Another entry in to the popular Sim/Tycoon genre, Zoo Empire lets you build and administer zoos in an effort to attract a disposable income crowd that loves seeing wild animals penned up. The less said animals sulk about it (they actually smile when they're happy, in fact) and the more bathrooms you provide for visitors, the more popular the attraction and the more lucrative the business and so on.

Manage everything from the animals themselves to the type of fencing that holds them (Plexiglas or concrete?), from the fauna they prefer to the employees that tend them (bright or smart-like concrete?). And that's just "free" mode.

Zoo Empire also offers "campaign" gameplay where you aspire to renown as the zoo industry's savior, going from zoo to zoo and fixing that which ails them like a celebrated jack-of-all-pooper-scoopers.

The game is rendered in 3D and is acceptably pretty about it with cartoonish charm. Its meticulous play mechanics are robust in the "real time" way of sims and gameplay is absorbing with countless fiddle-with-this menus which, as a downside, can overwhelm the screen and detract from the aforementioned prettiness of it all, but what do you expect? A National Geographic screen saver?