This is a nice release. Thanks GOG.

Loaded up the game after 18 years and all the memories came back. My friend and I Installing the game onto the school's lab computers and playing the game then getting a good scolding by the IT guy only to come back and play few days after.

Awesome! But I'm going to wait for the X-mas sale because I'm cheap.

From the news post:

"Notice:
We're glad that another long-awaited Bullfrog Classic finally joined our catalog. We know that many of you were anxious to see it here. At the same time, we need to disappoint those of you, who were hoping to pick it up during the upcoming Winter Sale. This particular title won't be discounted this time, as the sale is coming too short after it's release. So, you can be sure you can pick it up today, and you won't feel foolish seeing it discounted in a few days from now ;-) Just a heads up from your friendly GOG.com team!"

I was wondering when this will show up, since theme hospital was released some time ago. I will probably pick it up for sentimental reasons. Anyway, good job GOG.

Damnit. This is easily worth 5X the asking price. I guess I pick this in January.

Can someone elaborate on the differences between this versus Rollercoaster Tycoon (obviously the improved graphics engine notwithstanding)?

I am interested in these things from the perspective of my fellow GOGers that have played both games, whether the GOG release or the original retail release years ago.

Edit: I did read what reviews there were on the gamecard as of the time of this posting, but there was not enough compare/contrasting between the two to satisfy my curiosity.

NoooooOOoOooOooOooooo!...

Thanks for the headsup.

My reaction reading the news. :P

Monday release: woooo!
It's a classic: Woooooo!
It runs on a Mac: WOOOO!
It's THEME PARK: FUCK YES

I love both games so much. RCT has most, if not all the features that Theme Park has, RCT has a much more robust and in-depth focus on building rollercoasters of course. Theme Park requires you to stock up on goods that you sell like ice-cream periodically which RCT, iirc, doesn't have. Theme Park also has some sort of stock market for you to play with.

All in all, RCT is the better game. But if you consider that Theme Park is made in 1994, played it around that time and wear nostalgic glasses, Theme Park becomes a revolutionary game. Its graphics were exceptional in the 1994-1995 period, its gameplay was deep, and it's pretty much the first of its kind with only games like the original Simcity pre-dating it in the late 80s.

While I don't necessarily want to pick one over the other since they're both great games, Theme Park still retains its gameplay depth that I've never seen really equaled in the years to come. Yes, in comparison of the actual park-building TP may seem a bit light, but with the full simulation mode it's just one side of a coin.

I still can't figure out why there are guards to be hired in RCT as they're really of no use whatsoever. In TP they'll actually catch and kick out pranksters as well as possible saboteurs sent in by your rival parks to futz up your rides. On that note, the hirable entertainers are also of much more use in TP as they really do affect your visitors' moods; in RCT they only ever have very minimal effect, which also makes them a waste of money. Leading us to people getting fed up standing in line too long in TP. In RCT they could be standing there all day long and it wouldn't do much of anything to your park's general happiness meter while it certainly affects it in the former game.

I also never noticed that changing anything about the make-up of food your stalls sell to make much of a difference in RCT. Hell, in TP you can load up on extra ice on the soda so that you'll earn more on each soda sold, put extra salt on your fries to make your guests running to the nearest drink stall, etc. Then you have to pay attention on your item stock levels since you can actually run out of things to sell. Also you can play in the stock market and buy up rival shares, and you may have to deal with employee/union contract negotiations from time to time, which may lead to actual strike if an agreement can't be reached. If rides break down too many times they may eventually go completely kaputt and explode if they're not replaced. Never seen that happen in RCT. Also doing research in TP for new features, rides, or stalls is much more in detail so it's much easier to go after the improvements you want; that's one thing I never was too fond of in RCT as it's done way too general/broad.

So, yes, the actual park building in RCT is lovely, but its management side is quite light. ;)

Nice! great game :) Now if they could somehow get Dino Park Tycoon I would be like a little kid again xD

Heh, not me, I love both games. I was replying to jackster79.

Yup, I noticed the guards and the troublemakers. Seeing them getting caught eventually is just so entertaining.

Edit: oops, ninjad by spindown.
I said about Rollercoaster Tycoon and I'll say it again: I could not for the life of me understand the fun in running a park in a video game.

By the way, I loved Theme Hospital, Simfarm, Simant, which each have an analogous alien premise of its own, but I can't imagine myself playing Theme Park.