by Adam - November 18, 2004

Remember your first time at Disney World? Remember all the smiling faces ready to take your money? Well now you get to be one of them, in Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 you can push your megalomaniacal side by building and maintaining your own theme park.

More fun than an upside down coaster

Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 is a joy to play. On PC you have to use no more than your mouse, though hotkeys will be helpful. Controls are easy, allowing you to customize your park quickly and effectively. There is an immense list of ways you can customize your park from visual to audio. You can make it themed, customize colors, and customize music in order to build the park of your dreams. Fortunately this game does come with an extensive tutorial that I would suggest playing before the main game if you haven't played the previous games. An option of single player career mode is a fun and challenging. The game makes it easy to get started but still provides a challenge to veteran players.

It's a nice warm sunny day for the park.

Let me start by saying that the graphics in RCT3 are far superior to the first two. In RCT3 the lighting effects are gorgeous, from daytime lighting to night, all effects are very realistic. The weather system is gorgeous as well as hazardous to your guests on some occasions. There are no longer single people walking around riding in your park. Instead you see families and couples together, and parents waiting for children outside of rides and restrooms. There are a few pitfalls to the graphics though. The intense visuals associated this game definitely are for higher ended PCs. Zoom in on characters walking through your park reveal them to be unimpressive and simple looking. When pausing the game to build, the park bugs up slightly when it shouldn't. Some thrid party characters walk into rails and other objects requiring you to unstick them.

Oooh........Aaah.............

Theme pakrs are noisy places by design. The parks in RCT3 are no exception. You can customize music to each ride to suit it's theme, from a rock balllad circus, to a kiddy ride playing spooky music. While watching over your park you'll hear the rumble of guests. You'll know the sounds of people when their stomachs don't agree with a ride.

More fun than a coaster with your eyes closed

Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 is a blast to play. From custom building rides to the ability to set up your own frieworks display. This game takes a little time and dedication but it can be incredible. One feature in the game allows you to import old games from previous games in the franchise. VIP's and park awards add challenges to an already fun game. However one of the coolest things about this game is all of the different modes it has to work with.

Water park or kiddy park ?

Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 is a game with endless replayability. My favorite mode is sandbox where you have infinite money, and you can build whatever you desire. Creating a park and then watching your guests face to face on the rides is incredible. At any given time in the game you can select a coaster then go through the "coaster cam" and "ride" the ride. You can change speeds, ticket prices, and test custom tracks with ghost vehicles before you launch the real ones.

Park's closed folks !

All in all Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 was a delight to play. The smooth graphics, gameplay and sound are all top notch making this a genre classic.