Improvements to Coaster Support System

[Bo Marit]

Hi everyone,

As promised by our beloved Sam Denney in yesterday’s livestream, here’s a sneak peek on what’s coming in a small update next week regarding the coaster support system.

The team has been working really hard to make improvements to the current support system; the new system is more comparative to real-life coasters and coaster engineering, as well as being aesthetically pleasing!

Below we have a side by side comparison of the old and new system, so you can see exactly what will change regarding the coaster supports. Top image is the old system, bottom image the new one!




A comparative overview of the global support changes.




New support just on vertical drops/rises.




Dive coaster has its own new vertical support.




New diagonal supports just for specials.




Sloping supports stay facing the same way when ascending and descending.




No more 'Goal post' supports on track one variants.




Dog-legging now only occurs 100ft from the ground.




New support just for vertical loops on inverted (Rival, Boa, Stingray).


it’s worth noting that this is an automatic system based on angle slope and track piece type. There’s no manual option available, so we would appreciate any feedback and suggestions on how to improve upon the new system.

All these changes will automatically populate across your parks.

 

[Vampiro]

Looking great!! It does indeed look way more realistic!!

First thing that comes to mind, will already existing coasters in a park also update?

 

[Joël]

Great update! It really does look a lot more realistic. Thanks for the hard work Team Frontier! [up]

@Vampiro:

All these changes will automatically populate across your parks.

 

[Vampiro]

Great update! It really does look a lot more realistic. Thanks for the hard work Team Frontier! [up]

@Vampiro:

Aaand Vampiro gets another point for asking already answered questions again [mouth shut]

Can't wait to play around with those after the update

 

[Toorcam]

This is awesome! Thanks guys for providing great detail and realism.

The other thing that come to my mind is supports for Flying and Inverted coasters. I believe that supports for the lift section are not very realistic at the moment, as they do no the appear as the common inverted V shape that most of them have.

 

[seeker7]

Any news on when and if Frontier is gonna provide detail and realism in other key areas of the game, aside from the supports?

 

[Feitan1]

Wow, what a great improvement, this game is getting better and better every single update!
Thanks Planet Coaster Team! [heart]

Since its okay to leave suggestions and ideas, I will try not to be picky here [big grin]
The support system is becoming more and more sophisticated and great, so here are just a few things that come to mind.

The loop / half-loop supports for the Inverted coasters seem off a bit. I believe it should be on each side and not in the middle, plus different track connectors.
Here's an example

As well as reagular B&M Sit-downs loop / half-loop supports have different connectors than in Planet Coaster.

and arrow looping coaster and the other coasters.

Lastly, corkscrew supports for B&M as well as Arrow and other Inverting coasters.

These are all minor issues, and I hope I haven't been picky[squeeeeee], and hopefully, in the near future we can design our own Custom supports.[wink]
Thanks

 

[Wablamo0821]

I didn't notice in any of the pictures if the supports were fixed/changed for RMC/Hybrid wooden coasters?

I was building a RMC/Hybrid recently and some supports on some of the pre-made loop elements actually clip the trains while riding in ride cam. Have these been changed/modified as well? I had to scrap my build because of the clipping.

 

[Cosmic Cow]

Hi Bo / Dev's Frontier,

It's looking very good this way! I suggest to have two supports for a looping, in stead of one in the middle. Like it was, but with the new supports. If they are at the sides and a little bit in an angle like the supports that support vertical track, they look like it's in real life.

[edit: Feitan has posted some very usefull pics, I have the same suggestion as Feitan]

Another question:
You mentioned a small update regarding supports. But when can we expect the start of a series of bugfixing updates? There are more than 1000 threads of bugs and just a few are solved now. Among them a lot of simple / easy to fix bugs are already reported since beginning of november... (since Beta-release)

A little bit more communication on this is welcome!
Keep up the good work!

 

[BMCoasterFan]

Support tubes are still too skinny or thin, compared to support connectors. Doesn't look correct.

Great news btw, good update!!!

 

[funny_speed_spin]

Thank you for the update on the supports! They are looking much better now. I think that many parks will benefit of these new and good looking ones!

Spoiler

As in the stream said.. i am not one of these guys who count every bolt and if there are enough crossties. But i do not understand why you guys put so much effort in this system.
Since RCT3 we want to build our own supports and i think some other software does a better, while more creative job and isn´t complex to handle at all.
If you can use a smartphone.. you should be able to built your own supports. Anyway.. after this stream i say bye to my hopes that PC will ever anywhere close to a realistic coaster setup.
I know there are a lot of nitpicker out there which deserving it (i do not like them either). But in general, i do think this community isn´t nitpicking at all.
It only wants the best game available. So yeah.. some may think .. enough isn´t enough .. but i can´t understand it.
You have already the realistic graphics. Why do you not allowing your customers to make a realistic coaster as much as possible? Or at least an advanced option for this (if not planned).
So my last hope is, that the banking problem will be fixed. Sorry for the not so much hyped words.

 

[GGG2021]

GREAT -
as Feiten has pointed out - the tear drop shaped Vekoma vertical loop is really needed -
it's why i tend not to use the Vekoma looping coaster much, for it looks to 'unreal' - the straight vertical tear-drop shaped loop appears un-supported,
so please try not to forget to make that adjustment with the update - but otherwise - amazing job DEV's.
I've been really sick and this helps my days of recover, thank you and your incredible community support is really appreciated.[happy]

 

[LaurenceColes]

Fantastic! Thank you!

And Feitan you're spot on with your comments and examples, nice feedback! [big grin]

 

[Chems]

The new supports look amazing!! Any news about some improvements to the smoothness of coasters as well?? [haha][haha][cry]

(! continuous roll option !)

 

[Zildtek]

Excellent improvement from the last supports! But if Sam Denney is reading this, can you convert the Tiamat Supports to these supports?

I see those support on the rmc t rex but not the Tiamat. It would get rid of my ocd for coaster supports.[up]

 

[shockwave122]

I have a suggestion for the Anubis Coaster supports. IRL these coasters have scaffolding style supports similar to the Giga Coaster supports. (I live near a park that has one of these rides. [big grin])

 

[Restless Bohemian]

I would like to request setting a limit on the distance from the coaster track that a support can generate. Would rather see the angle of the "A Frame" supports get more severe for extreme heights as opposed to getting wider and cutting across the park. Thank you for the continued support and attention to detail~!

 

[Ramm]

I like the new supports but i'm not really a big fan of them being so wide because we run into space issues easily.

this for example is a little better than

because they take up less space

 

[Ramm]

I would like to request setting a limit on the distance from the coaster track that a support can generate. Would rather see the angle of the "A Frame" supports get more severe for extreme heights as opposed to getting wider and cutting across the park. Thank you for the continued support and attention to detail~!

yeah this to be completely honest. It's not that I dont like them but I think we had an update a few weeks ago that made the distance in the feet of the supports smaller, but with this new update they seem to be very wide again?

Especially if you build a very high coaster you are gonna have feet that are like 50 meters wide, that looks a bit off. Maybe give us some more control over supports like where we can select or have a checkbox what kind of supports we want. Like "wide" or "small" footers. Or maybe a general "randomize" support button or something

Thanks for all the lovely work devs!

 

[funny_speed_spin]

This is excactly what i mean and why i was putting it into a spoiler. Somone decided for us how the supports look like.
We all know how supports on a rollercoaster look like and how it should be transfer into a game about rollercoaster.

The best way and to solve it perfectly is a simple support generator or simply, that we could choose a support type and build it .. where on the track and how we want it.
If somebody need more info... look how TPS was doing it:

[video=youtube_share;jrqlXCy0or4]https://youtu.be/jrqlXCy0or4?t=825[/video]
...and don´t say .. it is impossible or too difficult

As addition .. an option for the thickness of the supports would be perfect. Done.

I am lucky about the change back to the A frame supports and to limiting the (sorry) not so good looking dog supports for a specific height. Because most of the coasters in parks (and i tested since the release every park which was uploaded to the workshop) aren´t that high/tall and more realistic in any ways. So the users created already many realistic looking coaster in many parks. That should give a hint, what the customers really want.
There are a few people which have to say that all is good and how awesome every update is looking. It is a good comment but it don´t help much to evolve the game. I do not want to be unrespectful and know how much work a change in a game is, but i would rather do it right then just adjusting parameters. The whole game experience would benefit from it.

I also suggest, that it could be great if we could connect scenery pieces to the track to build our own. Especially if supports where killed by the collision detection because they would be on a path .. under a path or something else.
If you see a floating track .. beside the new and good looking supports .. well .. it still doesn´t look that good (as it could be).

man,.. it can´t be really that hard to give us more freedom and more awesome abilities to make just things right and realistic.. awesome looking. As i said.. most of the user would really love it and every park would benefit from it.
Please think about that fact.

And yes, for all the people who might think, that an A frame support is taking much space when the track is sitting high over the ground: That is reality, my friend. A coaster have to be staying safe on the ground.

Over and out =)