The late RollerCoaster Tycoon's legacy

Oh, 2004. My nine-year-old self eagerly opened gifts on Christmas Day, searching through the pile for anything that seemed like it may contain a disk. She woke up at 4:30 AM. After I started RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 on my PC, I was unable to think about anything else for a whole year.

Even after all this time, I still like the RollerCoaster Tycoon series. However, it must be acknowledged that, for good reason, no subsequent series entry has ever been able to match the pleasure of RCT3 and the games that came before it. As I take you on a wild voyage through the history of RollerCoaster Tycoon, from the dizzying heights of the early 2000s to the current mobile doldrums the franchise finds itself in, please fasten your seatbelt, hang on tight to the restraints, and enjoy the ride.

Like a lot of the early video games, RCT started out small. The original RollerCoaster Tycoon, the brainchild of lead developer Chris Sawyer, was inspired by the success of Sawyer's Travel Tycoon, released in 1994. Sawyer used the money from that game to fund a tour of Europe and the United States, visiting some of the most ornate theme parks in the world.

Strangely enough, Sawyer's passion for coasters worldwide isn't what inspired him to work on this project. The creator was actually cited as stating that, while at the time he didn't like the steel creatures, he thought they were a logical development of the isometric technology he had used to build Travel Tycoon. As a matter of fact, Sawyer's first inspiration for RollerCoaster Tycoon was Bullfrog's Theme Park and a book he had called White Knuckle Ride, which is filled with images of some of the most amazing coasters in the world. He fell in love with theme parks very immediately, which inspired him to pursue his RCT concept further.

Should Sawyer have believed that Travel Tycoon had transformed his life, RCT was poised to add enormous momentum to his already prosperous profession as a game creator. With the help of industry experts for accurate fact-checking, illustrations from Simon Foster, Sawyer's future long-term partner, and playtesting from publisher Hasbro, Sawyer was able to put together the first game in the series, which was ready for distribution in early 1999.

Things quickly got out of hand, even though the publisher and developer were only expecting a modest return on their investment in RollerCoaster Tycoon. The developer told Arcade Attack that "it was a shock a few months later though to find out that sales had ramped up considerably and the game was now amongst the top selling games for the PC for that entire year." Over 700,000 copies of RCT for PC were sold in the first year, bringing in over fifteen million dollars in income. After the first year of release, however, sales continued unabated; only The Sims saw an increase in sales in 2000 and 2001. By the end of 2004, almost four million copies had been sold. Obviously, there was room for more.

Thus, Sawyer produced another tycoon game—what he does best. With an engine that was ready to go, a ton of community input, and all the lessons he had learned from the previous one, RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 was released in October 2002. Although there were several notable differences between RCT2 and its original title, critics were quick to point out that RCT2 was always going to be a financial success and would make over $20 million before it even reached its second anniversary.

In an interview with Eurogamer back in 2016, Sawyer stated that he "just couldn't get all that excited about taking the game in that direction for some reason, so the right thing to do was to hand the game over to others who were excited and inspired enough to take the game forward." Sawyer left the project after RCT2's incredible success, assuming that the series would continue in 3D. This choice ultimately proved to be both a boon and a bane for the RCT series' history. Things swiftly fell apart like, well, a roller coaster. Although the first product with Sawyer as an absentee rights holder experienced success in the form of RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, the same game I came rolling down the stairs on Christmas morning for.

Sawyer's selection of Frontier Developments as the takeover developer paid off with RCT3, as the IP inventor focused his efforts on Chris Sawyer's Locomotion and only acted as a consultant throughout the process. Though Sawyer's dream of a revitalized Travel Tycoon was not realized with Locomotion, RCT3 did at least maintain the series' trend of commercially successful entries, and the developer probably felt he could rest easy knowing his most iconic series' legacy was in capable hands. He neglected to take Atari into consideration.

Now, you are aware of what's going to happen if you have ever played a RollerCoaster Tycoon mobile game. Atari was trying to figure out how to turn RCT into a playable mobile game when the first real mobile gaming explosion of the early iPhone and Android period started to happen. Warning: The storyline was not good enough developed.

When RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 Mobile was released back in 2014, critics were harsh in their reviews, saying things like "I never would have thought I'd say this about a video game, but RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 Mobile is just absolutely sickening" and "at this point, you would be far better off picking up a copy of RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 than dishing out any money for this one." Again, those are concrete quotations from real reviewers, not the comments of internet edgelords lurking in dark corners. We can only presume that what we are reading made Sawyer and everyone else involved in the series' beginnings cringe like they were on a broken ferris wheel.

RCT4 Mobile crashed and burned for a variety of reasons, but the most common complaint among critics and those who were unfortunate enough to play the game on their own was the intrusive nature of microtransactions. The core game is totally dependent on purchases, meaningless purchases that will go down in history less than a decade from now, but which Atari for some reason knew would be beneficial for their definite mobile smash.

With the exception of RCT Classic, which we'll discuss later, RCT has released a string of unsatisfactory mobile titles since 2014 without ever pausing to consider why the public doesn't seem to like them. In the several tries, we've seen not only subpar renditions of the traditional RCT simulation style, but also a badly regarded puzzle game and a rollercoaster-based shooter that seemed like a real-life riddle that no one could ever figure out. Just Google RollerCoaster Tycoon Joyride, please, and see what seems to be a terrible way to spend thirty minutes.

Nevertheless, despite all the negativity surrounding the RCT mobile era, there is one great game from the last 10 years, and it's only here because of Chris Sawyer, which is not unexpected. With touchscreen controls and a plethora of scenarios to complete, RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic recreates the iconic isometric game world of RCT2, the series' undeniable high point. RCT Classic has gotten the highest ratings of any title in the series so far, scoring an 85 on MetaCritic and 90 on MetaCritic.

So, where is Tycoon RollerCoaster at the moment? To be honest, it's difficult to answer. Ironically, Frontier Developments—the same folks that took over when Sawyer determined he wouldn't be the one to lead RCT into the 3D future—developed Planet Coaster, which is now the big dog of the theme park tycoon subgenre. In truth, Planet Coaster would not have abandoned the moniker if the 2010s hadn't been rife with poor RCT mobile games. At the time, studio chief David Braben had said of the series, "It comes with too much baggage." Too many mediocre tycoon games were available. David, it's your words, not ours.

It seems that the Two Point series is willing to embrace the combination of humorous game environments and complex simulation architecture seen in the early 2000s tycoon games. Even though it seems more like a tribute to Theme Park World, the closest RCT has ever had to a rival in the industry, it's safe to say that the Two Point titles wouldn't have been produced if Chris Sawyer hadn't done such a great job with his early titles, which introduced my generation and others to the tycoon format.

In the end, despite what my title may have you think—I got you—the legacy of Rollercoaster Tycoon is still alive and well. It simply requires more examination to fully comprehend. The history of RCT, if anything, serves as a reminder that, in an era where the wealthy and powerful believe they can purchase the rights to anything and use them however they please, those who take pride in their work, such as Sawyer and the staff at Frontier Developments, will always triumph over companies like Atari, who continue to use RCT's good name to smuggle subpar garbage into the open mouths of those of us who are desperate for a little more information than we already know. Since a legacy is more than a name—rather, it's a feeling—I suppose I'll play Planet Coaster since it's the closest thing I can do to relive the excitement of starting up RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 on Christmas Day. I apologize, Atari.