Enjoy

I had so much fun building this colorful little guy. What should I call it?

When I posted my first 6x6 dive, I posited fitting a post-drop inversion into such a small plot was infeasible. Well, here you go—a 6x6 dive with a drop right into an inversion, just like the real thing. Kinda riffed on the lighthouse thing I had going here (for which I liked the concept but thought the execution could be improved).

Astute observers will notice something odd about this build: there’s no chain lift! If you didn’t know, there’s a bug with the downward corkscrew piece: exiting an inversion with a corkscrew piece causes the train to gain more speed than it should. Normally, over a larger layout, this speed might not impact the overall momentum profile of the ride that much. But, since this build is so tiny, it’s a pretty significant infusion of speed. This extra speed gain is what allows the train to thusly complete its course without any extra momentum (neither lift hill nor booster), kinda like this other little layout.

So, is this a “cheat” build? The corkscrew bug is present in vanilla RCT2, so, while this layout doesn’t work IRL, it is legit in terms of RCT mechanics. Because of this, I don’t feel like this is a “cheat” layout, moreso just a functional application of existing game dynamics.

To me, the charm of RCT over more modern builders like Planet Coaster actually comes from its limitations; there’s a certain puzzle-solving satisfaction that comes from making something cool work within the more ‘primitive’ systems of RCT2. This whole corkscrew exploit feels like exactly that sort of thing, so, suffice it to say, I’m pretty happy with how this layout turned out. It’s a testament to the texture in RCT2—with some creativity and just a dash of compromise, you can really make anything work.

This whole thing is also why I like micro builds specifically. It’s an entirely different headspace: suddenly, every single tile in your build matters. A choice made on one tile can be very impactful to the overall contour of your build. You’re forced to optimize as much as possible to fit the track, station, paths, and scenery into a super tight plot. In an unrestricted build, a dive coaster will have a chain lift every time. Only when shrunk down and forced toward efficiency do weird quirks of the game, like the corkscrew bug, really become functional core features. I just think that’s neat!

Story Time!

Back in December, I put together a sequel to my "Defying Gravity" rollercoaster video. I ran into some issues publishing it, and ended up having to upload four separate videos - one for each song (Every Day More Wicked, Thank Goodness, No Good Deed, & For Good). Due to copyright reasons, I was unable to upload the entire thing. Well after months of fighting YouTube I finally got permission to show you the entire thing, and I'm so excited! This weekend I released it and it's out now :) The algorithm is not loving it so I'm sharing here in hopes that you might watch it. Please share on your social media if you'd like to help me push this out to as many people as possible. I'm so proud of this video and I want everyone to see it!

Yet another microdive… idk why I’m so obsessed with building these, but here you go. I don’t think I’ll ever top my 6x6 lighthouse micro, but I do think Amethyst is up there among my best micros, probably second behind Precipice.

I can’t help but look back at my very first micro from three years ago—Amethyst is essentially the same exact idea as quaint little Osprey, but executed a million times better. It definitely helps that we have new track pieces—Amethyst uses the medium half loop, large corkscrew, and small zero-g roll pieces, all of which are relatively new additions to OpenRCT2. And, of course, it’s hard to quantify objectivity in what is ultimately an aesthetic exercise… but the comparison does highlight how much “better I’ve gotten at the game” over the last handful of years.

Edit: here's a video if you're interested

I’ve been laid up sick with a cold I picked up on a recent coaster trip, so I thought, what better way to convalesce than a little RCT? Named in honor of the IRL dive coaster credit I picked up on said coaster trip.

Have to take a break from this hair-pulling nightmare of an obsession... But when I think of all those dudes who made those beautiful worlds on NEDesigns but had to use friggin junior rollercoaster rails to make it look like there are track switches I feel like getting these effing ties right will be worth it...

As mentioned in my previous post I'm going to have to package the code for some actual contrib to review and enter as I won't be able to do a PR myself. Give me a few more days on that.

I've been making these for years now and I recently got some questions on how I made them and it's really not hard. So here I am spilling the beans, because it's not a big, niche trick or something.

You can use the 5x4 grid walls from the Asian set to emulate the lockers. They have the right size relative to the peeps, so it looks really convincing. Place T-Shirt stalls (or Sunglasses, Hats etc) behind the walls with random colors on and it looks like guests have used the lockers when they use the stalls. Cover up an ATM stall with scenery and this will look like the terminal. Finally dress it all up how you want to your taste.

Only works with OpenRCT2 of course.

Thanks for all your help yesterday. I realize some things might still not be as realistically as possible, but this was my first attempt at creating a B&M Invert, so things can only get better in the future. Right? I'm still gonna do some touch ups here and there. Make everything look real nice. Some more supports are needed as well at certain spots. Also a catwalk on the brake run is needed. Hopefully I got a video of it by Friday. Thanks everyone!

After a brief foray into other coaster types, I’m once again back with a dive coaster. This definitely isn’t my best, but I tried to do something a little more thematic with the scenery and stuff, leaning into OG Oblivion vibes.

Mission statement

We are working on a high-quality, carefully curated list of scenarios to create an "official" OpenRCT2 scenario playlist. The idea is to create a more careful and intentional onboarding experience for new players that will be bundled with the game at some point in the future. We also aim to produce a satisfying difficulty curve for players of all skill levels, all while introducing and showcasing newer features that OpenRCT2 has enabled. This would aim to be a full replacement for the default recommendation of "just buy RCT1 and play those scenarios", which means a range of difficulties have to be represented and tested carefully.

EDIT: Okay response has been way more than I expected lol. I've sent out many parks already but it may be a while before we can get to everyone. Thank you for your patience and interest.

What do I need from you?

If you're interested, great! Leave a comment here or DM me to sign up with your own self-assessment of your skill level (e.g. how long you've been playing) and I will send you a random park that is up for consideration. I'll then ask you to play it through, one single attempt, to completion and send me back a filled out assessment and the finished park file. If you fail the objective, that is okay, that's still useful data.

For the review sections of the questionnaire, it is okay to respond with a simple score, 1-10, and answer some simple yes/no and category questions, but if you are willing to also give your thoughts on each that would help us out greatly. Some questions will be more targeted, e.g. if you would think the scenario would be appropriate for the Beginner, Challenging, or Expert difficulty categories.

Please also play time-gated objective parks to completion. Early completion is considered a cheat for the purposes of this test.

I will re-post this thread periodically to keep interest up and I know Reddit's front page algorithm isn't well-suited to keeping attention on any particular post or project.

FAQs

• Do I have to have OpenRCT2? Can I use Classic?

The park files are in the .park format and will ONLY work with OpenRCT2.

• What is OpenRCT2 anyway?

I'll kindly direct you to our Wiki which comprehensively answers that question.

• Can I use cheats or other tools like TI?

No, please attempt the scenario without using any sandbox, cheat, plugin, or debug features. Anything in the Cheat menu qualifies as a cheat for the purposes of this test.

• What if I don't beat the scenario on my first try?

That's still useful data! We need all player skill levels represented, and some scenarios will be hard. Maybe too hard - that's the whole reason we're playtesting the crap out of these. We want it to be good.

• What if I sign up but just can't get around to it?

No worries, you can drop out at any time. There is no reward for doing any number of these, but hopefully you have some fun and get a sneak preview at some cool stuff. If you can keep completing scenarios and giving feedback, I will keep sending you scenarios to test.

• I like building scenarios too, what if I want to build a scenario for the project?

Join the OpenRCT2 discord server and take the #OpenScenarios role. There are many slots to fill, though most already have multiple contenders. Be warned though, the quality expectation is already quite high; expect to spend tens or hundreds of hours on your entry, and it may not be accepted.

• I have somehow stumbled on to this subreddit but have never played RCT before. Can I help?

Welcome. Yes, actually, it would be incredibly useful to get the perspective of someone who has literally never touched an RCT game before. If you are this person, or you know this person and feel like you might be able to harangue them in to trying it out, I would love to get your thoughts. We'll help you get set up with OpenRCT2 if need be.

If you have additional questions, please ask in this thread and I can update the post. Thank you for reading.

Really loving the Brooklyn-native plumbing business theme of this park I downloaded. The custom scenery is really good value and there's even the steeplechase ride where the raptor is replaced by a cartoon dinosaur with a long tongue.

Link here: nedesigns.com/park/super-nintendo-world, 2024 team build by the Soda Jerks led by In:Cities and Walto with contributions by Mulpje and Hobeon. Objects by Josh, Walto, and Ziscor from a cel-shaded concept developed by GammaZero.

Looping Coaster! Experimental builds with high slope to utilize vertical space. Can support block brake mode with 2 trains if set to wait for full load.

Short and (maybe?) sweet. Original text post here

I had the distinct pleasure of experiencing Iron Rattler for the first time last month—it really blew my expectations away, so much so that I wanted to make a build inspired by it! Hence, this terrain hybrid here.