So, this game is listed as a casual construction and management simulation game, but it is far from casual! The little bit I’ve played through so far has been an absolute nightmare, but I love it. It’s just… it’s so difficult to actually turn a profit from your amusement park. Anyway, let’s get into it!

Today, I’m going to start up a new playthrough so I can try to make it work this time and actually FINISH a park. I’ve had two attempts already and have only gotten about 4 or 5 rides up and running, but somehow end up in thousands of dollars of debt every time. Our goal for now: get some consistent positive numbers on our profits.

I’m starting a challenge park in the grasslands on easy mode because I can’t imagine how it would be possible to do this on any other mode. To anyone who CAN finish a park on a higher difficulty, I commend you for your bravery and effort. Right off the bat, I want to make sure the game is paused so that we aren’t losing money somehow for days passing. I’m actually going to keep it paused until we have enough buildings placed so I can ensure we’ll make some income at least. The first challenge that appeared is to have a monthly profit of $1,000. We’re gonna try a $5 ticket per guest and free entry for kids.

I started by placing down a few facilities including a drink shop, burger joint, a small bank with an atm, a first aid building, and a staff room. I put garbage cans at the corner of each one also. I’m also going to point out that the bank should have TWO paths, one leading to the entrance and another leading to the atm around the back. I didn’t realize this my first time around and kept getting an error with ATM 1 not being accessible.

My first ride is a roller coaster. I felt like I should start strong. I set the ticket price to $7 but I don’t think people are going to go for it. We’ll see. I’m going to set the load of people needed to run the ride at “any,” test the ride and hit the play button on our park.

Well, it’s working. I don’t know how or why but it is. I didn’t think they’d pay the entry fee or the ticket price for the ride but they are. I’m currently up to $1,000 on profit! At this rate, we’ll finish that first challenge easily. I think now it’s time to hire some staff. I’ll need a couple of backup vendors for the food and drink stands, a janitor for the trash, a mechanic for the rides, and a security guard.

After doing this, I noticed my cash balance is hovering at around $2,500. I think I need to add another ride, maybe a smaller one that’s cheap. I’m adding a ride called Wild Blue, setting the ticket price to $5, allowing it to run for any load of people, and changing the status to open. Let’s see how this goes.

This got us from a cash amount of $300 or so to about $1,000. I was going to add some scenery but I’m noticing the guests are saying that the line for the first coaster, The Madness, is too long. I think I’ll try changing the load from “any” to “full.” I also noticed that I completely forgot to put a bathroom and people are not happy about it, especially after visiting the food and drink stands. Don’t make my mistake.

I added the bathroom next to the food and drink buildings, as well as a couple of trash cans for the last three structures I placed. Unfortunately, our cash is basically nothing at the moment but I’m going to hit play again and hope we get money.

Fewer people are coming in and we aren’t making enough money. We’re floating around $100. The guests want more rides but we’re broke right now, so I’m going to add cheap scenery a bit and raise the price of the two rides and the entry fee by $1 each. I’m also changing the load from “any” to “full” for Wild Blue.

The guests are still complaining about the wait times of both rides so I’m reducing the minimum wait time to 30 seconds down from 60 seconds. I added fireworks to the queues and people seem to like it. They are saying that there’s nowhere to sit, though, so I’ll add benches.

I’ve messed around with the wait times for the Wild Blue queue but it doesn’t seem to be doing much. I’m just going to let people complain at this point because the line is still long which means there are people who are going on anyway. I am stuck at a cash amount of less than $100. I need to add more rides. I’m going to try to take out a $10,000 loan and pray it helps in the long run.

The second coaster is added, I made the ticket cost $9, threw in some scenery, a trash bin, and changed the wait times of all rides to a minimum of 30 seconds and a maximum of 60 seconds. I’m going to test this thing and open it.

Okay, I noticed that adding a new ride brought in a bunch of new guests. Our cash amount quickly went from around $100 to over $1000. I’m going to wait a bit and try to collect some more.

The end of the month summary came in and we have a monthly profit of $1,300 up from -$70. So, that’s good. Overall guest happiness is declining for some reason but I think the more rides and attractions we add, the better that will be. I also just completed a challenge to make a roller coaster over 1640ft long with my second coaster. That challenge gave me a $1000 reward. My total cash amount is over $2,500 and slowly growing. I’m going to wait a bit more and then maybe add a restaurant with 2 rooms to complete this new challenge I’ve received. The restaurant needs to be researched because I don’t have any unlocked, but it shouldn’t take too long if I throw $500 a month at the research budget.

That worked like a charm and I put the restaurant next to a small western-themed scenery spot I made. The reward for the challenge unlocked immediately. My next challenge is to get a park bonus of 30, which I’m hoping will just happen as I add more things to the park. I’m going to try to add another ride if my loan is paid off.

Well, the loan isn’t paid off at all. But I still have some money. I’ve just added a new ride, made the price $7, threw in the scenery, and a trash bin. Our cash went from almost $0 to over $500 pretty quick.

I think we’ve found a pattern here. This may be the way to continue. Unlock as many challenges as you can, grow slowly, and use loans when you need to.

That’s about all for this post. I’ll be posting another entry soon on how progress goes with this park. I can’t believe it was working.

I literally named my park “ATTEMPT 3” as a joke and the park ended up working. The irony.