Planet Coaster 2 review

pcgamer.com:

What is it? Theme park building sim with extensive customisation options and new water park features.
Release date November 6, 2024
Expect to pay £40/$50
Developer Frontier Developments
Publisher Frontier Developments
Reviewed on AMD Ryzen 5 3600, Nvidia 2080 Super, 32GB RAM, Windows 10
Steam Deck TBA
Link Official site

Back in the early noughties when I last visited Disney World, my favourite parks out of the whole archipelago of attractions were the water parks. The squealing chaos of the Typhoon Lagoon’s tsunami-generating wave pool. The terrifying, trunks-eroding descent of Blizzard Beach’s Summit Plummet. Blissfully bobbing along the lazy rivers. Oh, the lazy rivers! Forget Space Mountain or the Tower of Terror, give me a big rubber ring and let me bake my belly in the glorious Floridian sun.

Playing Planet Coaster 2 has reaffirmed my belief that pools rule, rides drool. Water attractions are the big new addition to Frontier Developments’ theme park sim, adding a new dimension to what was previously a comprehensive but unadventurous coaster creation kit. This is as well, because the sequel still coasts on its creative prowess, with actual management of its parks remaining a secondary concern.

Structurally, Planet Coaster 2 differs little from the first. You can fix and fiddle with partially built parks in career mode, or construct your own from scratch in variations upon the sandbox. These include unrestrained creativity where money and space are no object, and the more moderated Challenge mode where at least some management skills are required.

Whichever you choose, the key difference in your park building is the ability to lubricate them with water-based attractions. At the centre of these are pools. Like everything in Planet Coaster 2, you can build pools however you please using the game’s highly flexible toolset, creating everything from kidney-dish paddling pools, to aspiring lakes fringed by diving boards and wave machines.

Even when considered alone,