General / Off-Topic My money is on Planet Coaster now

[Vampiro]

Untill yesterday i was planning on buying both Planet Coaster and RCTW and just let time decide what game i liked better.

After playing the BETA i was sure there was 1 thing to do and that was to cancel my pre-order.
There are no darkrides, no waterrides, no transport rides, no piece-by-piece building. And after the Beta it was clear to me that even the main focus of RCTW (the coaster builder) was a major letdown. I would have liked 2 good games as competition makes the games better. Unfortunatly it seems like Frontier doesn't even have to do -anything- to win over RCTW fans.

Ok, enough about "the other" game.

Right now my money is on Frontier, and deep down it has always been like that. I hoped that Atari could surprise me, but it was Frontier who created RCT3 and thats the game that gave me days and weeks and month's even YEARS of joy when playing Rollercoaster Tycoon 3.

I thing the fact fans still create CSO after 10 years is pretty much a writing on the wall how good this game really was.

Hopefully Coaster World can be the next big thing is coastergame land. If i had my say, please take everything that made RCT3 so succesfull and implement that in Planet Coaster but upgraded into 2015 standards. So hopefully we will be able to have piece-by-piece building and darkrides this time. Hopefully we get updates about them soon, as quite honestly, we know quite a little on this whole game.

Right now the only concearn i have about PC is the cartoon style. Dont get me wrong, RCT3 was cartoon-ish as well but i feel it had just about the right mix between a cartoon and realism. Hopefully Frontier can do the same with PC, realistic enough to make me feel like im seeing a real life theme park yet cartoon enough to make the game seem like FUN.

My 2 cents

 

[Marvin1]

My money was always on Planet Coaster. I mean, they are the ones that built RCT3.

 

[Mattaust]

Don't be concerned with the cartoony style. In the long run you'll prefer it.

At the end of the day realistic looking games never age well. Hell look at cartoony styled games made back from 2001-2007. They have aged so well that they could pass as games from this day and age.

Cartoony art styles are faster and easier to produce for 3D and 2D artist. Plus they can have quirky characteristics that can make a game more appeased and memorable.

I strongly believe that this will be the better game, but my instinct says that there may be a limited map size that most might find irritable. : |

 

[David T-Rex]

As long as they can MOD the map like you can in Cities Skylines then go for it - so those with the horsepower can have bigger playable areas

 

[.Bole]

Mine two,i am just saving 70e for beta access

 

[Wobbly]

I shall be investing in both, but I think if Frontier get the players involved (because lets face it, our voices are landing on deaf ears with Atari & Co.) during the Alpha stage, and I mean really involved, then they'll have the best one.

Playing the "beta" over the last 2 days, I realised something fundamentally was wrong (I'm not talking about the bugs), the charm was non existent, it was sterile, even the scenery and the mood. It didn't feel like RCT, it feels alien to me. I find that unsettling.

When I first seen Planet Coasters paths, people running in directions, scenery and saturated cartoon style, that gave me the nostalgia feeling from the other games. Ironic isn't it, Atari have gone down a path of No Limits and another company is taking over with the character. I've felt pretty depressed over this beta, thinking to myself, I don't want my favourite franchise to just die like that, but in a way I'm hopeful that the charm of RCT will live on in another game.

I would have said that Atari should have gone with Frontier again, but I think Frontier will do a better job without Atari breathing down their necks and the disastrous marketing team.

I do have a worry though about Frontier, they need a great marketing team to get this going full steam a head.

 

[David T-Rex]

If they get some of the fans involved and have a great product word of mouth will do a lot more to help than a lot of money thrown at advertising.

 

[inspectorgadget1]

When I first seen Planet Coasters paths, people running in directions, scenery and saturated cartoon style, that gave me the nostalgia feeling from the other games. Ironic isn't it, Atari have gone down a path of No Limits and another company is taking over with the character. I've felt pretty depressed over this beta, thinking to myself, I don't want my favourite franchise to just die like that, but in a way I'm hopeful that the charm of RCT will live on in another game.

Reminiscent of the Championship Manager series when Sports Interactive (developer) split with Eidos (publisher) and they signed a new deal with Sega continuing the franchise with a new name 'Football Manager'. Eidos released forthcoming CM games but it was under a new developer and the game was created from scratch given SI had access to the code/database/programming. FM continues to sell in high numbers on a yearly basis whereas CM has not released a PC edition for 5 years due to poor sales.

Can see a similar scenario occurring here where the RCT franchise bombs and Planet Coaster goes from strength to strength over the coming years [up]

 

[MrPizzaCrust]

Anywhere you see RCTW being discussed, Planet Coaster pops up. This is exactly what happened with Cities:Skylines and that worked out pretty well for Paradox/Colossol Order.

 

[mr.sugar]

I shall be investing in both, but I think if Frontier get the players involved (because lets face it, our voices are landing on deaf ears with Atari & Co.) during the Alpha stage, and I mean really involved, then they'll have the best one.

Playing the "beta" over the last 2 days, I realised something fundamentally was wrong (I'm not talking about the bugs), the charm was non existent, it was sterile, even the scenery and the mood. It didn't feel like RCT, it feels alien to me. I find that unsettling.

When I first seen Planet Coasters paths, people running in directions, scenery and saturated cartoon style, that gave me the nostalgia feeling from the other games. Ironic isn't it, Atari have gone down a path of No Limits and another company is taking over with the character. I've felt pretty depressed over this beta, thinking to myself, I don't want my favourite franchise to just die like that, but in a way I'm hopeful that the charm of RCT will live on in another game.

I would have said that Atari should have gone with Frontier again, but I think Frontier will do a better job without Atari breathing down their necks and the disastrous marketing team.

I do have a worry though about Frontier, they need a great marketing team to get this going full steam a head.

No worries man. Just have a look at their first dev. diary. Compared to RCTW dev.blogs, it´s completely different level. It´s very informative, done with love and showing quite a lot of stuff in quite nice way (better than Atari´s wall of hollow words...)


If we put together all RCTW blogs together, it´s still less informative and mainly, done in quite boring way... Frontire will pull this off for sure, I´m sure about it.

 

[Mattlab]

Everyone here who is supporting Planet Coaster, Will be Banned Forever on the RTCW forums! [yesnod]

[Yeah yeah yeah, these sort of posts are not welcome here. Impersonation is NOT tolerated. ~Brett C]

 

[KnoxVegas]

I think Planet Coaster will offer some great new things, I'm actually more excited about it now then RCTW after playing the beta. They will both offer good things, but I think the route that PC is heading from the looks is very promising, and even more so than RCTW. Again it always comes to personal preference.

 

[RandyChimp]

Everyone here who is supporting Planet Coaster, Will be Banned Forever on the RTCW forums! [yesnod]

I think since the first trailer for RCTW, I lost faith in the project. All the talk about a new developer and all the changes they were implementing piqued my interest, but I wasn't expecting the game to be as good as I'd hoped, especially after seeing the PAX footage. Compare that with PC, where the first trailer still makes me smile whenever I watch it, and I'm happy to put my faith in Frontier. There are a few people around on reddit and other forums that are of the belief that because we haven't seen any actual game footage, we shouldn't put that faith into Frontier yet, but my position is this: we're in the early stages of development and we're seeing character model animations and we have a dev diary with information about how those characters will interact with each other and things around the park. That's why I'm putting my money on PC. We're getting information and footage as the game is being developed. They're keeping us informed.

 

[KnoxVegas]

I think since the first trailer for RCTW, I lost faith in the project. All the talk about a new developer and all the changes they were implementing piqued my interest, but I wasn't expecting the game to be as good as I'd hoped, especially after seeing the PAX footage. Compare that with PC, where the first trailer still makes me smile whenever I watch it, and I'm happy to put my faith in Frontier. There are a few people around on reddit and other forums that are of the belief that because we haven't seen any actual game footage, we shouldn't put that faith into Frontier yet, but my position is this: we're in the early stages of development and we're seeing character model animations and we have a dev diary with information about how those characters will interact with each other and things around the park. That's why I'm putting my money on PC. We're getting information and footage as the game is being developed. They're keeping us informed.

I had last minute hope that it would, and for just a coaster builder its fun, but I just need to have the new age look and feel for sure that I know PC will provide, it will just wet my apatite until the real show (Planet Coaster) comes out.

 

[etapley0687]

I must admit when both RCTW & PC where announced I focused on RCTW because they gave a closer expected release and seemed to be real involved in releasing a great FULL game. After PC uploaded the first trailer I waited for something else but nothing came as fast as RCTW was speaking so I lost interest. However after being involved with and seeing how RCTW is going downhill, meanwhile PC is doing great things with something as simple as guest apperance and reactions, I'm now more attracted to what PC has to offer. Which silly me, I should've realized this knowing they created RCT3 so who else could make it better other than the creator.

 

[Kerrash]

...Which silly me, I should've realized this knowing they created RCT3 so who else could make it better other then the creator.

I have made the same mistake with many games in the past.
Now I always check who is developing a game first [up]

 

[TRG86]

Remember, when it comes to RCT and the explosiveness of the genre in general we have to thank the original creator (RCT 1 & 2), Chris Sawyer, whom programmed them by himself in freaking Assembly code! [big grin]

 

[David T-Rex]

Remember, when it comes to RCT and the explosiveness of the genre in general we have to thank the original creator (RCT 1 & 2), Chris Sawyer, whom programmed them by himself in freaking Assembly code! [big grin]

Speaking of coding, I know RCTw is using the unity engine.. do we know (just for geek points) what Planet Coaster is using? Is it one of the standard engines or something custom?

 

[RandyChimp]

Speaking of coding, I know RCTw is using the unity engine.. do we know (just for geek points) what Planet Coaster is using? Is it one of the standard engines or something custom?

The Cobra Engine, same one as Elite: Dangerous I think. As I understand it, it's a more advanced version of the engine used in RCT3.

 

[TRG86]

Speaking of coding, I know RCTw is using the unity engine.. do we know (just for geek points) what Planet Coaster is using? Is it one of the standard engines or something custom?

Yes, it's Frontier's very own "Cobra" Engine. Frontier has been developing the Cobra engine since 1988 and has been used for games like Elite: Dangerous, Zoo Tycoon and RCT3. For reference, all of Frontier's games use the Cobra engine. In-house all the way baby. [up]