New Planet Coaster footage reveals obsessive attention to detail

Planetcoaster

Last night's livestream with Planet Coaster's art director John Laws was a series of improbable statements somehow accompanied by footage to back them up. From earlier videos, I had some idea that Frontier's new theme park sim, a spiritual successor to RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, was rich with detail and flexible in the extreme—see here for a clip of coaster tracks being deformed every which way you please. Laws' discussion of themes took 'rich' and made it 'obsessive'.

I'm a builder more than a manager: in any given game, I'm not so fussed how well my theme park/city/empire is doing as how neat and pretty it looks. In Planet Coaster, you start with a broad theme, as befits a gaudy tourist attraction: pirates, fairytale or ultra-modern, to name a few. In most sims, that would grant you access to a specific set of prefab assets. Here you develop a palette, select your signage and decide which potion bottles you want on display in your fairytale gift shop before dotting appropriate signs around the park to brainwash punters into buying your tat. Live the brand manager dream!

Planet Coaster dinosaur

Around hat shops, visitors can be spotted wearing more hats. People stagger around attempting not to wet themselves because you've built too few toilets. Reflections will play off every surface—an astounding level of fidelity for a sim.

The VoD is over an hour long, but highlights include the announcement of themes and mascots itself, some concept art for coming themes that details the modular aspect of construction and one, two, three good chunks of in-game footage.

Latest in Action
The First Berserker: Khazan review - Blade Phantom
How to claim The First Berserker: Khazan pre-order bonus and deluxe edition DLC
gta 6 trailer
Publishers 'don't want to be anywhere near' Grand Theft Auto 6 when it launches: 'It's proving to be very stressful'
An image of a Helldiver from Helldivers 2 shooting at a red dragon from Dungeons & Dragons.
'Ok, so dragon builds are a thing now': galaxy-brained Helldivers 2 player incinerates a bile titan with a hover pack and a flamethrower
Assassin's Creed Shadows promo image
Ubisoft scores a legendary ratio against Elon Musk on his own platform—which hopefully marks a final end to all the Assassin's Creed Shadows' culture war nonsense
Assassin's Creed Shadows immersive mode - Naoe holding a tanto in her hand as two guards fall to the ground behind her.
Assassin's Creed Shadows' first hotfix addresses stability issues and a photo mode crash
A plastic duck dressed like a circus weightlifter
The 5th highest-rated game on Steam in 2022 is back with a multiplayer sequel
Latest in News
The new Prime Asset featured in the upcoming update for the Outlast Trials.
The Outlast Trials puts its already paranoid players under surveillance for a time-limited story event
A Viera looking confused in Final Fantasy 14.
Old armor continues to fall victim to Final Fantasy 14's bizarre two-channel dye system, unless you're super into changing the colour of teeny-tiny eyelets: 'Why even bother at this point?'
Starfield: Shattered Space
By the time Bethesda was on Starfield, you'd 'basically get in trouble' for breaking schedule, says former dev: 'A lot of the great stuff within Skyrim came from having the freedom to do what you want'
Otter AI Meeting Agent
As if your work meetings weren't already fun enough, now Otter has a new all-hearing AI agent that remembers everything anyone has said and can join in the discussion
Monster Hunter Wilds' stockpile master studying a manifest
As layoffs and studio closures continue to deathroll the western AAA industry, analyst points out 5 of 8 major Japanese companies hit all-time share prices this year
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Ogryn
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide adds a psychic horde murderzone mode and makes Ogryns even smashier