Planet Coaster 2 review - A fun ride that will only get better
Following the decline of the revered Rollercoaster Tycoon franchise, Planet Coaster arrived to quench that thirst for park management sims. Developer Frontier Developments knocked it out of the park with their 2016 entry, leading to a full successor, Planet Coaster 2, which aims to take the fledgling franchise to even loftier heights.
So does this surprise sequel bring new tricks to the table, or is it just a glorified DLC? Find out more about that and other aspects of the latest park management sim in our full review of Planet Coaster 2.
Planet Coaster 2 is a refinement of its predecessor's fundamentals
This shiny new successor aims to revitalize nearly every aspect of the previous entry with more realistic coaster behavior, improved animations for NPCs, and more. Chief among these are new features, many of which fans have been clamoring for years now, such as scenery props that are attachable to rides and extra effects that trigger at specific points of the ride.
That said, fans of the genre or even the previous game can instantly get started with Planet Coaster 2 due to it refusing to start from the core fundamentals of any good park management sim. After booting up, players can pick between various game modes: Career, Sandbox, and Franchise, each allowing players to enjoy their game the way they want:
- Career: This is a single-player mode where talkative NPCs take players through the paces of building and managing a theme park, completing objectives, and getting to grips with the game's core mechanics and gameplay.
- Sandbox: The ultimate playground in Planet Coaster 2 allows taking fine control over every minute detail of a park, with as many or no restrictions as needed to make the park players have always dreamt of.
- Franchise: This brand-new mode allows players to manage a park with their friends wherever they are across the globe, including managing different aspects of the park, checking out other player's creations, and more.
While I have played and enjoyed the 2016 game, I spent most of my time in Career to see how things have changed and what new surprises await me. Plopping down blueprints, setting up paths, and decorating the park as desired never gets old.
Still, it was delightful to return to the basics of park construction, despite the chatty NPC caricatures who needlessly prolong what's essentially a tutorial.
Newcomers to the genre — just know that you will have to oversee every little facet of building a theme park. These don't just include setting up new rides and facilities, hiring and managing staff, and buying new land, but also testing and maintaining those rides, paying and upkeep of said staff, and ensuring guest safety and happiness. New research can also be invested in using Research Points to unlock new rides.
Although there is not much variety among themed decorations, players need to up their artistic flair to ensure a high Scenery Rating. Every progression element in the game is more or less interconnected: A well-rounded park keeps guests satisfied, which generates more income, which in turn helps acquire more upgrades and facilities to expand the park. That said, all of this is easier said than done in the grand scheme of things.
Rides can break down, guests' every need — like hunger, boredom, and more — must be catered to, and players will no doubt bash their heads trying to figure out why guests can't reach a certain ride.
Thankfully, the game offers a few ways to alleviate some of this burden. This includes a heatmap with varied tabs to keep track of power flow, which park areas need better satisfaction coverage and safety levels, as well as the ability to gauge fear, excitement, etc, stats on a ride, and more.
A bag of tricks and treats
That said, Planet Coaster 2 is more than just an encore of what came before. The new star of this show includes the all-new water park attractions; those who are bored of managing plain old rides can throw aquatic fun into the mix by establishing pools, flumes, and water slides for more high-octane action. These are also easy to set up and grant further variety to park customization.
Of course, the pool feature also has its own elements to manage and hurdles to overcome, like pool safety, allowing lifeguards, ensuring the public has access to key amenities like entry tickets and changing rooms, and more, which also introduce further welcome challenges. Unfortunately, much of this gets undermined due to the cumbersome UI experience.
Basic bits and pieces are tucked behind tabs, which in turn are stowed behind more tabs. This slows down the creation process by a decent margin as players will initially be scratching their heads searching for the tab that has the lifeguard chair, for example. On top of unsatisfying scenery options, this does leave players wanting for more.
Thankfully, given the studios' past record, we can expect further updates and DLC to address these issues so here's hoping that is sooner than later during the game's lifecycle.
Graphics, sound, and performance
Planet Coaster 2 is built atop Frontier Development's in-house tech. The visual style is realistic, yet stylized especially when it comes to its expressive guest crowds that populate the player's parks. As with the previous title, players can choose to view their creations from the eyes of any single guest walking around the park at any given time, which is always fun as it offers a new perspective.
It is also fairly performant for a genre that is traditionally computationally demanding, and a clear step up over the original Planet Coaster, so fans will be happy about this one. Sound-wise, it doesn't look to reinvent the wheel, and it doesn't need to when its crispy ride sounds and guest chatter works fine enough.
In conclusion
Players who are looking for an in-depth park management sim where they can conjure the theme park of their dreams may find Planet Coaster 2's offerings enticing enough to pick it up. Overhauled management and decoration options plus new attractions such as pool rides ensure this is no safe sequel.
Despite falling short in some minor areas, such as the UI and scenery options, Planet Coaster 2 is a robust package that improves upon its predecessor in meaningful ways — and it will only evolve and get better as the game matures via future updates.
Planet Coaster 2
Reviewed on: PC
Platform(s): PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S
Developer(s): Frontier Developments
Publisher(s): Frontier Developments
Release Date: November 6, 2024