fozzy360 said:
1. Great job not showing a damn thing, Atari.
2. Where's RCT4, Atari?
3. Why are yours and Nintendo's fingers in my wallet, Atari?
4. Currently re-installing RCT2 and 3.
After RCT3, I don't think I can trust them to make another RCT game. I loved the first RCT, and then they took the same formula and improved on it with RTC2 and gave me more things to build and more shops and stalls to make it actually look like an park that had a variety of things to offer my patrons while they waited between rides. RCT2 is the best there is out there in such games.
Then RCT3 came out and shattered my hopes when I found that it wasn't a proper sequel. It was totally revamped and redone. The hosed up the controls, trying to do anything in RCT3 is totally different then getting things done in RCT2. The challenges for the main part of the game(RCT3) were very liner in how they could be completed. You have to build this, and this, and this, and you have to show this person a good time. It was so much better in RCT2, where it would say do this, but then they set me loose with the park and I could do anything I wanted to reach my goal.
RCT2 made me feel free in what I could do. RCT3 made me feel tied down, and in some cases my hand was held along certain points, but then I was let go without good instructions at some points and but there was only on way to complete the task the game gave me. Another stupid thing they added in 3 was the ride inspector, if he didn't like how the ride was running, he would shut it down. What? So I the omnipotent park overlord can't determine if a ride is in proper running condition, I've got to have a little pipsqueak in a brown suit ride a ride and tell me it is not good and slap a bar on it so that nobody else can ride it until I bulldoze it and put up a new one.
Along with that they made RCT3 ultra kiddy-fide, and in doing so, they removed the consequence that the first two games had that made them interesting. In one and two, if I made poorly constructed paths, rides, and roller coasters, there was a possibility that people could die. If I didn't realize I didn't put a tall/long enough track for my launch coaster to run on and I opened the ride, the first group of riders would die as the cart shot off the track and exploded, then it would bleep and I would see at the bottom, 20 people have died in the such and such crash. But oh no, we couldn't have that in the kiddy RCT3. I was interested to see if they keep that consequence, so I specifically sabotaged a ride. Oh, the roller coaster does crash, but the people go, "oooh, aahh, weeee!", fly and roll about the ground, but then get up like nothing has happened and walk to the nearest path. That is bull crap.
I bet I know the reason they did that, it wasn't just to "protect the kids" from the thought, sight, and consequences of death, oh no, it was probably because of this as well:
The reason I sabotaged that first coaster wasn't just to test if the death thing was still there, I was purposely trying to kill the brown suit inspector guy. That of course didn't work.
Another problem with RCT3, was that it didn't have a proper sandbox mode. In it's version of a sandbox mode, I was still limited on how much money I could use and I still had to complete some arbitrary objective, which of course if I completed it, it would end the game, and if I didn't complete it, it would game over that park. Why couldn't they have just kept the awesome sandbox of RCT2, where I could give myself unlimited time and funds to build the park I wanted.
Really, the only interesting thing that RCT3 brought to the table was being able to ride my own rides. Though it wasn't very innovative a thing, since if I remember correctly, the much older game "Sim-Coaster" or something, not sure what it was called, did the same thing. But, since RCT3 was so restrictive with how I made things, being able to ride my rides didn't feel all that special.
I didn't intend to write this much, but that has been laying dormant inside me, festering, for some time now. If they want to be successful, then they should stick to what was done in RCT1 and RCT2. In my opinion, RCT3 put a giant ugly gash on a near perfect budding game franchise.
upon the prospects of a new Rollercoaster Tycoon...
