I haven’t unlocked deep tanks yet.
First two levels are definitely tutorial, so I’ll play some more this weekend and then give a report. So far it’s been adding new mechanics pretty regularly.
This is how it looks after level2:
Mechanics:
Currently, fish go in tanks, which need filtering and heating depending on size of tank and number/size of fish. Filters and heaters need to be adjacent to the tank, but guests don’t like to look at machinery. Filters and heaters can instead be attached to a pump, which targets a tank at a distance, so if you want to put a tank out in the middle of your floor, that’s how you do it.
Fish eat different kinds of food (3 kinds so far), and you need to hire staff to feed the fish, fix equipment when it breaks, clean up after guests. You need to leave an open spot on the tank for your staff to feed the fish from.
Tanks, fish, staff, and fish-food all cost money.
When guests enter the aquarium, you get paid, when they look at a tank this generates Prestige / Ecology / Science points based on the fish and decorations in the tank. Prestige decays, so you need to keep making your aquarium bigger and better to rank-up. Ranking-up with Prestige unlock fish and research projects. Fish unlocks are paid for with ecology, and Research projects are paid for with science points. Most fish so far give either Ecology or Science but not both.
Meta:
So far it seems there are two primary tasks: tank composition (what fish and decorations are compatible and can go in a tank together and in what quantities), and aquarium layout (how to isolate the machinery from the guests, how many staff to feed the fish and maintain the aquarium, staff has skills and can have job priorities and operating zones). On harder difficulty levels there would be the money crunch of doing it all efficiently as well.