RCT Discussion / OpenRCT: advantages and disadvantages

Is there a reason for people not to download openrct2? Just wondering.

Guys, this is exactly why I said Open is in the same boat as Modified. The devs said they WILL NOT adjust Open so that it will show correctly in vanilla.

 

 

But OpenRCT has way more advantages than Modified, I really can't see why people won't switch to OpenRCT. It's the future. 

As we're currently still using SV6 to save to, we accept patches to make parks saved/modified in OpenRCT2 show up correctly in vanilla, if that doesn't affect OpenRCT2 in a bad way. We have an explicit goal of having RCT2 (and eventually also RCT1) saves show up correctly in Open, and we try not to break RCT2 export, or at least label incompatible features as such, as long as we stay with SV6.

 

Thing is, some things require either much manual work or dark magic to achieve in RCT2. Or both. Hiding elements is one of them, as it exploits an implementation detail of RCT2 that would otherwise cause it to crash. In RCT2 saves I have only seen corrupt elements with 60 as their identifier; I'm not sure if other values work. (In OpenRCT2, any corrupt element that is not our own is treated as one inserted by 8 cars.) Anyway, our goal is to make hacks and modifications easier. We would prefer to implement features people on NE Designs use so switching between RCT2+8 cars and OpenRCT2 is no longer needed. Rotating entrance and exit buildings is already planned, for example.

Rotating entrance and exit buildings is already planned, for example.

 I never bothered even trying to figure this one out in rct2, but that would be incredible!

^you could do it easily using special build mode in the son of beast trainer. (and beast for LL)

 

I think if you guys made the tile inspector as robust as codex, there wouldn't be much else to do!

I certainly love the ideal of Open RCT2, but knowing its incompatibility with 8 cars or SoB makes me hesitant to switch just yet until all of the hacks that I use on a regular basis are present in open rct2 as built in features. I'd be very interested to see a comparison of the features of Open RCT2 and the features of 8 cars listed for side by side. 

Openrct has many functions from trainers as built in features and also has several new features not available from trainers. However, some features offered by trainers are still absent.

 

List of things openrct can do that are not offered from trainers:

-Cheat to allow disabling all breakdowns

-Changing the vehicle type does not cause instant breakdowns

-A new way how zero-clearance is handled

-Pricing both rides and entrance fees

-Changing various scenario parameters without going to the scenario editor

-Tile inspector to rearrange order of map elements on a given tile

-Disable guests vandalizing path objects

-Change the scenario's objective to: Have Fun!

-Fix broken down rides without a mechanic

-Set advertising campaigns to never end

-Generate a random landscape

 

 

Other notable things openrct can do in-game without using additional programs:

-Changing the mapsize, guest entry points, and park entrances without going to the scenario editor (hex editor)

-Changing/swapping available objects (parkdat)

 

List of things openrct can do that are also available from trainers:
-Make things invisible (handled differently)

-Change a ride's operating mode or vehicle type

-Force open/close park

-Add money

-Change/freeze weather

-Mountain tool and adjusting tile selection grid beyond 5x5

-Basically every function under the "staff" drop-down menu in some form

-Any height construction

-Spawn lots of guests or remove all of them

-Change the chain lift speed or the number of circuits beyond the default limitations

-Reset date (through console command)

-Subtract money (through console command)

 
List of things openrct cannot do that are offered from trainers:

-Vandalize park

-Own all of map's land besides path from map edge leading up to entrance and the entrance gate itself
-Remove the boundary fence

-Save/load a terrain landscape from a bitmap image file

-Cap land at max height (to fix glitches but may become obsolete anyway since I've never encountered a land spike in openrct)
-Rotate huts (in the plans)
-Modify an object's base height (map object manipulation) for "odd value" height placements
-Zero-clearance water through rides
-Change operating mode without de-spawning the trains

-Change number of cars per train more/less than default limitations

-Enable rides operating with individual vehicles to operate with trains
-Any track piece as a chain lift
-Freeze staff

-Change entertainers' costumes even without the available scenery tab
-Insert custom color-able messages and clear the message log

 

This is not a complete list but the important ones I can think of now.

oh, are the available entertainers tied to having that scenery group? that makes so much sense... I was always confused by that

Yes, I believe the tiger, elephant, and panda costumes are tied to the default trees scenery tab. Some workbenches have all the default trees deselected so the tab does not appear which will cause an error trap to occur when changing the entertainer's costume.

Finally got this thing working.

 

Only been playing around for a few hours now, but I love the new zero-clearance function. It's sometimes a little difficult to make sure that you're not building objects into each other because using shift doesn't 'snap' the object to go above what's previously been built. Not too relevant though, just something to get used to on my end.

 

Would it be possible to allow for merged tracks to run with block-sections at some point?

 

EDIT: I can't seem to find the object selection menu (ie parkdat equivalent). Where can I find this?

I know how to get merged tracks working with block sections (sort of). The game logic doesn't seem to recognize merged tracks for the purpose of block sections, but you can actually add the elements you want to use as part the track syle by copying the track paint functions from a track that has them. This looks like merged tracks but it isn't really; it's all one track as far as he game is concerned. The downside is that this is incompatible with not just the vanilla game but everyone else's version of OpenRCT2 as well.

The object selection windkw is accessible from the debug menu, which is the gear icon next to the cheat menu. You may need to enable debug tools in the options if you don't see this menu.

oooh, you know what I would LOVE

 

an easy way to save chunks of scenery/park and move them elsewhere. Right now you can save scenery with rides but the mechanics of it is really clunky and finicky. Could be great with a simple tile selector...

oooh, you know what I would LOVE

 

an easy way to save chunks of scenery/park and move them elsewhere. Right now you can save scenery with rides but the mechanics of it is really clunky and finicky. Could be great with a simple tile selector...

 

https://github.com/O...CT2/issues/2250

https://github.com/O...CT2/issues/1926

^yay! but I need it for my park now haha

^Yeah that would be super useful for me too! I would actually be restarting my Disney park right now if that feature was available

That would be awesome to be able to do that!! 

So, OpenRCT2 works on my laptop! And I gave it a try. The in-built zero clearance tool is great, but I've got some issues and questions...

 

-Is there a good guide on merging tracks in OpenRCT2? Can't seem to pull it off myself, and can't find what I'm doing wrong.

 

-What features am I NOT supposed to use if I want to maintain compatibility with vanilla RCT2?

 

-Last but not least: I've saved my project in OpenRCT2 after I've tested some features, nothing but the clearance tool for adding large path blocks. But when I open regular RCT2, it's the saved game from BEFORE I've used OpenRCT2. In other words, how do I open my saved game from OpenRCT in vanilla RCT?

To merge tracks, first build your two track sections, then turn on zero clearance and build the first track forward so it overlaps the second. Then go to know the cheat menu and select "Show all operating modes" so you can put the ride in boat hire mode.

If you want compatability with the original game, don't use corrupt objects or "No entrances". Corrupt objects show up differently in vanilla, and using no entrances will crash the vanilla game.

OpenRCT2 saves files in a different location to vanilla. On my Windows machine it's in Documents/OpenRCT2/save, and on my Linux install it's ~/.config/OpenRCT2/save. I don't know if this is configurable (if not, it probably should be)

Have been playing around with it a bit more; some features that would be super useful:

 

Map Object Manipulation capabilities, especially being able to raise/lower track. Zero clearance function is amazing for building, but less so for trackitecture.

Painting function, not sure if this is something that I can change already, but it would appear that I can only paint one object per tile, which can be very annoying when attempting to re-colour either large areas or specific objects (doesn't always paint the object that I want).

Thanks for the help! Greatly appreciated!