3D Roller Coaster Designer

"Painfully simple."

Years ago, I was browsing games at EB and came across 3D Roller Coaster Designer. Being a fan of RollerCoaster Tycoon who'd always wanted to ride his creations, it seemed right up my alley. Besides, it was cheap.

So I go home, pop in the CD, open up a tin of gummi worms I happened to have at the time, and start the game. You're almost instantly thrust into a landscape where you have to build your coaster. I'll tell you right now: there is almost no customizable aspects to this game. You basically just select a track piece, stick it in, select another, stick it in, and so on, until you bring it back to the station. There are a couple kinds of coasters, as well as a few different landscapes, but they're all basically the same. The selection of track pieces is small as well, so you'll be cramming every piece onto one ride just to make it long.

The real reason I bought this game, though, was to ride my coasters! And I must admit, it's pretty entertaining. Zooming around curves and spiralling through corkscrews is a lot of fun. That is, until you realize it's the same thing again and again, and you're riding a coaster in the middle of nowhere. In a couple hours you'll have seen pretty much everything this game has to offer, and then it's all the same.

Still, you can ride the coaster! That makes it worth it, right? Well, maybe when I got it. But now you can pick up RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, which lets you build much more sophisticated coasters, ride them, and build huge theme parks to accompany them.

So if you spot this game for a couple bucks at your local game store, should you buy it? If you enjoy rollercoaster building games, I wouldn't try to stop you from paying just a small amount of money for it. But really, there's much better out there. Just spend the extra forty-seven or so dollars and get a game that will last you longer than half an afternoon.

Gameplay: 2/10
Controls: 2/10
Graphics: 4/10
Sound: 1/10
Fun Factor: 2/10

Overall Score: 2/10

Reviewer's Score: 2/10, Originally Posted: 02/14/06