PTB: Update 16 Begins Testing!

Steam post imageWelcome, Park Testers!

This early version of Update 16 includes animal health, disease and death, a completely overhauled vivarium system, new flat rides and a variety of other changes. We are expecting to launch this update on December 23rd. While the update remains a work in progress, we are looking for feedback in these areas:

• Challenge Mode balance

  • Animal affliction balance

  • Animal treatment

  • Financial difficulty

  • Research tree experience

As mentioned there have been a lot of changes since the last update, so be sure to read the full patch notes below to see everything that's new!

PTB Features

Diseases, Vets & Quarantine Bays

The headlining feature for this update is Animal Health, Disease & Treatment! Animals can now contract Diseases with a wide range of symptoms and severities—expect changes like lethargy, fatigue, reduced appetite/thirst, sneezing/panting/scratching, reduced awareness, and even visible skin conditions.

Diseases progress through clear stages: Incubation → Persistence → Recovery → Resistance. Symptoms become more obvious as incubation advances, fade during recovery, and then remain dormant during resistance (preventing reinfection for a time). Some diseases won’t heal naturally and require veterinary intervention.

Certain diseases are contagious and can spread via Transmission Vectors —between animals through contact and airborne spread, and into enclosures via contaminated feeding and bedding. Many afflictions can also progress into more severe conditions if left unchecked (e.g., Common Cold → Pneumonia → Pulmonary Edema → Respiratory Failure).

Disease risk is influenced by the animal’s condition and environment—things like stress, injury/compounding illness, malnutrition/dehydration, dirtiness, contaminated feed/water/bedding, age, genetic immunity, swimming, and improper/insufficient vegetation. Animals also track an Immunity value affected by genetics, illness/injury, vegetation compatibility, and vitamins.

Enclosure modules can become contaminated over time—dirtier enclosures contaminate faster, and at 50%+ contamination you’ll see flies. Keepers will automatically clean contaminated modules, but diseased modules (marked with green particles) must be detected via Survey before a Keeper is dispatched—and any diseased food found in feeders is destroyed during cleaning.

To properly identify illness, animals and modules must be Surveyed by a Vet. If an affliction is detected, that target is marked Under Observation, revealing all current (and newly acquired) conditions. Early-stage diseases (under 50% incubation) are harder to spot unless your Vet has the Early Detection perk.

Treatments may require research to unlock, and are generally faster than natural healing—often skipping persistence and reversing incubation. Treatment is delivered via Remote Medication (dart), Field Medicine (sedation and treatment within the enclosure), or Quarantine (sedation + transport to a bay for life-saving care).

With the right research and a Quarantine Bay placed near an enclosure, Automatic Quarantine Transport can handle transfers for you (swapping one-time transport costs for monthly upkeep). Animals can also be discharged automatically by the same proximity rules—unless they’re suffering from something you haven’t unlocked treatment for yet.

Feeders can also be configured for Supplements, consuming Medicine resources and delivered by Vets: Vitamins (higher immunity), Steroids (injury resistance), Mating Boosters/Suppressors (higher/lower fecundity), and Mutagen (more genetic variety in offspring).

Vivariums

Vivariums are placeable habitat modules designed to house small or specialized animals —letting you build everything from compact reptile houses to miniature aviaries. They expand on the old Mini-Aviary concept with Terrestrial, Arboreal, and Amphibious setups, giving these species a dedicated home that better suits their scale and movement.

To help you decorate in a smaller space, Vivariums include a quick customization system with environment-based nature presets you can mix and match, and even randomize with a seed. From the same menu, enrichment items can be easily toggled on or off, adding destinations for animals to explore— logs to jump onto or frames to glide toward.

On top of that, each Vivarium wall comes with glass, mesh, facades, and cladding styles that can be switched out, fitting cleanly into your builds. Amphibious Vivariums benefit from a new water tech that can generate water volumes on demand, helping these exhibits look better and run efficiently.

Rides

The update introduces two brand-new guest rides: the Ferris Wheel and Panoramic Tower. These major attractions are designed to pull crowds and provide a big boost to your park’s appeal thanks to their high Attraction Points value.

Both rides are operated by Cashier Staff and function with a full guest flow. Visitors will form a queue on designated waiting platforms, board when space becomes available, enjoy the ride cycle, and then disembark before the next group enters.

PTB Changes

ANIMAL TRANSPORTATION

Moving animals outside of their enclosures now has a cost based on the animal size and movement distance. To move an animal into a Quarantine Bay, it will need to be sedated.

What is NOT included in this PTB?

As usual, we are still working to add the remaining features, audio and other components that'll be there when the update fully releases. All of the new Vivarium animals will be released once the full update drops.

While the game is playable, you can expect to run into bugs, crashes or general oddities. Please send your feedback and bug reports to our Discord server's appropriate channel.

Here are the major outstanding things not present in the PTB:

• The new Vivarium species

How to Access the Public Testing Branch (Experimental!)

The Public Testing Branch (PTB) is a version of Prehistoric Kingdom that can be opted-into on Steam, containing experimental and potentially breaking changes. With the help of the community, we're able to hunt down various issues and gather feedback before pushing a an update to the public version of Prehistoric Kingdom. Right click Prehistoric Kingdom in your Steam Library Go to Properties Betas Select 'ptb_public_testing'Please note that it is not recommended to play Public Testing Branch parks on earlier versions of the game. Please send feedback and bug reports to our Discord server's appropriate channel.

Known Issues & Additional Notes

• A little under half of all animal species are currently missing their knockdown, struggle, and death animations, which can result in janky visuals for animal sedation and demise. The animation volume for this update has been challenging, but this is something we'll keep working on and polishing until the update's release and beyond.

• Currently some of the animals models are missing vertex data critical for the rendering of visual affliction symptoms, meaning some skin conditions will not be fully functional.

• As a result of FSR, humans can appear smeared in motion. Turning off FSR will resolve this issue.

• The side faces of the water volumes in amphibious vivarium have glitchy visuals at this moment. This is something we're actively looking to fix.

• There currently are a couple of guest art issues, relating to one of the man's outfits animations and the old cashier outfits.

Full Patch Notes

Features

• NEW FEATURE: Vivariums

  Vivariums are brand-new habitat modules designed for compact exhibit displays. Place Terrestrial, Arboreal, and Amphibious vivarium modules in multiple sizes, then decorate them with new props and scenery to create detailed exhibits for smaller animals.

• NEW FEATURE: Animal Health, Disease & Treatment Animals can now contract diseases with distinct symptoms and progression stages. Some illnesses are contagious and can spread through transmission vectors like animal contact, airborne spread, and contaminated food, or bedding.

  To properly identify illness, animals and modules must be Surveyed by a Vet—detected targets become Under Observation, revealing current (and newly acquired) afflictions. Treatments can be delivered in the field, or in the most severe cases, in Quarantine Bays. To be moved to Quarantine, an animal must first be sedated by Staff.

• NEW FEATURE: Vets

  A new Vet Staff role has been added to handle animal medical care. Vets can survey animals and enclosure modules to detect afflictions, keep sick animals Under Observation, and administer treatment. When hands-on care is needed, Vets can also sedate animals for procedures, preparing them for quarantine transport. Vets can also deliver supplements to feeders, providing improvements to animal welfare and maintenance.

• NEW FEATURE: Animal Death

  Health outcomes now have real consequences. Untreated diseases and worsening conditions can become fatal, making early detection, enclosure hygiene, and timely treatment more important than ever. Additionally, animals can succumb due to the health implications of old age and unmet needs.

• NEW FEATURE: Flat Rides

  Two new guest rides have been added: the Ferris Wheel and Panoramic Tower. Operated by Cashier Staff, guests will queue up, board, take the ride, then disembark—earning these attractions a high Attraction Points value.

• NEW FEATURE: Expanded Modular Merging

  Modular merging has been expanded to allow for the quick collection of multiple Groups, each being now able to have a parent and a set of children. Select your preferred merging options through the Modular Group Infomenu.

• NEW FEATURE: FSR 3.1 Upscaling

  From the settings menu, players with modern GPUs can now choose several levels of FSR upscaling to improve their rendering performance. This also includes a new ‘Native AA’ mode which offers smooth, anti-aliased visuals via FSR. Players with older GPUs can still take advantage of FSR 1 to improve their framerate. Please note that Prehistoric Kingdom is a CPU-heavy game, so performance gains greatly depend on your park!

Additions

• Gameplay

  • Added the following excavation sites to the game:

    • Fram Formation, Canada

    • Maevarano Formation, Madagascar

    • Tiaojishan Formation, China

  • Added a new Research category to the Research Menu - Pathology - containing unlockable research items that enable the treatment of most of the animal afflictions, as well as treatment facility upgrades.

  • Added new research items to the Biology research tree:

    • Medium Vivariums Unlocks medium-sized Vivariums, housing larger species.

    • Large Vivariums

      Unlocks large-sized Vivariums, housing the largest vivarium species.

    • Vitamins Unlocks the Vitamins supplement, allowing animals to heal faster from afflictions.

    • Steroids Unlocks the Steroids supplement, allowing animals to heal faster from wounds.

    • Mutagen Unlocks the Mutagens supplement, increasing the chances and intensity of mutations from parent to offspring.

    • Mating Suppressants Unlocks the Mating Suppressant supplement, decreasing animal’s courtship during the breeding season.

    • Mating Boosters Unlocks the Mating Booster supplement, increasing animal’s courtship during the breeding season.

    • Improved Healing Supplements Increases the efficiency of Vitamins and Steroids.

    • Potent Healing Supplements Maximizes the efficiency of Vitamins and Steroids.

    • Improved Mutagens Increases the efficiency of mutagens.

    • Potent Mutagens Maximizes the efficiency of Mutagens.

    • Improved Mating Supplements Increases the efficiency of Mating Boosters and Mating Suppressants.

    • Potent Mating Supplements Maximizes the efficiency of Mating Boosters and Mating Suppressants.

  • Added new research items to the Construction & Design research tree:

    • Ferris Wheel Unlocks the Ferris Wheel ride

    • Panoramic Tower Unlocks the Panoramic Tower ride

• Buildings & Scenery

  • Quarantine Bay Small

  • Quarantine Bay Large

  • Added 2 brand new Flat Rides

    • Ferris Wheel

    • Panoramic Tower

  • Added Medical Props

    • Vet Lamp Large

    • Vet Lamp Small

    • Vet Computer

    • Vet Desk 1

    • Vet Desk 2

    • Vet Desk 3

    • Vet Ultrasound Machine

    • Vet Oxygen Monitor

    • Vet Oxygen Tank

    • Vet Heartrate Monitor

    • Vet Bin 1

    • Vet Bin 2

  • Added Misc Backstage Props

    • Electric Cable Thin 4m

    • Electric Cable Thin 1m

    • Electric Cable Thin Corner

    • Electric Cable Thin Junction

    • Electric Cable Thin Power Boxes

    • Metal Walkway 2m

    • Metal Walkway 4m

    • Metal Walkway Railing

    • Metal Walkway Square

    • Metal Walkway Stair 1

    • Metal Walkway Stair 2

    • Metal Walkway Stair Step

  • Vivarium Amphibious - Box, Small, Medium, Large

  • Vivarium Arboreal - Box, Small, Medium, Large

  • Vivarium Terrestrial - Box, Small, Medium, Large

  • Added Vivarium Props & Items

    • Wooden Platform Square

    • Wooden Platform Bridge 1m

    • Wooden Platform Bridge 2m

    • Beam Wooden 1m

    • Beam Wooden 2m

    • Beam Wooden 4m

    • Beam Wooden Base

    • Heating Lamp 0.5m

    • Heating Lamp 2m

    • Heating Lamp 4m

    • Heating Lamp 6m

    • Vivarium Birdhouse

    • Vivarium Box Climbing Set

    • Vivarium Large Climbing Set

    • Vivarium Medium Climbing Set

    • Vivarium Small Climbing Set

    • Vivarium Hammock

    • Vivarium Tree Shell

    • Vivarium Faux Tree

    • Rope Thin 1m

    • Rope Thin 4m

    • Rope Thin 4m Hanging

    • Rope Thin Knot

    • Rope Thin Cap

    • Rope Thin Hook

    • Log Hollow

    • Log Hollow Short

    • Stump Driftwood Roots

    • Stump Tree 1

    • Stump Tree 2

    • Driftwood Curved Trunk

    • Driftwood Curved Trunk Rootless

    • Rock Hiding Cave

    • Rock Lounging Platform

    • Vivarium Rock Cladding Walls with 3 styling options (Wet/Forest/Dry)

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding 4x4

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding 4x8

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding 8x12

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding 12x16

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding Half 4x4

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding Half 4x8

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding Half 8x12

      • Rock Vivarium Cladding Half 12x16

• UI/UX

  • The animal paleopedia menu now has a ‘Diseases’ tab, displaying brief information about all the various diseases a species can contract

  • Added supplement selection to the animal feeder menus, allowing players to feed their animals various supplements, if available

  • Added a Vivarium filter toggle to the Animal Nursery gallery panel, giving players the ability to quickly switch animal selection between all animals and vivarium animals only

  • Added a water trough selection widget menu

  • Added a bedding selection widget menu

• Audio

  • Added more sounds to the Nursery menu to make it a more polished experience

Changes

• Animals

  • Completely overhauled the models, textures and animations for both Microraptor and Archaeopteryx, now featuring a completely new navigation system tuned to work within the new Vivarium framework

  • Moving animals outside of their enclosures now has a cost based on the animal size and movement distance

  • Increased time between vocalisations for all sauropods as well as Charonosaurus and Parasaurolophus

  • Balanced weights, costs and appeal points for all medium and large ceratopsians

  • Updated Nursery icon for Charonosaurus to reflect its updated crest

• Staff

  • Re-designed the Cashier Staff outfit

  • Cashiers’ tasks now extend to Ride operations

• Environment

  • Adjusted sky and atmospheric lighting to both look more cohesive and interact better with FSR

  • Grass should appear thicker at a distance and slightly more varied in height

  • Tropical Grass color is now a little deeper and more saturated

  • Updated terrain textures for:

    • Boreal Grass

    • Temperate Dirt

    • Temperate Grass

    • Tropical Grass

    • Tropical Sand

    • Scrubland Sand

    • Scrubland Dirt

    • Scrubland Rock

  • Decreased the tiling scale of all grass textures to feel more detailed when looking at small animals

• UI/UX

  • Increased the efficacy of the camera flashlight

  • Updated various terrain texture previews

  • Logistics resources will be hidden if disabled and empty

• Rendering

  • Geometry draw distances increased: Ultra from 1.2x to 1.4x. Cinematic from 1.4x to 2.0x. You can select a high geometry quality setting by itself with any other combination of other visual settings to get longer draw distances.

• Post Processing

  • Auto-exposure is now more responsive to dark areas and no longer brightens the game when looking down

  • Bloom now responds better to bright highlights and has a lens dirt effect

  • Color grading has a bit more contrast and saturation to make the game look less drab

  • Post-processing now updates even when the game is paused

• Audio

  • Midtone ambient frequencies will now be slightly ducked by animal sounds

• Misc.

  • The base camera FOV has been made slightly tighter in order to make the player feel like they’re more “in the world” while building and managing

Bug Fixes

• Crashes

  • Fix for a potential crash

• Critical

  • Fixed multiple memory leaks that could stop core systems from functioning during long sessions

  • General improvements and stabilization to animal asset and texture loading

  • Fixed a new modular group misalignment issue in the starting levels

  • Fixed a long standing shading error causing modular selection outline to render with incorrect coloration when a selection stack contained multiple colors

  • Fixed animal animation stability issues

• Gameplay

  • Fix for a long standing logical bug that could allow for the early research of a late-game research item, if accessed directly through link buttons throughout the GUI

• Animals

  • Improved animal reliability when pathing around nav boundary corners

• Staff

  • Improved operator saving, staff should return to their previous Cashiering/Ride Operation jobs quicker after loading a game

• Buildings & Scenery

  • Fixed coloring issues related to modular lighting, which should be much more consistent and stable now

  • Fixed some modular pieces not being see-through for the guests, including the 4x4 Glass Wall, and the chainlink pieces

  • Feeders should track their consumed food more accurately between play sessions

• Environment

  • Fixed an issue that caused the Coastal dirt to be lower resolution than intended

• UI/UX

  • Fixed a recurring bug causing the Modular Style Menu to hide away if a structure was deselected and selected back fast enough

  • Fixed fill toggle layouts overflowing outside of masked GUI elements

• Rendering

  • Light LODs have been restored (there will be more improvement coming here)

  • Fixed Light LODs culling incorrectly close to the camera

• Audio

  • Fixed a bug that caused ambient audio to “pop” loudly when exiting the Park Services menu

  • Fixed excavations menu ambience not fading in at high zoom levels

  • Fixed an oversight that could potentially cause guests to become louder than expected

• Misc.

  • Fixed a bug that could have prevented triggering the Noah’s Park achievement

Performance

• Strategically removed shadow casting from small or “whispy” plants to reduce batch and shadowcaster count. For players using high or ultra screen space shadows (recommended) the visual impact should be minor

• Made massive CPU optimization to Scroll rects containing hundreds of elements

• Significant CPU performance gains while viewing the Animal Management Menu

• Minor performance improvements to the building menu

• Optimized animal material batching

• Minor general CPU performance gains