Hi Coaster friends,
As you all know, everyone here at Frontier is working passionately on Planet Coaster in order to bring you the best theme park simulation game we possibly can! Sometimes it can be difficult to see what exactly goes on behind the scenes, with many departments working together and crossing over, from audio to publishing to QA to support etc. Therefore we thought it would be fun to reinstate the Meet the Team QAs we did a while ago; this will give you an inside look at the people, development, and passion that makes Planet Coaster.
We are starting off with the lovely James Stant, Senior Audio Designer. James will be checking in on this thread during the day to answer any of your questions - enjoy!
What’s your earliest memory of visiting a theme park?
To be honest, I didn’t visit many theme parks growing up following a somewhat nauseating encounter with a teacups ride!
What is the craziest memory for you about theme parks?
A number of years ago, I performed at Disneyland Paris with a touring band. It felt so incredibly surreal; from the mind-blowing attractions to the larger-than-life characters to the immaculate detailing everywhere, my childhood was being brought to life right before my very eyes.
What is your favourite type of ride at a theme park and why?
Having recently become a father for the first time last year, I feel like my whole outlook on life has shifted towards discovering new things for my son to experience. As such, I get the feeling I’m going to develop a newfound love of kiddie rides/coasters. Now then... where’s the Wendigo?
What exactly are you working on with Planet Coaster?
These days I’m mainly working on the people of Planet Coaster. This covers crowd guests, guests on rides, vendors, mascots, the janitor, etc. but there is some crossover of tasks (so for example, each sound designer ‘owns’ a couple of mascots’ – mine are King Coaster, Chief Beef and Princess Amelie). Many of you may know me as the creator of Planco, the language spoken by the people in your parks. The dictionary continues to grow on a daily basis and I’m so excited to have seen people embracing it with the same enthusiasm I’ve had throughout its development. At the moment though, I’m currently giving a huge overhaul to the guests on rides/coasters, which is a large task but one area of the game that I hope you’ll notice has improved when the game reaches its full release.
What does an average day at work look like for you?
I’ll start off by checking my emails, updating my code/resources, have a quick read of the Planet Coaster forums and updating the Planco dictionary with any new words I jotted down on my phone the previous evening at home. I’m very fortunate to have a varied workload though so an average day could hold anything in store for me. One day I may be composing music for the carousel, the next I may be interactively implementing Jim Guthrie’s main menu music. Another day I’ll find myself working on the mechanical sounds for the Kickflip flat ride or perhaps I’ll be recording people screaming excitedly to use for the guests on rides. Maybe I’ll be sticking balloons up my jumper and rubbing them together to get the squeaky sound of King Coaster’s body suit. The life of a sound designer is creative, experimental and often very unexpected!
What kind of music do you listen to while you are working?
Due to the nature of my job, I don’t get a huge amount of chance to listen to music while working. My academic background is Music Composition and as you may expect, my tastes are rather diverse. I did develop a love for pop-punk-rock (and various similar genres) around the turn of the century and that never really faltered. Lately I’ve been hooked on new albums from Billy Talent and Erik Chandler, but typically I still like listening to acts such as Bowling For Soup, The Offspring, Army of Freshmen, Reel Big Fish, Patent Pending, Zebrahead, ‘A’, etc. I love any band that try to bring a smile to your face; I think that is such a beautiful thing.
What have you worked on before Planet Coaster, and what did you do on those projects?
My first two AAA audio credits were with Rare on Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts and Kinect Sports, both of which I gained before finishing my university studies. I moved to Frontier in May 2013, where I immediately joined the Zoo Tycoon team. I worked on some of the animals (bears, giraffes, parrots, large lizards, etc.), the conversation system, biome ambiences, diegetic music placement and additional VO. After that I contributed ambiences, Foley and instrumental/vocal performances to Tales From Deep Space, our delightfully charming adventure game for Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablets. I did a bit of work on ScreamRide too, where I worked on the dynamic dialogue system, chatter VO, tutorials and additional cutscenes. Following that, I worked on Elite: Dangerous providing CQC ambiences and match notifications, console optimisations and force feedback (controller vibration using audio signal). I then joined the Planet Coaster team where I was able to combine my park management experience of Zoo Tycoon with my coaster experience of ScreamRide, adding to my childhood love for management sim games (Theme Park, Theme Hospital, Zoo Tycoon, etc.)
How does working on Planet Coaster compare to working on other games you’ve worked on?
I feel like we have a great degree of creative freedom and this is remarkably liberating for us. It encourages you to let your imagination run wild and explore possibilities that you may not otherwise do. Planet Coaster is such a fun project to work on and I’m not sure that creations such as Planco would have been born had it not been for this working environment that nurtures originality and experimentation. I’ve always been immensely proud of my past achievements, but never before have I felt so rewarded for my contributions to a game. This is certainly a massive testament to the work of the whole team, for it is them who inspire me on a daily basis and challenge me to meet the high standards that are being set throughout Frontier.
What have you learned so far from working on Planet Coaster?
That the community are incredibly passionate about importing their own music! We hear you and, as we assured you in our Audio Q&A, we most definitely are looking into it. As players, it’s a feature we’d all love to see added to Planet Coaster, but it’s genuinely not as simple as many would assume it would be. And after all, if we’re going to do something, we want to make sure we do it right!
What makes Planet Coaster special, in your opinion?
The heritage that Frontier has with coaster games and the experience of my team members. I cannot describe how amazing it is to work on a project where I will walk past a colleague’s desk and see something new in development that literally makes my jaw drop in amazement or makes me grin from ear-to-ear. We have exceptionally talented professionals here at Frontier and the desire to be ‘best-in-class’ within this genre is most definitely clear.
What is currently your favourite Planet Coaster feature in Alpha 3, and why?
The Steam Workshop integration. It encourages players to create, to share, to learn, to collaborate and to express themselves. We’ve seen so many mind-blowing creations added to the Planet Coaster Workshop and it’s always remarkable to find scenery pieces being used so ingeniously. Oh, also a special mention for plazas; having seen how frequently requested it was on the forums, I was delighted to see another highly sought-after feature added to a recent update.
Tell the community a fun fact about yourself.
I’ve been very fortunate to perform with the band Bowling For Soup on numerous occasions, performing in front of crowds of thousands of people at some amazing venues across the UK, including Download Festival at Donington Park. My lifestyle is far removed from one of typical rock-n-roll, but this is probably my biggest ‘claim-to-fame’ outside of my life in the games development industry.
If you could ask the Planet Coaster community one question, what would it be?
What sound(s) do you most associate with visiting a theme park?
As you all know, everyone here at Frontier is working passionately on Planet Coaster in order to bring you the best theme park simulation game we possibly can! Sometimes it can be difficult to see what exactly goes on behind the scenes, with many departments working together and crossing over, from audio to publishing to QA to support etc. Therefore we thought it would be fun to reinstate the Meet the Team QAs we did a while ago; this will give you an inside look at the people, development, and passion that makes Planet Coaster.
We are starting off with the lovely James Stant, Senior Audio Designer. James will be checking in on this thread during the day to answer any of your questions - enjoy!
What’s your earliest memory of visiting a theme park?
To be honest, I didn’t visit many theme parks growing up following a somewhat nauseating encounter with a teacups ride!
What is the craziest memory for you about theme parks?
A number of years ago, I performed at Disneyland Paris with a touring band. It felt so incredibly surreal; from the mind-blowing attractions to the larger-than-life characters to the immaculate detailing everywhere, my childhood was being brought to life right before my very eyes.
What is your favourite type of ride at a theme park and why?
Having recently become a father for the first time last year, I feel like my whole outlook on life has shifted towards discovering new things for my son to experience. As such, I get the feeling I’m going to develop a newfound love of kiddie rides/coasters. Now then... where’s the Wendigo?
What exactly are you working on with Planet Coaster?
These days I’m mainly working on the people of Planet Coaster. This covers crowd guests, guests on rides, vendors, mascots, the janitor, etc. but there is some crossover of tasks (so for example, each sound designer ‘owns’ a couple of mascots’ – mine are King Coaster, Chief Beef and Princess Amelie). Many of you may know me as the creator of Planco, the language spoken by the people in your parks. The dictionary continues to grow on a daily basis and I’m so excited to have seen people embracing it with the same enthusiasm I’ve had throughout its development. At the moment though, I’m currently giving a huge overhaul to the guests on rides/coasters, which is a large task but one area of the game that I hope you’ll notice has improved when the game reaches its full release.
What does an average day at work look like for you?
I’ll start off by checking my emails, updating my code/resources, have a quick read of the Planet Coaster forums and updating the Planco dictionary with any new words I jotted down on my phone the previous evening at home. I’m very fortunate to have a varied workload though so an average day could hold anything in store for me. One day I may be composing music for the carousel, the next I may be interactively implementing Jim Guthrie’s main menu music. Another day I’ll find myself working on the mechanical sounds for the Kickflip flat ride or perhaps I’ll be recording people screaming excitedly to use for the guests on rides. Maybe I’ll be sticking balloons up my jumper and rubbing them together to get the squeaky sound of King Coaster’s body suit. The life of a sound designer is creative, experimental and often very unexpected!
What kind of music do you listen to while you are working?
Due to the nature of my job, I don’t get a huge amount of chance to listen to music while working. My academic background is Music Composition and as you may expect, my tastes are rather diverse. I did develop a love for pop-punk-rock (and various similar genres) around the turn of the century and that never really faltered. Lately I’ve been hooked on new albums from Billy Talent and Erik Chandler, but typically I still like listening to acts such as Bowling For Soup, The Offspring, Army of Freshmen, Reel Big Fish, Patent Pending, Zebrahead, ‘A’, etc. I love any band that try to bring a smile to your face; I think that is such a beautiful thing.
What have you worked on before Planet Coaster, and what did you do on those projects?
My first two AAA audio credits were with Rare on Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts and Kinect Sports, both of which I gained before finishing my university studies. I moved to Frontier in May 2013, where I immediately joined the Zoo Tycoon team. I worked on some of the animals (bears, giraffes, parrots, large lizards, etc.), the conversation system, biome ambiences, diegetic music placement and additional VO. After that I contributed ambiences, Foley and instrumental/vocal performances to Tales From Deep Space, our delightfully charming adventure game for Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablets. I did a bit of work on ScreamRide too, where I worked on the dynamic dialogue system, chatter VO, tutorials and additional cutscenes. Following that, I worked on Elite: Dangerous providing CQC ambiences and match notifications, console optimisations and force feedback (controller vibration using audio signal). I then joined the Planet Coaster team where I was able to combine my park management experience of Zoo Tycoon with my coaster experience of ScreamRide, adding to my childhood love for management sim games (Theme Park, Theme Hospital, Zoo Tycoon, etc.)
How does working on Planet Coaster compare to working on other games you’ve worked on?
I feel like we have a great degree of creative freedom and this is remarkably liberating for us. It encourages you to let your imagination run wild and explore possibilities that you may not otherwise do. Planet Coaster is such a fun project to work on and I’m not sure that creations such as Planco would have been born had it not been for this working environment that nurtures originality and experimentation. I’ve always been immensely proud of my past achievements, but never before have I felt so rewarded for my contributions to a game. This is certainly a massive testament to the work of the whole team, for it is them who inspire me on a daily basis and challenge me to meet the high standards that are being set throughout Frontier.
What have you learned so far from working on Planet Coaster?
That the community are incredibly passionate about importing their own music! We hear you and, as we assured you in our Audio Q&A, we most definitely are looking into it. As players, it’s a feature we’d all love to see added to Planet Coaster, but it’s genuinely not as simple as many would assume it would be. And after all, if we’re going to do something, we want to make sure we do it right!
What makes Planet Coaster special, in your opinion?
The heritage that Frontier has with coaster games and the experience of my team members. I cannot describe how amazing it is to work on a project where I will walk past a colleague’s desk and see something new in development that literally makes my jaw drop in amazement or makes me grin from ear-to-ear. We have exceptionally talented professionals here at Frontier and the desire to be ‘best-in-class’ within this genre is most definitely clear.
What is currently your favourite Planet Coaster feature in Alpha 3, and why?
The Steam Workshop integration. It encourages players to create, to share, to learn, to collaborate and to express themselves. We’ve seen so many mind-blowing creations added to the Planet Coaster Workshop and it’s always remarkable to find scenery pieces being used so ingeniously. Oh, also a special mention for plazas; having seen how frequently requested it was on the forums, I was delighted to see another highly sought-after feature added to a recent update.
Tell the community a fun fact about yourself.
I’ve been very fortunate to perform with the band Bowling For Soup on numerous occasions, performing in front of crowds of thousands of people at some amazing venues across the UK, including Download Festival at Donington Park. My lifestyle is far removed from one of typical rock-n-roll, but this is probably my biggest ‘claim-to-fame’ outside of my life in the games development industry.
If you could ask the Planet Coaster community one question, what would it be?
What sound(s) do you most associate with visiting a theme park?