Planet Coaster 2 Preview
Roller coaster and theme park-building sims are one of my favorite video game genres. I’ve poured serious numbers of hours into the Roller Coaster Tycoon series, No Limits, and since 2016, Planet Coaster. When Planet Coaster was released it was a dream come true for coaster fans. With a colorful, detailed style and nearly endless options for building, Planet Coaster allowed for immense creativity. A boatload of themed expansions and Steam Workshop support added to the wealth of content. Still, gamers want more and better, and that’s where Planet Coaster 2 comes in.
I had the rare and exciting opportunity to play a couple of hours of Planet Coaster 2, including a scenario from the campaign and a bit of sandbox mode. Of course, most of my time was less about goals or productivity than exploration. I wanted to see what was new, what I liked, and what I didn’t. After all, no game has ever been released in its final form. Plus, Planet Coaster 2 is still a couple of months away from its final release.
Splish Splash
For anyone who isn’t familiar, Planet Coaster allows players to build not just roller coasters, but elaborate and sprawling theme parks. Just about every element of real-life parks — from dust bins to dark rides — can be dropped into the build and customized. YouTube is home to Planet Coaster devotees who have built, sometimes over the span of months, amazingly detailed, artistically inspired parks.
Thanks to 11 themed expansions, each of which adds usable content to the main game, it would be hard to imagine that anything was missing. And yet it was: water slides and water parks. Planet Coaster 2’s standout feature is the addition of a whole suite of pools, slides, and decor. Players can now build standalone water parks, or integrate water-themed areas into their coaster collections.
In the campaign scenario I played, I was tasked with building a large pool with two flume slides. Pool sizes and shapes are completely customizable and the water looks fantastic. You can add cool little touches like wave machines and the requisite lifeguards are added as staff. Of course, pools require some basic amenities like changing rooms. Guests can’t swim in street clothes. The variety of slides is impressive, from tame kiddie slides to monster enclosed slides that would be terrifying in real life. Players design, decorate, and modify slides in much the same way as coasters.
Off the Grid
It’s clear that developer Frontier has borrowed some mechanics from their Planet Zoo game. Maybe the most notable is that parks and rides now operate on a power grid system. Every ride and shop needs power. Generators, substations, and power cables connect everything. In typical city builder style, a power overlay layer shows what’s being covered. Additionally, the power plant needs specialized staff in order to run.
While I didn’t spend enough time in the game to really see how this feature impacts the long-term experience, my feelings are somewhat mixed. Certainly, it adds another touch of realism. After all, real parks’ energy needs are significant and costly. Power and water systems are part of a real park’s layout, too. That said, for those interested in simply playing with design tools, it adds a bit of complication that feels unnecessary. I’m not sure if the feature can be toggled off in sandbox mode.
Forge a Path
With some changes to the UI and menus, experienced Planet Coaster fans might face a learning curve and challenged muscle memory. Aside from that, there’s a long list of new features, coaster types, shops, and small changes. The path construction tool is now much more refined, if not exactly easier to use. A wide range of surfaces makes a larger variety of textured plazas and paths possible. It’s now much easier to add theming to queue lines and other paths. Some of the basic flat rides come in a decor-free vanilla form, ready for decoration and theming.
Graphically, Planet Coaster has always been impressive but Planet Coaster 2 is a step forward. Park guests now reflect a wider diversity of character types. There are new weather effects, with actual environmental rain. Covered platforms are darker and more realistic, and some coaster types have switch tracks or maintenance sidings. The list of small changes is very large and I look forward to seeing them in practice.
While my personal ultimate park sim would fuse elements from Planet Coaster and Planet Zoo, I’m happily content with Planet Coaster 2, which looks to make a fantastic sim even better. I can’t wait to play the final game and see what wonders the very active Planet Coaster community creates using the sequel’s excellent tools.
Thank you for keeping it locked on COGconnected.
