The Story of RollerCoaster Tycoon | Noclip Greatest Hits

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My wife bought the current mobile version of classic RCT and she's been playing it so much that her hands get cramped. She hadn't played since she was a kid and now that she's older and understands the game a bit better, has just been crushing it. What has been most surprising is realizing how many levels there are and how many new rides/stalls come up later in the game that she never saw when she was kid. This thing was, and still is, a masterpiece in gaming.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 437 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/PureBloodPotterFan πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

Nothing like spending what seemed like hours to develop a bad ass coaster only for the patrons to be too scared to ride it.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 67 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/ThreeTo3d πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

I want to get off Mr. Bones’ Wild Ride

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 194 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/Calm_Canary πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

Ah the endless queue line that terminates in a body of water.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 137 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/[deleted] πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

I grew up playing RC1 & RC2. I'd just spend hours and hours creating custom themed parks in RC2 because that was the version that had all of the Halloween, winter, candy and tons of other themed decor for your park. Can honestly say those 2 games helped me escape a lot of shitty days during my younger years, lol

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 112 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/polarwaves πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

My experience with this franchise is limited to stumbling across youtube videos of diabolical rollercoasters designed to kill as many people as possible. Anybody got a link?

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 17 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/mymeatpuppets πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

This reminds me that I loved Transport(ation?) Tycoon by microprose. There is a kind of similar version in the iOS app store but I think it misses a lot of the nuance around competition for resources, resource depletion and has no rail or air transport...they just added shipping.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 17 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/[deleted] πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

If you're into RCT 1 and 2, check out Marcel Vos on youtube. His videos look at mechanics, exploits, and how certain things interact with each other in the game. His videos are quite enjoyable.

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 13 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/Cyynric πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies

Well that was nostalgic. Loved these and simcity so much, and good to see there's still major communities playing!

πŸ‘οΈŽ︎ 11 πŸ‘€οΈŽ︎ u/kdanham πŸ“…οΈŽ︎ May 05 2021 πŸ—«︎ replies
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[PLAYFUL MUSIC PLAYING] DANNY: Hello, and welcome to Greatest Hits, the brand new show from Noclip where we dive into the history of some of your favorite games. And we mean your favorite games, because the titles we cover on this show are voted on and selected by our patrons. And this episode they've sent us on quite the wild ride. [PEOPLE SCREAMING] I'll have to admit it. When RollerCoaster Tycoon won our first poll, I was pretty surprised. What is it about a theme park management series that resonated with so many people 20 years after its heyday? Well, it's a good thing that's the entire point of this show, to not only talk to the people who made these classic games, but to explore their legacy, to figure out what it is about these games we consider classic, and what our love for them tells us about video games today. This series has spawned a half dozen sequels, bunches of expansion packs, and more than a few spiritual successors. But when people are talking about their love of RollerCoaster Tycoon, generally they're referring to the first two games. These two games programmed by a single guy. These days he's pretty hard to find. That is, of course, unless you own a boxed copy of the originals. Tycoon designer Chris Sawyer all but left the games industry after the release of the third game. And by modern media standards, he's almost impossible to get a hold of. But if we're to tell the story of this game, we also need to figure out who kept the torch lit since Chris' departure almost 20 years ago. The developers evolving the genre, the communities keeping the game alive, and the YouTubers creating brand new RollerCoaster Tycoon fans today. Why do people still care about RollerCoaster Tycoon? What effect has this series had on the games we played today? And can we get Chris Sawyer to turn on his webcam? A lot of questions, and the clock is ticking. Welcome to Noclip Greatest Hits. [KEYBOARD CLICKING] [MUSIC PLAYING] Okay. A brief history lesson for those of you out of the loop. This won't be long, but it's a bit twisty. So please keep your limbs inside the car at all times. The original RollerCoaster Tycoon was first released in 1999, programmed by Chris Sawyer with graphics by Simon Foster and music and sound by veteran composer Allister Brimble. Chris and Simon had previously worked on Transport Tycoon together, an isometric transport management game set against the backdrop of 20th century expansionism. The story goes they worked remotely, sending floppy disks through the royal mail on a daily basis. The game was a critical and commercial success, and Chris used the profits to take a well-earned break. The Scottish developer traveled around Europe and across the Atlantic to North America, visiting theme parks during his journey and quickly developing a love for riding roller coasters. So when it came time to create his new game, a new idea was on the tip of his tongue. And while the original title of White Knuckle would eventually be dropped in favor of continuing the Tycoon brand, he was true to his vision, creating a game that satisfied both the management pleasures of his transport game and the joyful creativity of designing looping diving roller coasters. In RollerCoaster Tycoon, you build and manage theme parks, placing rides, paths, concession stands, and toilets. And while there are non roller coaster amusements available, the bulk of the game's creativity comes from making custom roller coasters from a variety of styles. The goal of the game is to attract visitors to your park by creating the most exciting roller coasters possible. But many players will tell you that the pleasure of RollerCoaster Tycoon comes from the craft of park building. Organizing paths, placing rides where you want them, adding flowers and flair, and constructing increasingly imaginative coasters. The first game sold a staggering 6 million units by the time its sequel came out. RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, largely considered to be the pinnacle of the series, added dozens of improvements over the first game, leaning into the creativity of the community to give the players more options with rides, buildings and scenery. By the time it was released in late 2002, the strategy genre was ready to leave 2D. And while Chris Sawyer did do some consultancy work on the third game, Atari handed development over to Frontier Developments for RollerCoaster Tycoon 3. The story gets a little bit messier after that. Don't worry. We'll check in on it later. But what's important now is that you know when people talk about their love for RCT, generally they're talking about those first two games in the series, written in Assembly by Chris Sawyer with timeless graphics by Simon Foster. So what if I told you that despite all the sequels, all the spinoffs and spiritual successors, there are thousands of people today who were still playing those original games and millions watching them? Alright, it's time we checked in on the RollerCoaster Tycoon community, but like any good club I'm going to need an in. And mine is a Dutch guy with a YouTube channel. MARCEL VOS: Hello everyone, and welcome to another video. Today we will be answering the question that has plagued many generations of great RollerCoaster Tycoon players. Why do tired guests drown slower than fully energized guests? RCT was huge in the Netherlands. When I was a kid, you know, like early 2000s, you couldn't go anywhere without people talking about RCT. Everyone had the game. Like I remember my friend's dads burning it onto a different CD for another classmate. I think one of the main reasons why it's popular is that it has an incredibly low entry barrier. I mean, anyone can, who's never played any kind of game like that can pick it up. And you can then see your park, and you can put down a merry-go-round. You can open it, and then you will get guests. And they will get on it. And you can build a roller coaster. You don't have to build it yourself. There are plenty of good prebuilds, and most of them aren't too big. So you can put them in almost any park, and it just works. But then when you get better at it, you can, there are a lot of options. So it doesn't get played out very quickly. I got a few comments every now and then, people saying, I don't even play the game. I just watch the videos. Or people are saying, you know, I've played this game 15 years ago, and it's interesting to see how it works in depth, even though I don't play the game anymore. Also a lot of comments saying people picked up the game again, but also still quite a few people that are actively playing, either that are in the community or that, you know, play on their own and are not necessarily in any community. Hello everyone, and welcome to another video. A few days ago, I uploaded the video about why certain mazes are nearly impossible to solve for the guests because of how the path finding algorithm works in mazes. If you haven't seen that one yet, you will not really understand this video. So I recommend watching that one first. DANNY: But you brought up an interesting point, which is that the game I played growing up on my Amiga was Theme Park, which is similar in some ways to RollerCoaster Tycoon, but you hit that threshold pretty quick. Like the game ends at a certain point. There's not much more to do. Whereas RollerCoaster Tycoon, it seems, I mean, your channel is a testament to how limitless it is. MARCEL: That said, you know, almost everyone isn't going to reach that skill gap. And I would not have reached it either if not for a lot of other people and the community that, yeah, there's just so much to do with a very low skill ceiling. And another thing which I think is very important is the graphical style makes it so that you can really easily make something that looks pretty. You have, for example, you have Planet Coaster, which is kind of, sort of like a spiritual successor, especially to RollerCoaster Tycoon 3. But the downside to Planet Coaster is that you need to be better at it to make something decent than you need to be in a RollerCoaster Tycoon 2. Because RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, you can put down a few trees and it just works. DANNY: There are many things a game needs to be in order for it to become a classic. But one of the most important things is how it looks. Some games age more gracefully than others. And thankfully for RCT, there is something timeless about the original two games. There's no better example of this endurance than New Element. For almost 20 years, this website has been highlighting outstanding visual design in custom RollerCoaster Tycoon parks, with accolades handed out to the most beautifully crafted levels. The latest iteration of their community competition is currently running. So it's all the more impressive that the graphics for RCT 1 and 2 were created entirely by one person, Simon Foster. He used 3D Studio Max to create thousands of 3D renders, which he would then manually export and send to Chris on rough grids. Once you factored in all the animations, the four isometric angles, and the different number of people that may be riding on the coaster, one roller coaster car could take as many as 6,600 unique frames. It was painstaking work, but it led to a game which looked incredible in its day without adversely impacting performance. This was absolutely crucial, as levels in RCT could get really complex. But with most of the game written in Assembly, Chris Sawyer ensured that even at the absolute limit of parks sizes, RollerCoaster Tycoon ran well and rarely suffered from computational errors. But even the most tightly written code cannot avoid the passage of time, and for many years the original two RollerCoaster Tycoon games were unplayable on modern machines. So how exactly is Marcel playing RCT 2 in 2021? MARCEL: I can't imagine making my videos without Open RollerCoaster Tycoon. For example, it's got windowed mode and HD resolutions, which is really useful. But other than that, you know, a lot more hotkeys. You can speed up the game for when you need to test a long coaster or have your guests spread out in the park and maybe go ride around a lot. There are just so many quality of life improvements. There are way too many to list, but they make the original game you know, by comparison, playable. DANNY: The original RollerCoaster Tycoon was written by a single programmer, Chris Sawyer. But the person keeping the original RollerCoaster Tycoon alive today does so with the help of a global team. Open RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 is a free program which modifies the original game's installer to work on modern OS's, including several operating system families the original never supported. So every two months we're going to have the patrons vote for a new episode of this show, which means that we only have about four weeks all in all to get the interviews locked in to give us enough time to actually edit the episode. So pretty quickly we've reached out to Chris, at least the company that represents him to try and get an interview. And we also have a couple of industry back channels working as well to see if we can contact him that way. But so far it's been a couple of weeks. We've heard nothing back. So while our attempts to contact Chris Sawyer were still going unanswered, we decided to reach to the only other person who knows the code as well as him. Ted John started Open RollerCoaster Tycoon in 2013, but his passion for the series came much, much earlier. - I mean, I got the first game RollerCoaster Tycoon. I was probably seven at the time. You know, I played other park games. I think I played Theme Park in the past. But what interested me most about RollerCoaster Tycoon is it didn't feel dumbed down. It seemed quite sophisticated, and the graphics looked really good. They still look good today 'cause they're all pre-rendered. and I really liked the second game as well. In fact, I remember looking at the screenshots before it came out. I also looked at the game manual because that was available before the game was released. So one of the other games I played was Transport Tycoon, which is the previous game Chris Sawyer made before he made RollerCoaster Tycoon. And I remember in, I think it was about 2005, I found OpenTTD for the first time and was impressed at what they achieved and how it was the exact same game but had these new features, had multiplayer with many players. You could be the same company. You could work on the same, on the same infrastructure. And it ran on every platform operating system you could think of at the time. And I thought that this is great. RollerCoaster Tycoon should have the same thing. We got it working on other platforms like Mac OS and Linux quite early. And then I think the community are quite excited about being able to make much, much larger maps with a lot more different types of rides, scenery. The other commonly asked for request is improved guest AI. There's quite often the guests that, you know, they get lost and they complain about being lost. Even though your park's got brilliant pathing systems, directions, they got maps. Yet they still can't seem to find where they want to go. DANNY: Your job is like half game designer, half like game preservationist in a way. So where do you draw the line between like, oh, this is additive, but it doesn't take away from what the original was or is. - Yeah, we're very cautious about adding too many new features. I've got a lot of, a lot of people like to request things that make it a bit easier or in other ways, things that we think of as a cheat, I suppose, where it tells you how much you should price the rides and various things like that. And we're not sure whether that should belong in the base game. However, we know that some people do want that, and to sort of please everyone we've decided, well, why don't we make the mod for the game moddable so that other people could add their own mods on top of that and make the game exactly how they want. DANNY: Ted seems uniquely positioned to start this project. Not only is he a massive fan of the original games, but remarkably his day job as a software engineer is focused on getting COBOL programs to run on modern machines. He's eager not to take all the credit for this work though, as like any successful open source project, OpenRCT2 has benefited from a passionate community of developers who have a deep love for the design of the game. TED: So we've had over a hundred contributors now. A hundred different people have contributed to the source code in different ways. People translating the game to numerous different languages, where we've got some people trying to create new art for the game. And some people are just there to test the game or do documentation. DANNY: When we asked our community on Patreon why they voted for this game, we received a broad range of answers. Some said it was the management. Others talked about coaster design or park layout. For some, it was a relaxing sandbox experience or just a shot of nostalgia. But Ted told me that in recent surveys, they had noticed an influx of younger players into RollerCoaster Tycoon, folks who weren't even born when it came out. So I asked him, why does he think people are still playing this game? What makes RollerCoaster Tycoon such a hit? TED: Well, I think a lot of people, they haven't played in a long time. They played it when they were younger and they see the game again. And they realize they can play it. But I think for a lot of other people, it's a toy. It's like Lego and the, you know, you can't get old of it. There's always different things, new things that you can think of building. It's not too complex. It's very uniform. You know, you're talking about isometric grid. Everything's tile or block-based, a bit like Lego and Minecraft. You know, it's easy to place things exactly where you want. [EXPLOSION] RollerCoaster Tycoon 1, it's all about the progression, you know, playing each park gets bigger, and you research more new rides, and you have to meet objectives. And then you can tick off those objectives. You can complete the game. Whereas RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 is your sandbox mode, where you create whatever you want. One thing that stands out and you can get this from the game is that Chris Sawyer is clearly obsessed with roller coasters and theme parks. And he knows, he's read a lot about them. And that is in the game, the detail, the different types of roller coasters, the different pieces that make up a roller coaster. It's all in the game. It's very technical, and you have to be very technical with how you build them. You can't build anything you'd want, you have to stick to the rules. You have to make sure that the lateral G isn't too high, people don't get too sick. Also that they're not too boring either. And likewise, you can't have a theme park with just really scary rides. You have to have a balance between everything, and the game is very good at encouraging that. I don't think it's crazy that it was written in Assembly. I think lots of games back then were written in Assembly. Certainly lots of games written for game consoles were written in Assembly. But it must've given it an edge in performance because I think it's one of those games where you think it works on any computer. When you think, yes, you got a part, you got 2000 individual people do path finding logic. You got all the roller coasters, and they've got all the animations. There's a lot going on. In order to get the performance good back then is the graphics are very simple. Palette based, 8 bit. There weren't many mathematical calculations. It's all very integer based and lots of table look ups. There was no, you know, crazy floating point numbers going around. It was all very simple physics. And I think that's what allowed the game to have that high performance on any machine. DANNY: After the release of RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, Sawyer, for one reason or another, decided to focus on a new game, Locomotion, a spiritual successor to Transport Tycoon. By now, Chris had made his fortune with the series. So while retaining the rights to the IP, he handed control of the franchise over to publisher Atari. They in turn hired Frontier Developments, who had done the Xbox port of the original and both expansion packs of RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, to create a sequel. Sawyer would do a small amount of consulting on the project. The result was RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, and it would be a significant technical leap for the franchise. The first 3D version of the game with a free camera, day and night cycles, and significant additions to customer behavior. It would go on to sell more than 10 million copies and review well, but like a lot of early 3D games, many fans of the series failed to connect emotionally with RollerCoaster Tycoon 3. The game was well-designed, but for many, much of the magic of those originals was simply missing. The original RollerCoaster Tycoon games had a beautiful simplicity to them. At least the story around what those games are, right? It was a Scottish developer who just loved roller coasters, and on his own, he created these rich and deep and beautiful, artistic even, games about designing roller coaster parks. Those first two games play and look pretty similar and have a lot of nostalgia with them. But after RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, stuff started to get a little bit messy, a little bit more complicated. And not just in the games themselves, but also the politics that surrounded them. The relationship between Atari and Frontier soured in the years after RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, resulting in a complex and largely private set of legal battles over the rights and usage of the threequel's code and intellectual property. Between this and Atari's general financial woes, the franchise would disappear for the best part of a decade. And it's here that you can start to feel sorry for serious fans. RollerCoaster Tycoon did eventually return in 2012 with the confusingly titled RollerCoaster Tycoon 3D, a 3DS exclusive which used assets from RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, but with a more classic isometric like perspective. And this knife was twisted further by 2014's RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 Mobile, a freemium phone game that was critically panned in part due to its aggressive micro-transactions. Rather confusingly, RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 Mobile was followed by RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 Mobile, a Frontier developed mobile version of the game, which by and large was actually pretty decent, though obviously not the RollerCoaster Tycoon game that many fans of the series had been praying for. Okay, you still following along? This is where it gets a bit more confusing. 2016 saw the release of multiple RCT products and the return of Chris Sawyer, though perhaps not in the exact way fans of the series were praying for. RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic was a mobile release in the style of the original games, created by Chris Sawyer and a team that he'd worked on in an earlier mobile release for Transport Tycoon. It was generally well received. The second RCT game that year was RollerCoaster Tycoon World, a new 3D entry that bounced from studio to studio and enjoyed a tumultuous early access stint before it was officially launched one day before Frontier's new roller coaster game, Planet Coaster. Planet Coaster reviewed well, while RollerCoaster Tycoon World was about as bad a nightmare fans of the series could have possibly imagined. Buggy, unfinished and not very fun. It was critically panned. A mobile port of Worlds quickly followed under the title RollerCoaster Tycoon Touch, followed then by RollerCoaster Tycoon Joyride, an on rails shooter for PlayStation VR, and RollerCoaster Tycoon Story, a mobile matching game. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention RollerCoaster Tycoon Adventures, an equity crowdfunded port of RollerCoaster Tycoon Touch for the Nintendo Switch, which later came out on PC as an Epic Game Store exclusive, which I guess makes that a PC port of a Switch port of a mobile port of the worst RollerCoaster Tycoon game. Beginning to feel sorry for RollerCoaster Tycoon fans. From the fans'perspective, it does seem that under Atari's stewardship, the RollerCoaster Tycoon franchise has become a bit of a cash cow. But it hasn't been all bad news for fans of the genre, as outside of the Tycoon franchise, there are two games that have attempted to pick up the baton. Planet Coaster by Frontier Developments is the spiritual successor to RollerCoaster Tycoon 3. It was their return to the genre on PC, having attempted to do so on console twice with Thrillville and Screamride. Planet Coaster launched to critical acclaim in 2016, enjoyed frequent content updates and DLC, and is reported to have sold over two and a half million copies to date. We successfully made contact with Frontier and attempted to get some spokespeople on to talk to us, perhaps David Brabham who worked on RCT3 and knows Chris, or even some of the folks who worked on Planet Coaster. But sadly, they stopped communicating at a certain stage. And honestly, it's tough not to see why. The RollerCoaster Tycoon brand has an element of chaos attached to it. And in Planet Coaster, Frontier had managed to create a fresh start, one that through significant work and support had generated its own passionate community. Perhaps this is also why we failed to get Chris Sawyer on board. In many ways, he's been hands-off with the IP over the past few years. And with all those old lawsuits, one could forgive him for being cautious over what he says and to whom. His most recent interview was conducted by my old colleague in the UK games press, Wesley Yin-Poole over at Eurogamer. And even that was conducted via email through the company that represents him. Not exactly a prime candidate for the type of off-the-cuff video interviews that we like to do. So while Planet Coaster may be the tycoon game of choice for many players and a worthy spiritual successor to RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, what about all those fans of Chris' original games? Surely somebody out there can make a spiritual successor to those games. Something cute and vaguely isometric. Maybe from a small team. One guy who programs and loves roller coasters, and another who does all the art. And maybe they answer their emails. I mean, I can dream, right? SEBASTIAN MAYER: I grew up next to Europa Park, which is one of the the largest theme parks in the world. So I always was kind of interested in how a park like that operates and all the technology that goes into the rides. GARRET RANDELL: I took some pictures when I was out there with Sebastian, and it was great to see like how these roller coasters work up close. - My name's Sebastian, and I'm the lead programmer for Parkitect. - My name's Garret. I am the, I guess art director and co-designer of Parkitect. Parkitect is a theme park building game in the line of the classic theme park building games such as Theme Park and RollerCoaster Tycoon, with more of an emphasis on management specific to like decorations and resources in a theme park. There's still all of the building and customization, but we wanted to get a little bit more into the behind the scenes of a theme park when it comes to what people want to see and how the back end is managed. To win the game, you're not just building the park of your dreams. You're also having to manage the backstage and everything that goes on there. SEBASTIAN: The focus is not just on the guests that visit the park, but also on the employees that run the park. So you have stuff like staff buildings and training rooms that you have to build. It's kind of like a real theme park. So guests don't enjoy seeing these parts of the park, so you have to build decorations and stuff to hide them behind the scenes apart from your guests. DANNY: Parkitect seems to have succeeded where so many theme park games have failed in keeping things simple on the surface, but adding depth where it matters. While Parkitect may boast a cute and cartoonish aesthetic, under the hood, there's a lot of simulation work going on here. For instance, each visitor's line of sight is calculated, and so their experience at the park is positively or negatively impacted based on how much of the backstage park maintenance stuff they can see. An innovative idea which actually incentivizes players to add flair and scenery to their parks. GARRET: A lot of game companies are very into the idea of innovation, especially when it comes to market value and things like that. And it's very hard to innovate this kind of game, not only for technical reasons, but also just gameplay reasons. Yeah, there's kind of been a renaissance in sim games, and we kind of got really lucky that we kind of were at the beginning of that wave. And it's been really interesting to see all of these different takes on 100 different aspects of the genre. Like you've got town builders, you've got theme park builders, you've got city builders. There's some interesting ones out there, like that one where you build a town on the back of a walking creature and like all these cool, innovative takes on it that I think is just really cool and does push traffic across the genre for people who want more of those experiences, I think. DANNY: Do you think there's a difference between the way in which people play a game like Parkitect and a game like Planet Coaster, right? Because thematically they're very similar, but in terms of the gameplay experience, they're worlds apart. - What we hear from players very often this that they enjoy both games for different reasons. And that's really cool that two games that are kind of similar can co-exist. So for Parkitect, people are looking for usually is the management part, I would say. And for Planet Coaster, the options for building that you have in that game are just amazing. And it looks really good too. GARRET: Yeah, I've seen some truly amazing dioramas from Planet Coaster, just in pure 3D space and realism. I will say like it's community that drives these games, right? For us community was like the number one thing. We always knew from the beginning that we had to build a relationship with the community and kind of keep them, keep them happy. And I'm not saying like we had to bribe them or anything, but we just had to moderate it and also keep their expectations in check, because we were very worried about this getting out of hand because there hadn't been a theme park game in awhile. So we have the devlog where Sebastian would painstakingly describe a lot of the decisions we had made and a lot of the technical stuff so people didn't get crazy expectations. 'Cause I think trust is important in this kind of endeavor because we are trying to get them to buy a product we made. But above that, the community just also fuels the game far past we ever could imagine too. When it comes to community content, we wanted to make it cool for the community. And our mod support is important to support after that kind of became a thing way earlier than we imagined. And now we support like custom code to a point, using Unity, but custom like assets and stuff like that, where you can insert your own rides. Because we can't cover everything. It would be impossible for us. And there was 1,001 things people want. I think that's the number one most important thing in this entire genre, in any simulation game, if it has a creative element to it is just community. Of course that's true of most games, but especially for these kinds of games. DANNY: That's the word that keeps coming to mind when I think about RollerCoaster Tycoon. Since Chris Sawyer all but stepped away from full-time game dev in 2004, the legacy of the original vision has been shepherded by the kids who grew up playing them. YouTubers who have introduced the game to countless new players, hobbyists who ensured that old fans and new could continue to play this classic, and new innovators who, spurred on by a similar indie spirit and love of roller coasters, created their own vision for the genre. So eventually we did actually hear back from the people who represent Chris, and they reiterated what I had already come to understand from looking into this story, that he's retired from games and is generally a pretty private person, but that he's flattered that people still take such an interest in the games he created. In interviews, Chris Sawyer has mentioned how much focus and work games development took in his younger days and how even more demanding the world of games creation has gotten since he left. But there's one answer from 2016's Eurogamer interview that really stood out to me. When asked how hands-off he's been with the series since 2002, Sawyer said, "I think you have to understand that my personal vision for RollerCoaster Tycoon was fulfilled with the last version I created myself, RollerCoaster Tycoon 2, and I had no interest in working on someone else's vision for future versions of the game. Much better to let those who have inspiration fulfill their vision of the next iteration of the game and not to interfere. RollerCoaster Tycoon has moved on a long way since its early days as RCT1 and RCT2. And while I'm intrigued to see how the newer games evolve and expand, I'm not the right person to guide or restrict the design and development of games so different to my own." Perhaps radio silence is Chris's gift to this new generation of devs. While many lament his lack of activity, he's also not stood in anyone's way. When I started this episode, I wanted more than anything to talk to Chris, to ask him why he made the game and what the series means to him. But in trying to find the answers for myself, I stumbled upon far more interesting stories. This video isn't about him. It's a video for him. A celebration of the legacy he left behind and a worldwide community of players who are still gleefully creating roller coasters 20 years later. SEBASTIAN: It's really cool how supportive the community for these types of games is. I mean, if you look at RollerCoaster Tycoon, game is like, 16 years old, 17 years old by this point. And it still has an active community. MARCEL: I like teaching people stuff or showing off cool stuff I made. And it's just so satisfying to see people, you know, leave nice comments and, you know, also just to watch those numbers go up. I'm a big numbers guy. - So that's what's probably most fascinating is that he's made effectively three games. - Right. TED: Transport Tycoon, RollerCoaster Tycoon, Chris Sawyer's Locomotion. And all three of them have now got open source projects replicating it. How many game studios, you know, could admit that? - Yeah, it's amazing. Drop the mic and walk away, Chris Sawyer. [LAUGHING] [MUSIC PLAYING]
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Channel: Noclip - Video Game Documentaries
Views: 487,504
Rating: undefined out of 5
Keywords: rollercoaster, tycoon, chris sawyer, rct, rct2, openrct2, marcel vos, noclip, danny o'dwyer, ted john, parkitect, interview, developer, developing, video games, games development, game dev
Id: ts4BD8AqD9g
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 37min 4sec (2224 seconds)
Published: Sun May 02 2021
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