ## Animals and habitats - **Animal awareness:** Animals account for nearby animals while moving around their exhibit. - **Large marine animals:** Swimming and turning take the animal's body size into account near tank walls. - **Marine plants and rocks:** Habitat ratings use the individual species' preferences instead of treating every marine decoration as suitable. - **Water requirements:** Marine habitat checks account for water depth, cleanliness, salinity and whether the animal needs land. - **Mixed habitats:** Animals such as walruses can move between land and water within their enclosure. - **Dinosaur behaviour:** Expanded handling for eggs, hatching, feeding, rampaging and capture by the Dinosaur Response Team. - **Animal animations:** Improved handling for multi-step actions, turning towards a target, finishing an animation and catching prey. ## Mods in the game - **Downloaded mods:** Downloads and imports start disabled. Choose which mods to enable after installing them. - **In-game mod switches:** Main-menu Enable and Game Options use the same selection. Optional mods can be switched during play. - **Required mods:** A mod supplying the current map or placed custom content stays enabled while that content is needed. The menu explains the reason. - **Mod pages:** The in-game list uses separate left/right arrow buttons and a Page 1 of N counter. - **Mod pictures:** The download menu shows cover images before installation. Lab uploads prepare a cover from the mod's About picture. - **Download sizes:** Small files show their size in KB instead of rounding down to 0 MB. - **Custom freeform maps:** Maps supplied by enabled mods appear in map selection with their own picture and description. The custommaps option controls this feature. - **Custom names:** Mod animals, buildings and staff display their own names in the relevant buy lists and information windows. ## ZT1 Lab mod studio - **Mods workspace:** Browse a mod's contents by kind, open its artwork and edit its properties in the Inspector. The studio also lists missing parts that need attention. - **New animals:** Choose Zoo, Marine or Dinosaur, give the animal a name and select a starting species whose behaviour it will use. - **Existing animals:** Create a separate species from an existing animal, then change its appearance, needs, food and behaviour settings. - **Animal needs:** Set its carer, food, preferred ground, plants, rocks, shelters and compatible animals, or copy the needs of another species. - **Marine settings:** Edit depth requirements, swimming height, wall clearance, salinity and water-cleanliness preferences. - **Dinosaur settings:** Edit egg and hatching properties, egg eating, rampaging and fence-breaking behaviour. - **Animal pictures:** Create or edit the buy-panel icon, list picture and plaque. A drawn animation frame can be used as the starting picture. - **Item builders:** Create new items or customise existing buildings, fences, staff, tank filters, plants, rocks, shelters, enrichment and zoo entrances. - **Staff and guests:** Custom staff use an existing job's duties. Guest artwork can replace one of the four existing guest appearances. - **Tank filters:** The Inspector exposes cleaning, wear, servicing and upkeep settings for custom filters. - **Paths:** Create custom path artwork for all twenty connection shapes. - **Ground textures:** Replace the appearance of an existing ground type while keeping that terrain's gameplay properties. - **Animal food:** Choose custom food in an animal's Needs page. Its usual keeper or specialist supplies that food. - **Dinosaur egg artwork:** Edit the egg, hatching sequence and broken shell separately from the adult animal. - **Remake, Stencil and Blank:** Start artwork from an existing picture, trace an outline, or draw from an empty canvas. - **Independent artwork:** Own copy separates artwork that was linked to another item so it can be edited independently. - **Animation editor:** Edit layers and frames, use a faded view of neighbouring frames as a guide, and preview the animal from different directions. - **Artwork tools:** Resize and reshape artwork, recolour selected shades, paint within a stencil, add stripes or fade a pattern across the body. - **Editor controls:** Zoom with Ctrl + scroll or the zoom bar. The stencil browser previews animals, people, buildings, plants and fences before selection. - **Building artwork:** Edit idle and in-use animations together with the building's static background and default colours. - **PNG imports:** Import a single picture, frame strip or directional sprite sheet, fit it to the game's size and preview it before saving. - **OBJ imports:** Render a model into game directions. Several supplied poses can be turned into an animation sequence; material and texture files provide its colours. - **Animation links:** Reuse an existing pose for selected animal actions while building up a new animal's artwork. - **Game-file editing:** Copy an existing game definition into a mod to change values such as an animal's price or a building's capacity. Files already inside a mod can be edited directly. - **Mod pictures:** Use your own image, a drawn frame or a Test Zoo picture for the mod's cover. - **Starter kit:** A starter mod provides examples of the different kinds of content a mod can contain. ## Custom maps, theme packs and Help - **Map editor:** Build terrain, water, hills, paths and scenery in the Test Zoo, then save the design into a mod. - **Blank maps:** Start at Small, Medium or Large size, or choose your own dimensions. Set the zoo boundary and place its entrance. - **Terrain view:** Inspect the map from above while working on its ground layout. - **Theme packs:** Select several compatible mods and publish them as one named download with a picture and description. - **Pack conflicts:** Conflicting files are reported before creating a pack. The original individual mods remain available for editing. - **Tutorial mods:** Wildlife Import Tutorial, Park Workshop Tutorial and Moonstone Habitat Kit are available separately or together as Moonstone Zoo Theme. - **Help tab:** A tab beside Mods contains 21 searchable guides, illustrated lessons and nine videos. Press F1 to open it. - **Help topics:** Guides cover the Lab workspaces, animal and object imports, habitats, maps, testing, theme packs and publishing or downloading mods. - **Offline Help:** Included guides and tutorial media can be viewed without an internet connection. Older recordings are labelled for their earlier interface. - **Lab mod tests:** Test Zoo and Play with it use temporary mod selections, keeping an experiment separate from the mods enabled for normal play. ## Game windows - **Side-by-side windows:** Zoo Status, animal, guest, exhibit and staff lists, information windows and a buy panel can stay open together. New windows use nearby clear space. The smartstack option controls this. - **Window dragging:** Move windows by their title bars, including Game Options, and remember their positions between sessions. The dragwindows option controls this. - **Window locks:** A gold lock beside the close button prevents accidental dragging. Each window remembers its lock setting. - **Window positions:** Game Options > Controls > Window Positions > Reset restores window positions while keeping their locks. - **Information lists:** The optional infocloseslists setting closes a source list when its information window opens. - **Main menu:** The version number is displayed in the corner. # Bug fixes ## Marine shows and staff - **Automatic shows:** Ready shows recruit a marine specialist without the player having to assign one manually. - **Dolphin performers:** Both eligible adult dolphins can join the same show instead of only one being selected. - **Show equipment:** Required toys and equipment placed in the show tank are recognised when choosing tricks. - **Home-tank animations:** Waving, water-spitting and other performance animations no longer play randomly in an animal's normal exhibit. - **Dolphin flips:** The renderer keeps the full animal visible while it is above the water. - **Marine specialist platforms:** Corrected the worker's standing height on the platform. - **Specialist ladders:** Corrected the direction of climbing animations when going up or down. - **Grandstand spectators:** Corrected guest height and individual seating positions. - **Interrupted shows:** Animals keep their home assignment and return through the connecting gate when a show is interrupted. - **Stranded performers:** Animals left in a show tank recover their home when it can be identified. An unavailable route leaves them in a transport capsule for relocation. - **Show-tank feeding:** Specialists feed animals in their home tanks. Show tanks clear ordinary food piles while keeping trick rewards available. - **Blocked platforms:** Connecting another tank or placing a building can move the platform to a clear bank. The fence gate tool can also relocate it. - **Platform changes:** Moving a platform during a performance cancels and resets that show safely. - **Show admission:** Updating one show's price updates its linked stands rather than requiring each stand to be edited separately. - **Show frequency:** The Never setting is available and keeps its value after saving and loading. ## Tanks, placement and demolition - **Large swimmers:** Corrected animals drawing through tank walls while turning, including views near platforms and filters. - **Tank gates:** Gates open and close with their animations and draw in the correct order against passing animals. - **Underwater placement:** Animal, plant and rock previews use the tank floor instead of appearing on the water surface before placement. - **Show-toy placement:** Previews use the appropriate water height, and toys draw correctly near the specialist platform. - **Marine plants:** Underwater plants require a filled tank instead of being accepted on ordinary land. - **Demolition targets:** The highlighted object matches the one selected for removal, making toys, plants, equipment and nearby walls easier to distinguish. - **Tank floors:** Original-save imports preserve the floor's terrain. Removing a tank uses its saved ground or the surrounding ground when no earlier ground record exists. - **Tank filter animations:** Running filters animate and hum. Worn and broken filters use their appropriate appearance and sounds; filters beside empty tanks switch off. - **Filter maintenance:** Workers service filters without restarting their existing wear countdown. - **Custom filters:** Separate filter definitions retain their own artwork, footprint, cleaning rate, wear, upkeep, servicing and refund values. ## Saving and loading - **Failed loads:** The incoming zoo is checked before replacing the open zoo. A failed load preserves the current session. - **Missing mod content:** Load errors name a missing custom map or definition so the required mod can be enabled. - **Startup loading:** Save restoration waits until catalogue and research loading is ready before using that information. - **Save-file validation:** Damaged or truncated shared-save data is rejected instead of silently dropping its engine content. - **Repeated saves:** Saving again no longer puts another copy of the previous save inside the file. - **Save-file writing:** A temporary file replaces the destination only after writing finishes. - **Converted saves:** A converted zoo can be reopened without the original file still being at its previous location. - **Animal restoration:** Preserved young animals, eggs, crates, lifetime information, health and need timers across supported imports and reloads. - **Guest restoration:** Preserved more guest appearance, inventory, favourite-animal and recent-visit information. Reordering animal definitions does not change a saved favourite. - **Staff restoration:** Preserved supported worker appearance, duties and exhibit assignments. - **Research and finances:** Corrected restoration of research settings, financial history, income and expense signs, awards and marketing values. - **Tank equipment saves:** Filters remain working equipment after conversion, with saved condition and supported costs. Engine saves retain service countdowns and the selected filter type. - **Original species references:** Mods replacing stock animals keep the correct stock animal identity when saving for the original game. - **Custom show programs:** Tricks requiring engine-only definitions stay with the engine content instead of producing an invalid original program. - **Original entrances and boundaries:** Stock entrance pieces survive export, custom tank walls use a compatible stock wall, and older custom-map objects receive valid records. - **Original tank contents:** Submerged generic dung no longer prevents the original game from filling a tank. The engine still keeps that dung in its own saved state. - **Camera restoration:** Saved position, zoom and all four rotations restore correctly, including supported original-game views. - **Zoo changes:** Corrected loading another zoo from inside a game and returning to the main menu. Looping zoo and building sounds stop when switching zoos. - **Older food records:** Older converted saves using generic food references are mapped to the appropriate food. ## Buildings, dinosaurs and guests - **DRT base:** Corrected the Dinosaur Response Team building's grid alignment and its position when rotating the map. - **DRT helicopter:** Corrected helicopter animations and dinosaur capture duties so the response team handles dinosaur capture. - **Shops and attractions:** Buildings use their available idle, customer-use and service animations. - **Building signs and animated parts:** Restaurants, gift shops, DRT buildings and other structures keep their parts aligned in each camera direction. - **Building entrances:** Guests enter through the door on the correct rotated side. A path touching another wall no longer counts as door access. - **Custom buildings:** Mod-defined animation paths work during placement, use and after loading a saved map. - **Custom staff:** Workers listed in enabled mod registries can be hired and carry out their inherited duties. - **Custom names:** Buildings and hired staff show the names supplied by their mods. - **Dinosaur feeding:** Eating poses, including head-down feeding, consume food correctly. - **Rampaging dinosaurs:** Dinosaurs approach a suitable building before damaging it. - **Egg hatching:** Corrected the handling of healthy hatches and failed eggs. - **Guest tours:** Guests leave tours when they need a building or must leave. Guides clear their followers when a tour finishes or the guide is fired. - **Guest thoughts:** Time-in-park thoughts use the original game's thresholds. - **Custom entrances:** Mod entrances provide the zoo's guest entry path. - **Custom bins:** Bins can use their own art and participate in rubbish collection. ## Interface and camera - **Game Options:** Opening the menu pauses the zoo. Closing it resumes a running zoo and leaves a manually paused zoo paused. - **Mod list:** Names, required-content explanations, page controls and help text no longer run into each other. - **Tundra (Small):** The full entrance is recognised as part of the zoo boundary, restoring construction inside the zoo. - **Placement rotation:** Turning a held object with Q or E no longer makes it disappear until the mouse moves. - **Starting cash:** Freeform remembers the selected amount, and its difficulty label follows that amount. Scenarios use their own starting funds. - **Date display:** The date remains visible while the zoo is paused. - **Window dragging:** Zoo Status, recommendations, plaques, messages, Help and other movable windows drag by their titles correctly. - **Staff Information:** The panel opens on its Status page, and pictures in the Staff List display at their intended size. - **Button help:** Help appears after a click as well as after moving the pointer. - **Game Options controls:** The sidebar button closes the window again, and the Game page's buttons are positioned correctly. - **Camera drawing:** Reduced work for terrain and objects outside the camera view, including while placing animals, shops, scenery and paths. - **Tank drawing:** Tank geometry is reused during each frame instead of recalculating the same work repeatedly. - **Show crowds:** Readiness and attendance decisions avoid unnecessary repeated work each frame. ## ZT1 Lab and downloads - **Lab pointer controls:** Closing a native game dialog or stopping Play no longer leaves the Lab's window and title-bar controls unclickable. - **Embedded Play:** The game's position follows Lab resizing, minimising and restoring. - **Lab replies:** Startup and command responses are read completely, preventing missed readiness messages and incomplete results. - **Test Zoo loading:** Map loads wait for their own completion reply. Choosing a map cancels a delayed startup rebuild that could replace it. - **Temporary mod selections:** Ending a mod test restores the normal selection. A newly installed Lab does not carry developer test selections. - **Recorded setups:** The Test Zoo setup is kept before rebuilding or restarting after a mod change. - **Map editing:** Reopened blank maps can be saved again, saved ground drawings restore correctly, and imported packs select the correct installed folder. - **Building artwork editor:** Static backgrounds and default colours are kept with animated parts. Sources with diagonal artwork open on a direction containing a picture. - **Portable Game Build:** The ZIP includes the mod-download client and creates its own key on first startup, preserving an existing key. - **Lab installer:** Included the process-output helper required by the updated Play controls. - **CodeRook publishing:** Source updates preserve protected build files, and a failed source upload stops before downloads can be attached to the wrong version.
• v2026.10.20 (2026-10-18): v2026.10.20: Everything since v2026.10.14 (the last engine release; v2026.10.15 re-released only the Lab). — Everything since v2026.10.14. Every addition beyond the original game is a switch in Game Options. Turned off, the game behaves as the 2001 original did. # What's new ## Game Options - Game Options opens as one window with every setting, and the main menu has it too. *Switch: `optionswindow` (off: the original side panel).* - **Display:** window, borderless or full screen; window size and full-screen resolution; an FPS limit and V-sync; brightness. - **Interface Size:** any size from 0.5x up to the largest the window can show, or Auto. The interface resizes live as you drag. - **Graphics:** how zoomed-in art is drawn (FSR, Stylized, Sharp, Smooth or MMPX), and an art sharpness setting. - **Accessibility:** colour-blind filters (protanopia, deuteranopia, tritanopia) with a strength setting; cursor size 1x, 2x or 3x; edge scrolling on or off. ## Automatic updates - The installed game and the ZT1 Lab now update themselves. They look 15 seconds after starting and then every 30 minutes. - **Check now:** Game Options › Mods & Updates has a **Check now** button and shows what the updater is doing. The Lab's header button does the same. - **Download first, then ask:** a new version is downloaded in the background and checked first. Then the game asks at the main menu, never in the middle of a zoo: **Update now**, **Skip this version** or **Later**. The Lab's header button turns into **Restart to update**. - **Later** installs the update quietly when you next close the game or the Lab. - Updates are signed: anything that isn't, or doesn't match its signature, is refused. - The Game Build zip doesn't update itself; get the new version from the releases. ## Marine Mania tanks - Adjust Base goes as far as the original's, up to 12 above the ground: a tank can stand on its rock plinth. - A tank built over a path clears the path inside it, as the original does. - **Removing a tank puts its sea animals in their aquarium crates** straight away, and the food and dung in it go too. - **Removing a tank puts the ground back as it was**, instead of leaving a hole. *Switch: `tankgroundback`.* - **Fences and tank walls can't be built across a path** (along a path's edge is fine). *Switch: `nofenceonpath`.* - Raised walkways (bridges) can't be built over an exhibit or a tank. When a path drag becomes a bridge because the ground is too uneven, the tooltip says so. ## Marine Mania animals and staff - Sea animals swim at the original's heights; surface-only species stay on top. - Tank ratings and the zookeeper's advice cover depth, cleanliness, salinity and needing land. The info panels name the right carer. - The marine specialist visits when due, and climbs the tank wall up and down. - Sick and dying sea animals hold still as in the original. Floor shadows and fight clouds show where the animal is. - 41 animations that the game's own files name wrongly are now found and shown (the hammerhead's thrash, the marlin's and more). *Switch: `misnamedart`.* ## Mods - **Mod Menu** on the Tutorial & Scenario screen's layout. - **Add a mod...** brings in an old Zoo Tycoon download (`.ztd`), a `.zip` or a mod folder from your own files. Mods made with the 2001 tools work as they did: their own names, their object files, and big art such as cliff packs. - **Mod repository** (the installed game and the ZT1 Lab): browse and download mods from inside the game. Mods are checked for safety (rules and a virus scan) before they're offered. The Game Build zip has the Mod Menu for your own mods only. - **A Mods choice in the buy panels' filter**: only what your switched-on mods add or change. *Switch: `modfilter`.* - **Mod settings:** a mod can have its own options in Game Options. - **Shader mods** restyle the art or the whole screen (Game Options › Shaders). The Toon look is now one of these. - **HD art mods** carry bigger frames for the zoomed-in map. - The modders' guide is in `docs/MODDING.md`. ## ZT1 Lab - **Your mods:** make a mod, bring one in (drag and drop works), check it against the repository's rules, upload it with your CodeRook account, and see or take down your uploads. - **Experiments can make things:** run programs, write files and make mods. The HD art maker is now one of these experiments, so you can copy and change it. - **Sharing** (in the header, opt-in): what you find about zoo.exe is shared with other Lab users in the background, and what they find comes to you. - The game's window in Play is now part of the Lab's window, so it follows when you drag the Lab. - The original game in Play keeps its own drawing size; clicks and the keyboard reach it. - New tools: the art kit; the animation maker reads FATZ and shadow frames; memory poke and frame series for the original. # Bug fixes - Tank walls could be built on top of another tank's water: the cursor aimed at the sunken floor, two tiles off. Walls now go where you point. - Removing a tank left its sea animals lying on the sand as "escaped". - Laying a path near a tank or fence didn't show its tiles, so the path looked refused. - Keeper food (the fish food's swirl, every chow pile) was frozen on its first frame. - Paths stayed on a new tank's sunken floor under the water. - Tank heights now use the original's whole units; older saves are converted. - In the Lab, a function with only a made-up placeholder name now takes the real name someone else shared. - In the Lab, Build engine no longer fails with LNK1104 in a checkout. - The walkway self-test's stairs-down drag no longer fails at random.

README

{ "mcpServers": { "zt1-lab": { "command": "node", "args": ["lab-app/mcp/server.js"] } } }