Ask the Experts / Advanced Hacking Tips and Tricks

Following the addition of an image limit on these forums I've had to split the tutorials into separate pages. Below are the more advanced hacks, I would suggest reading the Basic Tutorials first however. http://www.nedesigns...ips-and-tricks/

Advanced

Hacking for the confident and slightly insane, this section shall be updated with the more complicated hacks such as the Swinging Floorless Suspended Trains and the Coasterbowl.

Eurofighter Drops
Eurofighter or Beyond vertical drops use the same hacking technique as the tower coaster above but take it a bit further.

First up start with your lifthill, for obvious reasons this really should be a vertical coaster track type, The shortest good looking eurofighter drop you can do is about 22 height units. so in this case 28 down to 6.



First up build a flat bit of track at the maximum height a fair bit away from your lift hill.



While leaving a segment of track at the top remove the excess track and do the same at the bottom of the drop



Make sure you mark the square where your vertical track in the drop is and you should end up with something that looks like this



This is the odd bit. Turn the top piece of track around so that the build direction faces the lift hill. This track will eventually form the beyond vertical track in the drop



Next use this track to place a piece of vertical track over the same square we marked earlier (ote only place 1 piece of vertical track, not 2 like the screen shows)



Use this new bit of vertical track to add a little angled drop like so.



One you have removed the excess track, your progress should look like this. Note: There is a piece of vertical track at the top of the drop but not at the bottom, This is so we can merge the track in the right order later



Time to connect the bottom of the drop. Using the bottom segment we placed earlier you should be able to get the sections to line up like this. I have highlighted the segment we are about to merge together in yellow.



Zero Clearances and using the middle section of track build through the piece i highlighted moments ago. This should make something like this. Note: you do not need to use normal merging techniques here. Because all segments are from the same coaster it will work anyway.



We will now do the same for the top segment.



Build the top of the drop from the lifthill we placed at the beginning and it should line up perfectly with the vertical track we built in the middle segment.



Zero Clearances again and build through the yellow segment from above and we are done. Your drop should now work perfectly



Essentially this same trick can be used for other purposes. This screen is from Loopy’s Silver Valley where he’s used the same trick to create an Intamin tophat. The track bit where the vertical sections are merged may be 90degrees off instead of 180degrees like a eurofighter but the coaster will use act in the same way and fly over the top



The Coaster Bowl Element:
This is probably one of the most complex coaster elements that I routinely build. It is essentially a junction which allows a coaster train to enter on any track and leave on any other track. I am yet to see it used by anyone else but it’s quite useful to explain some basic hacking techniques to new guys. It’s pretty much a useless element unless it is used in a shoestring. (see here) but it is good fun to play with and watch a car run through.

Examples of coaster bowls can been seen in the Insania Ride pack and my up and coming War Of The Worlds coaster.

First Up you need to set up a centre square and mark out the 7th square in all four directions like this. The outside squares mark the position of the four towers while the inside



We then need to build the 4 principle coasters which will make up the bowl. Try and set them up in the following way.



The arrows represent which way each coaster track is built. This is important otherwise the coasters won’t merge properly.

The first two merges should be the merging of the two curved sections into the straight sections like so



Next up we need to cross the two straight sections in the middle. To do this both sections of track must be different so they don’t merge. In this instance I used a set of brakes set to 67mph. A booster will work just as well.



Next merge the 2 straight pieces of track into the curved sections



This should complete the bowl. Now whichever spike a train enters on it will always be diverted to a different spike.



I usually use vertical towers for the escape routes. But there’s nothing to stop you messing around.

Can anyone help me? The Eurofighter hack is not working. It say's that the ride isn't completed.

EDIT: It's a hack in RCT-2 Don't know if that matters.

Set the coaster to Boat Hire Mode.

Thanks, it works now!

I might be able to make that coaster bowl cleaner, though a whole lot less realistic... When I have time.

Unpinned to clean up this forum.