Amazing Earl has finshed

Have any of you all been to his site today, there was an announcement that stated that he will no longer be making real rides or scenery or anything for RCT in the future. SAD TIMES. This is a disasster, I enjooyed his work so much. WHat does everyone else think?

I think he was secretly hired by Chris Sawyer to assist in development of new rides for RCT3(D). Hence the veiled reasoning for his retirement.

He made a lot of good rides... more than we've seen from the official game in years, and he did it all in a couple of months. I'm just grateful that he produced as many as he did.

Some A-Holes posted rude comments in his guest book or B*tched because he wouldn't /couldn't make certain rides. Geesh give people something for free and they still gripe. Have you ever seen anything like that Jeff,haha.

Anyway I'm gonna miss him. Hopefully he'll feel the urge to come back sooner rather than later. Using already built rides, he designed much better and realistic rides for the game than Atari did in the lame add-ons. He also pretty much killed the theory that flat rides were too hard and time consuming to be included in the game or expansions. At his peak he was kicking out 1 a week and still living his "real life"

I still intend to build a park featuring many of his as well as some creators rides. The file will probably be too large to distribute though. Maybe I'll sedn him a copy as a thank you.

Ps my favorite ride of his was the Sky Diver

I may be the only RCT player who never downloaded a single "amazing earl" ride.

Just thought I'd say that...

Blast!

Up until a couple days ago I could have also boasted that I have refrained from downloading his rides. I have no regrets though. They are really well done.

Just thought I'd day that..

Get this. I been trying to get on the UCES site and I get a page that says it can't be found. How can I download all Earls rides? Does anyone have them to send?

It is a shame, his rides were really good, my only complaint was that they still had the same stats of the ones they were based off of, whic of course wan't soemthing he could control. He was one of the best custom object designers.

And that's exactly the reason I wasn't interested, Danimal. I just couldn't get past the fact that just because a ride looked different, it was still essentally a crooked house with different clothes on.

I don't just make parks for looks and the rides those were based on were ones that I don't use in the course of normal play. If I'm building for effectiveness and those rides are just reskinned uneffective rides - well the math is simple.

That's not to discount those creations, many of you obviously really enjoyed those rides. They just didn't fit my playing style.

Actually Gonch, Earl never did post a crooked house or 3 d cinema re-skin. He did post many rides that were common to carnivals, super loop, sky diver, tilt a whirl ect.

I know other designers have posted many cooked house/3 d re-skins. Some ok some as senseless as any Wacky World flat or coaster train.

I know that you don't generally build mega parks so the rides may not be useful to you but they are worth a look. I mean the master coaster builder should see the master flat ride builder, right?

For those still interested in custom flats you can find some good ones at rct bonanza. They are currently working on a double ferris wheel. There are also several Disney themed rides like Dumbo. *** Edited 2/12/2004 11:35:11 AM UTC by john13601***

Ok, I worder that a little wrong. I do know of most of the rides he made, but even with them being super loops, sky divers, etc - weren't they just new graphics stuck on the crooked house engine?

To my understanding the crooked house was the easiest to reskin. (most of the UCES rides were based on the crooked house) I always assumed the "earl" rides were mostly based on the crooked house too - meaning regardless of the ride he created the stats figured as if it were a crooked house sitting there.

And the crooked house is the most useless flat in the game. Crap stats and peeps get bored with it quicker than any other flat in the game.

That's where I'm coming from.

LG-

I know that the sky diver was adapted from the ferris wheel, the swing ride was adapted from the carousel, and the super loop was adapted from the inverter ship. These are the only ones I can remember, as college and ROTC has taken up all of my playing time. :(

Man, that's one dull Skydiver, then... ;)

(Those things are EVIL in real live. Love 'em)

Ahh, I see.

I still think I'll just wait for RCT3 and see what we get there. The included rides work for me for now.

Gosh this is a Shame! His Round Up animation was amazing! Well hopefully RCT 3D will be as good as we hope.

I dont think AE used the crooked house at all. Those ride makers that used the crooked house made another un-animated ride. All of the AE rides are animated and many the AE rides are actual real-life rides that were missing in the game. For the rides based on twist, pirate, space rings, ferris wheel and tracked rides, the riders are viewable, and reflect the actual number of riders the game says is riding the rides. Rides based on enterprise only have viewable riders at the loading stage, which is same as enterprise in the game. Rides based on looping starship do not show riders, just like the ride in the original game.

While they use existing animtion sequences as the base, some are different rides in my opinion as their motions are different. Just like real life rides.

Rides based on twist:
Swinger-new ride, nothing like it in game.
Tilt a Whirl-new ride

based on enterprise
Round Up-new ride

based on looping starship
Super Loop-while same motion as looping starship, i would consider it a different ride on a real life midway.

based on space ring
Ice Skating-new attraction

based on Pirate
Frisbee-new ride. Many parks feature frisbee and pirate both.

based on ferris wheel
Skydiver-new ride, it has a different motion. the cars flip unlike a ferris wheel.

Some are useful rethemes, like Flintstone driving cars, 50's car dodgems, school bus rainbow and some holiday themed rides.

The Vekoma inverter he did is another version of looping starship, but with 2 cars. The Chance inverter he did actually imitates the unique motion of that ride.

So i find the rides he produced add somehting that is missing in the flat ride department of the game. They are working rides and many are different rides in real life than what is in the game. Just because they use the same animation sequence does not mean its not a new ride in my opinion. The rides have a different name in the game when you select them, and the only other thing that is similar is the excitment ect ratings.

Some of the rides in the actual game use the same philosophy. The dark rides and the car rides use the same animation sequence, they are interchangeable as far as track size. The splashboats and the river rafts are also. I would venture to say several of the coaster types use the same logic in the game and are just new graphics in the same animation system.

A new guy called Rigger.has come along with some excellent new rides. He has created several rides, but his most recent rides are masterpieces that are the Dumbo, Aladdin and space rocket rides at Disney. The animation sequence used is twist, but they have a unique up and down motion that the other rides in the game do not. Their motion though reminds me more of a Dartron Hurricane than the Disney rides, but they are good, useable, unique rides. His only flaw is the peeps have yellow faces. There is a link to his downloads under RCT.com forums new completed attractions. *** Edited 2/12/2004 5:16:01 PM UTC by super7***

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super7 said:

the only other thing that is similar is the excitment ect ratings.

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But see, this is THE thing that's important to me. I like to actually play the game much of the time as opposed to making nice looking parks.

In terms of gameplay (cost, effect on park, peep reaction) these rides will be exactly the same as the ones their based on. That's my lack of interest.

I really don't need the extra pretty graphics pretending to represent a different ride. It's the stuff we don't see that I'm after. The number crunching behind the scenes. Yes, many 'official' RCT rides lift animation or graphics from each other but most have a different way of figuring stats, a different cost to build, a different effect on your park. (one exception is the snow cups being a direct ripoff of the twist - and I'm not sure I've ever used the snowcups unless the twist wasn't available.)

AE rides are just new graphics slapped on existing game code. The same way the official add-ons did it. If I'm after pretty, then multiple graphic variations of the twist ride could be useful - whether it be the snowcups, earl's swinger or tilt-a-whirl, or the official add-on's fabrege egg or goofy ass coffee grinder looking thing. In the end in terms of affecting gameplay it's all the same. Combine that with the fact that I rarely need 'pretty' in my flats selection and you see why I never bothered with Earl's rides.

I dont believe the game reacts negatively if you put the same ride in multiple places in a park. For example, the Magic Mt scenario has multiple twists in it when you open it.

If you hold to the unique animated flat rides in the game you are limited to 8 rides.

Twist/Snow Cups-they are same ride
Pirate
Looping Starship
Carrousel
Dodgem
Ferris Wheel
Enterprise
Top Spin

plus the space rings, which i dont really consider a "ride".

If you want more than 8 rides in your park, you can 1. reuse the same rides or 2. use AE rides with different motions.

For me, the game is about theming, and making a realistic parks. The user-contributed rides allow more realism and variety in the game. Its a personal choice what you want out of the game, but i feel the user rides add good variety to the parks just like the user-created scenery. *** Edited 2/12/2004 5:52:16 PM UTC by super7***

Let's not forget that chaotic was also based on the enterprise & was in fact one of Earl's greatest challenges as far as the animation of the ride is concerned.

As far as I know you can still download the existing rides from Earl's site it's just that new ones will not be made :( as for Rigger's site I get a bandwidth exceeded message every time I try to visit so I havn't been able to view the site in a few days.

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super7 said:
I dont believe the game reacts negatively if you put the same ride in multiple places in a park.

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I know that too, my point is that if I'm going to use the same ride multiple times in a park (and I do at times) - then why not just use the two twists. The rest are just visually different versions of the same thing (as far as the game is concerned)

If you like making visually appealing parks (or 'realistic' parks) then Earl's rides are great. I'm not disputing that.

I've always been more of a scenario guy and if I need that second twist, I just slap in a second twist. The computer doesn't see the different between it and any reskinned version of it.

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If you hold to the unique animated flat rides in the game you are limited to 8 rides.

Twist/Snow Cups-they are same ride
Pirate
Looping Starship
Carrousel
Dodgem
Ferris Wheel
Enterprise
Top Spin

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But again, it comes down to playing style. I'm more concerned with stats than visuals. The way I see it I have between 30 & 40 (didn't bother to get an exact count) different rides I can use in the game. By different, I mean rides that don't figure stats like any other ride in the game. Each will produce unique stats, each will attract peeps in different ways, each will have a unique lifespan and profit cycle. OPen a running park and put a twist in somewhere - watch how it affects the park. Now reload that park and put one of Earl's rides based on the twist in the same spot. You'll get the exact same effect. To me that's not a new ride, it's new graphics.

It's two totally different approaches. You're thinking visually. I'm thinking like a player of simulation games. I wouldn't care if the graphics were just a big red box that had text on the side saying what the ride was to represent each individual ride in the game. As long as the back-end was there, I'd probably still play it.

The game to me (when playing scenarios) is all about numbers - money, peeps, stats - what's on my monitor doesn't mean dick to me.

And let me just say again - I'm not discrediting Earl's rides. They just weren't what I needed. I'm after new coding in RCT3, not new artwork on the old code.

*** Edited 2/12/2004 6:26:37 PM UTC by Lord Gonchar***

http://www.rct2.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=12194

This provides a link to a site where you may download Riggers 3 new rides. The one i have put into the game, the Disney-like orbiter ride is simply spectacular as far as the animantion quality of the ride itself. The yellow peeps are the only small flaw.