Planet Coaster

[Guest2]

Down to £6. Hows the mod scene and updates since the beginning of the year been?

I was a massive fan of RCT and RCT2... just not sure this is worth it.

For £6 I would say it's definately worth it. I was only a bit of a RCT fan (and before that theme park/hostital/transport tycoon)and paid full price for it on release. I played for 23 hours back then
As Rufus said, great fun just in Sandbox mode

 

[Vern1961]

Sorry for mega bump...

After the missus showed me some footage of PC for the console (might be the PS5 forthcoming version) I decided to take the plunge and buy the PC version.

A couple of frustrating hours later, still scratching my head a bit so would appreciate a bit of advice.

First and obvious one: How the heck do you make money in the early game? Started a Challenge mode game, you hardly have any cash so laid out a very basic arrangement with a couple of roundabouts, a food and drink shop, toilet and staff room. I took out a loan to place a small pre-built coaster. However the park is haemorrhaging money. If I put the entrance price up, no one wants to come in. If I put the price of the rides up to exceed the running cost, no one wants to go on them. Even charging $1 for the toilets isn't helping. I don't really want to just run the sandbox game, as then there's no challenge whatsoever.

I'm guessing what you need to do is hit a sweet spot where you make a small amount of money then just read a book while the game runs for half an hour, bit like Cities Skylines, rather than rush the expansion.

The version my wife showed me had what appeared to be a tutorial level with helpful and humorous comments and quips from a male and female "assistant". How do I access that in the PC version, as the only tutorials I see are links to YT videos?

The menu at the bottom of the screen seems a bit hit and miss, spent ages trying to get simple items like trash bins and benches to appear.

I'm sure there is huge potential in this game but, a bit like Elite Dangerous, it seems to have been made a bit overwhelming when you first start out.

 

[CaptainRAVE]

Start with minimal staff, reduce wages. Start with just a few cheapish rides, adjust the price as high as possible such that the ride is always full. Toilets aren’t going to make you money. Food and drinks stalls will. It’s a bit of trial and error at first. You also need to work out what kind of guests will use your park.

 

[Supernova]

It's a fantastic game - stick with it. I got so hooked on it that I now have every steam achievement. When you are running so close to the wire with money, food and drink stalls can really lose you money. Just shut them down. Shut the staff room too. If your staff quit you can just press the rehire button and they come back. Staff rooms are only needed if you're specifically targetting an achievement or an objective related to staff happiness. When a park is small you don't need food and drink because guests don't stay long enough. This is also why your entrance fee should be free. In a small park it is hard to make money with food and drink, because you simply don't have the numbers of customers consistently buying. But you are of course paying the wage of the employee running the shop. When you start turning a profit consistently over a couple of months and people start complaining that you have no food/drink, this is when you can add one stall (start with food), and add some extras to the food like sauces and inflate the price a little bit. If you click on the shop you can see if you have any lost sales. If you do, you know the price is too high. Also shut the toilets for the reasons above. Only build them when people complain. You should be busy playing the game if it's going well. There is no time to read a book! You have to constantly monitor incomings and outgoings when you are running out of money. I also suspect that your loan to get a coaster straight away is a major reason you are losing money. You need to pick the cheapest ride that has a high fun score. There's a ride available for 1600 that has a good fun score (forget the name).

 

[CaptainRAVE]

=You need to pick the cheapest ride that has a high fun score.

This right here. Coasters will eventually make you ridiculous sums of money, but not at the start. I loved this game, it was brilliant.

 

[uncle_rufus]

Have they updated the game or something? When I played it I found the management aspects to be so trivially easy to the point that the game was just boring... slap stuff down any old way no need to consider anything and suddenly you're just swimming in cash and waiting for the numbers to tick up to victory

A shame because I loved the RCT series and this just didn't deliver. But reading the above seems like maybe that changed at some point? I played it quite soon after release originally

 

[Supernova]

Challenge mode is harder, much harder. The career mode gets extremely difficult later.

Edit: In fact, to Vern1961, start with career mode. Challenge mode is just a kick in the balls frankly. Not that fun compared with career.

 

[Vern1961]

Thanks for the tips. I did start in Challenge as I didn't fancy taking over a half built park which is all that appeared to be available in Career.

I intend to stick with it though, always liked logistical and building management style games.

 

[Supernova]

In career you quadruple the size of the pre-built areas of the park usually. Plenty of opportunities to make it your own IMO, but totally your choice.