I poured a lot of time in my younger years (and I suppose my current years too, seeing as I still play it pretty regularly) with the original Roller Coaster Tycoon. It is and always has been one of my absolute favorite games, one that leaves me shocked by how much time passes every time I play it. The years have seen plenty of sequels to the game, as well as many others entering the amusement park management genre. A decently well known contender here is Planet Coaster, and I recently tried out the sequel to it, Planet Coaster 2, which I'll be sharing my thoughts on.
Visuals and Music
Planet Coaster 2 is a good looking game. The visual style is nothing particularly unique or timeless, but it's fairly pretty, and has plenty of decorative options to make your parks good looking themselves. I'd say the same applies to the music, it's nothing particularly amazing, but it doesn't get in the way and isn't too
Gameplay
The game has a few different modes to choose from. Career mode is the main mode, and drops you into various scenarios involving parks that are struggling or incomplete, and give you a series of objectives to complete to ultimately make them successful. These objectives can be things like making certain attractions and shops, achieving certain levels of income or popularity, and more. I did find that the career campaign overall was a bit too easy on the standard difficulty, and that there were some parts that could be a bit better balanced.
Beyond that, franchise mode has you build up a franchise in various parts of the world and compete with other players to rank on the leaderboards, challenge mode puts you in harsher challenges than career mode, with a small starting budget and tighter management requirements to stay afloat, and sandbox mode allows you to drop into either an empty area, or a template based on the career mode scenarios and create your park to your heart's content.
The most important aspect of the game is of course the rides you build in your park, since an amusement park is nothing without its attractions. There are flat rides, which include things like teacup rides and bumper cars, and while they have various options for theming, they're generally as simple as placing and opening.
Roller coasters are another matter. While there are several premade options you can choose to build, you can also build a coaster from scratch. You can build the entire length of the coaster, using chain lifts to bring the cars up and creating whatever kind of paths and ups and downs you'd like, making considerations for the physics involved. Depending on what you create, the ride will have a certain level of excitement, fear, and nausea, and guests will usually want certain amounts of each. A coaster needs to be functional and safe to be opened, so you also need to test it first to make sure it completes a loop and doesn't exceed safety limits.
The game also allows for building water parks, with attractions like pools and water slides available. Pools have their own considerations involved, there needs to be changing rooms nearby, the water needs adequate temperature, there needs to be good lifeguard coverage, and the slides, similar to roller coasters, need to be tested before you can open them, but can also be built in any shape you'd like similar to a coaster. You an also use jets and wave machines to create lazy rivers and wave pools, so you really do have options to create a full water park.
Rides aren't all there is to it of course. You'll need the park well staffed, with janitors keeping it clean, mechanics keeping your rides going, people to research new attractions and infrastructure, and vendors to manage any food, drink, or souvenir stands. You'll also need lifeguards for pools as mentioned earlier and attendants for your various rides. They can be assigned to zones to help keep things well managed, but will need break areas or they'll be unhappy with their work.
You'll also need to make sure your park has a power grid keeping all your attractions functional, water filtration for any pools or flumes you have, and ideally you'll want the scenery of your park to be pleasant as well. You'll have to make sure there's restrooms and places for guests to get food and drink around in order to keep them happy. You'll also want to make sure people are aware of your park, and you can pull in attention by running advertising campaigns and continuing to add new things over time. Everything you do will require maintaining a solid park rating, which is determined by a combination of attractions, scenery, and guest satisfaction.
At first there will be limits to what you can build, both in terms of rides and infrastructure, but you can build workshops where mechanics can do research, and those points can be spent to unlock new things. This can include new types of rides, or better means of generating power and filtering water, so it's definitely a good idea to keep on top of research.
Money needs to be managed as well; advertising isn't free, rides cost money to build and maintain, staff have salaries, and admission can vary. You can charge for park entry or individually for rides, but generally if you charge for entry, guests will expect rides to have little to no cost themselves. You'll also have to consider how expensive to make things; a higher price might get you more money per guest, but you might end up with less guests overall as they may not think it's worthwhile to ride attractions or buy concessions.
Scenery options are plentiful, and many of these options fit specific themes that can be used to achieve a specific theme for your park. Sticking to a theme can appeal to guests so it's definitely worth consideration. I did find it a bit tough to make my own parks look as good as some of the premade ones, but I'm sure that's a combination of my lack of an eye for design and just needing to get the hang of the tools more.
Conclusion
I'm really only scratching the surface here, but there's far too much for me to go into too much detail, so I'll wrap things up here.
I did find that there were some minor balance issues in the campaign, getting the hang of the tools to make your park a good looking one takes some doing, and there was definitely some bugs still lingering in the game, but all in all I had a pretty good time. It won't dethrone my old lifelong favorite, but it's definitely a game I'll come back and play time and time again over the years.
If you like games about building and managing amusement parks, I definitely recommend Planet Coaster 2; it's a pretty solid one.
VERDICT: Recommended
Reviewed on PC
Review Copy was Provided
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