Possible solution for the ride aging/prestige mechanic...

[Bitter Jeweler]

While I haven't been completely bothered by the ride aging system, it has another flaw that hasn't been discussed.

While I believe this mechanic was brought in to make the game harder, it is only temporary.
This was brought in, because many, many, many people complained the game was too easy, even on "hard" challenge parks.
Then, the "hard" challenge was only hard until you got your third flat ride in, then you started rolling in cash.

While I have enjoyed the new "harder" challenge park, it is only hard until your rides start become "classic".
Then, soon, you are rolling in dough, and the difficulty is completely lost

So, the only solution I think might be acceptable to the majority of players is as follows:

-The rides still age, but no more "revival" and "classic" status.
-Aging should take a little longer. Longest for "easy" challenges, and shortest for "hardest" challenges.
-Once a ride is old, it should still be popular, and popularity could still vary according to "prestige". Prestige should drop a little over time, but perhaps adding scenery can bring it back up some. This means we should still see full queues of peeps for all our rides, regardless of age. I think this currently is the biggest bummer for people.
-Old rides should never be cash machines ever again. Even with full queues, they should not be cash cows. They should operate at a small loss, or a small profit. Flat rides should not be profitable, but coasters should. Coasters are the centerpieces for parks. They are why the majority of people come to the park. Old coasters are still popular, but may no longer be the headline, so they should not rake in the cash. After 10 years, peeps should only be willing to pay $1-$2 for the Tea Cup ride, or the Zipper, or the Whirly Rig, or the Carousel... The flat rides should break even, lose $30 a month, or profit no more than $30 a month (scenery/prestige dependent)


I disagree with the people who think there should be some metric or action that can be done to make old rides profitable again, such as refurbishing.
Nothing should make an old ride profitable again. Refurbishing should make rides more reliable, which comes at a cost.
BUT, the rides should ALWAYS have riders.

As your park grows, the draw to your park is no longer that one special flat ride, or that one old coaster. The draw to an old park is EVERYTHING it offers. Your park ride rating draws the peeps. Sure that new flat ride, and new coasters are draws. They should be profitable for a while. But nothing lasts forever, and parks keep having to do new things to maintain crowds. If Cedar Point, or Alton Towers never put another new ride in, how long would they be profitable? Why did Geauga Lake go out of business?

 

[seeker7]

While I haven't been completely bothered by the ride aging system, it has another flaw that hasn't been discussed.

While I believe this mechanic was brought in to make the game harder, it is only temporary.
This was brought in, because many, many, many people complained the game was too easy, even on "hard" challenge parks.
Then, the "hard" challenge was only hard until you got your third flat ride in, then you started rolling in cash.

While I have enjoyed the new "harder" challenge park, it is only hard until your rides start become "classic".
Then, soon, you are rolling in dough, and the difficulty is completely lost

So, the only solution I think might be acceptable to the majority of players is as follows:

-The rides still age, but no more "revival" and "classic" status.
-Aging should take a little longer. Longest for "easy" challenges, and shortest for "hardest" challenges.
-Once a ride is old, it should still be popular, and popularity could still vary according to "prestige". Prestige should drop a little over time, but perhaps adding scenery can bring it back up some. This means we should still see full queues of peeps for all our rides, regardless of age. I think this currently is the biggest bummer for people.
-Old rides should never be cash machines ever again. Even with full queues, they should not be cash cows. They should operate at a small loss, or a small profit. Flat rides should not be profitable, but coasters should. Coasters are the centerpieces for parks. They are why the majority of people come to the park. Old coasters are still popular, but may no longer be the headline, so they should not rake in the cash. After 10 years, peeps should only be willing to pay $1-$2 for the Tea Cup ride, or the Zipper, or the Whirly Rig, or the Carousel... The flat rides should break even, lose $30 a month, or profit no more than $30 a month (scenery/prestige dependent)


I disagree with the people who think there should be some metric or action that can be done to make old rides profitable again, such as refurbishing.
Nothing should make an old ride profitable again. Refurbishing should make rides more reliable, which comes at a cost.
BUT, the rides should ALWAYS have riders.

As your park grows, the draw to your park is no longer that one special flat ride, or that one old coaster. The draw to an old park is EVERYTHING it offers. Your park ride rating draws the peeps. Sure that new flat ride, and new coasters are draws. They should be profitable for a while. But nothing lasts forever, and parks keep having to do new things to maintain crowds. If Cedar Point, or Alton Towers never put another new ride in, how long would they be profitable? Why did Geauga Lake go out of business?

If only there was a thread about the age mechanic you could have posted this in, or even something like a suggestion forum, right? [rolleyes]

Aging mechanic makes sense for coasters, maybe even for darkrides, but not for flatrides. What's so exciting about the new teacups that peeps would pay more the first couple years? Also there is no reason why an old coaster should lose you money.
And being able to boost rides with scenery is another strange idea. Who decides to go on a ride because of the scenery? Scenery rating should contribute to guest happyness and popularity of the park (= guest generation) but I don't pay more because the queue has nice theming.
Gotta anchor your game mechanics in reality if it's supposed to be a themepark sim.

 

[stuk71]

Very good suggestions from Bitter Jeweler - thank you [happy]

Moving thread as better suited to the Suggestions and Ideas forum

 

[Games4Tom]

While I haven't been completely bothered by the ride aging system, it has another flaw that hasn't been discussed.

While I believe this mechanic was brought in to make the game harder, it is only temporary.
This was brought in, because many, many, many people complained the game was too easy, even on "hard" challenge parks.
Then, the "hard" challenge was only hard until you got your third flat ride in, then you started rolling in cash.

While I have enjoyed the new "harder" challenge park, it is only hard until your rides start become "classic".
Then, soon, you are rolling in dough, and the difficulty is completely lost

So, the only solution I think might be acceptable to the majority of players is as follows:

-The rides still age, but no more "revival" and "classic" status.
-Aging should take a little longer. Longest for "easy" challenges, and shortest for "hardest" challenges.
-Once a ride is old, it should still be popular, and popularity could still vary according to "prestige". Prestige should drop a little over time, but perhaps adding scenery can bring it back up some. This means we should still see full queues of peeps for all our rides, regardless of age. I think this currently is the biggest bummer for people.
-Old rides should never be cash machines ever again. Even with full queues, they should not be cash cows. They should operate at a small loss, or a small profit. Flat rides should not be profitable, but coasters should. Coasters are the centerpieces for parks. They are why the majority of people come to the park. Old coasters are still popular, but may no longer be the headline, so they should not rake in the cash. After 10 years, peeps should only be willing to pay $1-$2 for the Tea Cup ride, or the Zipper, or the Whirly Rig, or the Carousel... The flat rides should break even, lose $30 a month, or profit no more than $30 a month (scenery/prestige dependent)


I disagree with the people who think there should be some metric or action that can be done to make old rides profitable again, such as refurbishing.
Nothing should make an old ride profitable again. Refurbishing should make rides more reliable, which comes at a cost.
BUT, the rides should ALWAYS have riders.

As your park grows, the draw to your park is no longer that one special flat ride, or that one old coaster. The draw to an old park is EVERYTHING it offers. Your park ride rating draws the peeps. Sure that new flat ride, and new coasters are draws. They should be profitable for a while. But nothing lasts forever, and parks keep having to do new things to maintain crowds. If Cedar Point, or Alton Towers never put another new ride in, how long would they be profitable? Why did Geauga Lake go out of business?

I absolutely agree with Bitter Jeweler here!
I have to say, that an old coaster is quite interesting for me when visiting apark, but I wouldn't pay as much as for a new one
The only thing I really like is that some parks (like Europapark) put new features to their coaster (they added VR toalready 2 coasters) which makes the ride a complete new experience. Then the rides are really more attractive.

 

[seeker7]

The only thing I really like is that some parks (like Europapark) put new features to their coaster (they added VR toalready 2 coasters) which makes the ride a complete new experience. Then the rides are really more attractive.

And they charge extra for VR. Old rides isn't where you lose money.

 

[breezerHOG1]

I don't like the aging system, I think it shows a lack of creativity. Combine this with the overly simplistic and repetitive objectives and it makes me feel like the devs dont understand there own game. RCT1 had great scenarios that are still enjoyable to replay. PC doesn't have replayablility in its scenarios because they dont feel any different from sandbox, except they have preset terrain.

If your playing sandbox then there should be NO management, they really should give us more options to chose from to set how we want to play. Just combine sandbox and challenge mode into one and allow players to pick and choose there own settings, then everybody could be happy as so many people have differing opinions

But for the career mode, a game like this needs a proper progression system. And the ride aging shows a total failure in "progression". Like BJ said, the aging system only adds challenge for a few years and then BAM your rolling in dough. THATS NOT FUN!

They need to figure out how to develop a career mode that actually has you feel like your starting out small and working your way up to bigger and better things. Each scenario feels the same because were always plopping rides shops and scenery. There needs to be something more driving us through the career. I cant keep repeating myself as Im going off-topic so theres links to my threads in my sig

 

[stuk71]

If your playing sandbox then there should be NO management I dont understand why aging rides is included in sandbox

The ride ageing system is not part of Sandbox mode - only some of the hard scenario levels and the advanced Challenge modes

 

[Wablamo0821]

While I haven't been completely bothered by the ride aging system, it has another flaw that hasn't been discussed.

While I believe this mechanic was brought in to make the game harder, it is only temporary.
This was brought in, because many, many, many people complained the game was too easy, even on "hard" challenge parks.
Then, the "hard" challenge was only hard until you got your third flat ride in, then you started rolling in cash.

While I have enjoyed the new "harder" challenge park, it is only hard until your rides start become "classic".
Then, soon, you are rolling in dough, and the difficulty is completely lost

So, the only solution I think might be acceptable to the majority of players is as follows:

-The rides still age, but no more "revival" and "classic" status.
-Aging should take a little longer. Longest for "easy" challenges, and shortest for "hardest" challenges.
-Once a ride is old, it should still be popular, and popularity could still vary according to "prestige". Prestige should drop a little over time, but perhaps adding scenery can bring it back up some. This means we should still see full queues of peeps for all our rides, regardless of age. I think this currently is the biggest bummer for people.
-Old rides should never be cash machines ever again. Even with full queues, they should not be cash cows. They should operate at a small loss, or a small profit. Flat rides should not be profitable, but coasters should. Coasters are the centerpieces for parks. They are why the majority of people come to the park. Old coasters are still popular, but may no longer be the headline, so they should not rake in the cash. After 10 years, peeps should only be willing to pay $1-$2 for the Tea Cup ride, or the Zipper, or the Whirly Rig, or the Carousel... The flat rides should break even, lose $30 a month, or profit no more than $30 a month (scenery/prestige dependent)


I disagree with the people who think there should be some metric or action that can be done to make old rides profitable again, such as refurbishing.
Nothing should make an old ride profitable again. Refurbishing should make rides more reliable, which comes at a cost.
BUT, the rides should ALWAYS have riders.

As your park grows, the draw to your park is no longer that one special flat ride, or that one old coaster. The draw to an old park is EVERYTHING it offers. Your park ride rating draws the peeps. Sure that new flat ride, and new coasters are draws. They should be profitable for a while. But nothing lasts forever, and parks keep having to do new things to maintain crowds. If Cedar Point, or Alton Towers never put another new ride in, how long would they be profitable? Why did Geauga Lake go out of business?

The only problem I see here is that people could continually just delete and replace rides as they age which would circumnavigate your suggestions.

As for Geauga Lake going out of business - GL went out of business due to a very strict local city (Aurora) government (not allowing any rides over 200ft high) and because Cedar Fair bought the park (the same company that owns Cedar Point). Cedar Fair didn't want to deal with the local government putting unnecessary restrictions on their park, but they also didn't want to own a competing park rivaling their flagship park only 75 minutes away. (I live approx 25 mins from the old Geauga Lake site and about an hour from Cedar Point).

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

The only problem I see here is that people could continually just delete and replace rides as they age which would circumnavigate your suggestions.

As for Geauga Lake going out of business - GL went out of business due to a very strict local city (Aurora) government (not allowing any rides over 200ft high) and because Cedar Fair bought the park (the same company that owns Cedar Point). Cedar Fair didn't want to deal with the local government putting unnecessary restrictions on their park, but they also didn't want to own a competing park rivaling their flagship park only 75 minutes away. (I live approx 25 mins from the old Geauga Lake site and about an hour from Cedar Point).

Here's a nice read about Geauga Lake...
http://www.themeparktourist.com/fea...w-worlds-largest-six-flags-disappeared?page=4

Wablamo, you live in Cleveland by chance? (I do)

Part of the tragedy from a customer stand point, was visiting the park in it's final years. They ripped out all the licensed theming, and did nothing to hide it.
As a visitor, the park looked and felt tragic. Anyways...

No matter what, players will find a way around just about any system in place, so I don't see that as an argument against it. It gets harder to replace rides when you've decorated them. The game is too open to have restriction to prevent a player doing that. But yeah.

@ creaper...way to go bringing all your pet peeves with the game into a thread that is not about them, as usual.

@seeker "Also there is no reason why an old coaster should lose you money." Why is Cedar Point revamping Blue Streak and Mean Streak?

"Mean Streak, despite debuting to positive reviews 25 years ago, had fallen out of favor in recent years because of its rough ride and relatively dull layout."

 

[seeker7]

@seeker "Also there is no reason why an old coaster should lose you money." Why is Cedar Point revamping Blue Streak and Mean Streak?

"Mean Streak, despite debuting to positive reviews 25 years ago, had fallen out of favor in recent years because of its rough ride and relatively dull layout."

Yeah 25 years, not 25 minutes! And the reason not being "I hate everything old except my grandpa!".

If the research mechanic had something to do with it I could see a gameplay element here (research faster engines, better brakes, smoother tracks etc. as guests become progressively more demanding over the years).

 

[breezerHOG1]

the problem is not the fact that rides age, but the rate of speed at which time flows

 

[Wablamo0821]

Here's a nice read about Geauga Lake...
http://www.themeparktourist.com/fea...w-worlds-largest-six-flags-disappeared?page=4

Wablamo, you live in Cleveland by chance? (I do)

Part of the tragedy from a customer stand point, was visiting the park in it's final years. They ripped out all the licensed theming, and did nothing to hide it.
As a visitor, the park looked and felt tragic. Anyways...

No matter what, players will find a way around just about any system in place, so I don't see that as an argument against it. It gets harder to replace rides when you've decorated them. The game is too open to have restriction to prevent a player doing that. But yeah.

I'm one of those locals (I've lived all over NE Ohio) who is still in awe as to what happened at GL. I've actually read that article a bunch of times. I agree, it's the management of the park (Six Flags and Cedar Fair) and the local government worried about their skyline for some reason. I currently reside in Madison (just moved a few days ago actually) but I've lived on the east side of Cleveland almost my entire life. That explains your "snowblowing in your shorts picture"! We're a quirky bunch here near Cleveland. [haha]

Back on topic: What you said is absolutely true. Players will find ways around everything. With that in mind, maybe they could implement your suggestion just to harder mode and then tweak and balance easy, medium and hard?

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

I'm one of those locals (I've lived all over NE Ohio) who is still in awe as to what happened at GL. I've actually read that article a bunch of times. I agree, it's the management of the park (Six Flags and Cedar Fair) and the local government worried about their skyline for some reason. I currently reside in Madison (just moved a few days ago actually) but I've lived on the east side of Cleveland almost my entire life. That explains your "snowblowing in your shorts picture"! We're a quirky bunch here near Cleveland. [haha]

Back on topic: What you said is absolutely true. Players will find ways around everything. With that in mind, maybe they could implement your suggestion just to harder mode and then tweak and balance easy, medium and hard?

I lived in Long Beach, CA for a year, and I missed winter most of all. Well, that and having a job in my field, and the lower cost of living. Hahaha.

I think my idea would work across the board, but yes, balanced for all the difficulty levels.
I think the most common complaint about what Frontier implemented is the lack of ridership.
I think the majority of players would have less of an issue with lowering the tickets for "Old" rides, because as long as the rides are ridden, it keeps the aesthetic of a busy, successful park. Even in sandbox, where money is unlimited, people can either set the rides to be free, or as some have said, they still like to charge. I don't know why you'd worry about actual profit in sandbox.

So then easy challenge would still have rides age, but still be ridden, and still make some profit (peeps would be willing to pay more for an old ride). Then just scale that up to "harder" challenges, where you still get people lining up, the ride rating still increases your attendance, but they are not willing to pay a lot to ride, and they will more than likely be a "loss".

The idea may not be perfect, but I think it hits on what is the worst part about how it is now.

@creaper...there you go again, interjecting another separate issue that doesn't matter to the topic at hand.
Time is an abstract.

 

[breezerHOG1]

Time is an abstract.

Isn't that a contradiction to your previous statements?

-Aging should take a little longer.
-Prestige should drop a little over time

The aging system currently takes decades in game (or hours IRL) to reach prestige. That might be fine for challenge mode, but scenarios dont take that long. In classic RCT the scenarios were only a few years long before you failed, but in PC you cant fail which is why the devs implemented "aging" to force players to play each scenario for longer amount of time, but thats not how most casual players go about gaming. Its fine for those who enjoy working on the same park for hours on end, but it just slows down progression.

You even said yourself in another thread, scenarios are more like "speed play" while challenge is like "slow play"

 

[Mogeley]

I disagree with the OP...

Ride age does not have a direct correlation to ride popularity.

There are many rides which are decades old and everyone loves to ride them. Some rides have protests when they are taken down. Some people ride because they are old!

Let's look at some of the different correlations that effect ride popularity...

1. Is the ride fun? Ancient rides that are fun will always be popular.
2. Brand new ride boost. Any new ride get's a boost because it's new. Usually, within a year this is worn off. However, replacing a ride with the same ride is not new!
3. Which other rides are more popular. Building more popular rides will make a ride less popular indirectly.
4. Bad reputation. If a ride has an accident, is rough, or excessive G's then it is not liked in the minds of the guests.
5. Ad Campaign boost. Similar to new ride boost but not as effective.

Planet Coaster does not have enough rides, ride upgrades, or options for any type of aging mechanism. If I want to replace a carousel with a similar ride which do I use? I can't there's only one type of carousel.

I'd love to see Planet Coaster go where no coaster game has and allow players to build custom stationary rides. Much in the same way scenery is built up. They already have the ride evaluation and rating system.

Let the player loose! Then an age system makes more sense.

 

[Abletudu]

I'd love to see Planet Coaster go where no coaster game has and allow players to build custom stationary rides. Much in the same way scenery is built up. They already have the ride evaluation and rating system.

Off topic:

Spoiler

Another coaster game has done that, but without the money management part Theme Park Studio.

But back on topic it is true in some areas you are limited such as flat rides and track rides, but in the area of coasters you have a flood (possibly IMO too many) especially for someone that doesn't know a B&M from an Arrow from a Vakoma (Spelling?) like me.

 

[breezerHOG1]

it is true in some areas you are limited such as flat rides and track rides, but in the area of coasters you have a flood (possibly IMO too many) especially for someone that doesn't know a B&M from an Arrow from a Vakoma (Spelling?) like me.

this is actually a big problem that rarely gets discussed. When I first played RCT the only coasters I could (with a decent rating) build were the junior and wooden coasters, and a basic boomerang, but it took me a while before I could build more advanced coasters. I always liked how the original had that progression from simple to advanced.

 

[Qikese]

I share Mogeley's view that ride age does not necessarily correlate with ride popularity....at all. IRL, my favorite rides are the Tilt-A-Whirl and Round Up and I'll ride them both over and over again anywhere I get the chance and you can't get much older than those two rides.

Regardless, I like to have the management aspect, but I want it to be easy because I'm only moderately into the management, but more heavily into park design. So, I (mostly) like the current Challenge mode for easy park management. But, I've got a park I've been painstakingly designing since Christmas (when I got the game) and now due to this awful prestige "feature," virtually no one is riding all the rides in the beginning of my park, the most beautifully and completely designed area. And, as I'm sure many already know, when you do heavy park design/theming, having to change out old rides out because they're not being used becomes impossible without having to redo gobs of scenery, which is not only a lot of work, but totally undesirable if you've spent forever on detailing an area and you're happy with it, and most especially if you've designed specifically for a certain ride.

Additionally, because of this ride aging thing and the entirety of the beginning of my park no longer being of interest to my guests, I've got over 4,000 peeps all bunched up on the back of my current park creating pile ups of confused peeps that the game's guest algorithms obviously have a hard time handling. So, the easy short term solution to me is for Frontier to allow those of us who want our entire park to be used just to be able to shut off this "feature."

 

[Kickflip]

I think price tolerance should only go down to some baseline level for it's fun per minute. Refurbishing should restore popularity but not price tolerance at least on hard, harder modes.

Price acceptance for flat rides should be closer to break even than on big coasters which run at a loss long term but contribute huge amounts to your park score.

 

[seeker7]

Price acceptance for flat rides should be closer to break even than on big coasters which run at a loss long term but contribute huge amounts to your park score.

Why a loss? You only have maintenance and staff costs, why shouldn't they make money?