H2H4 / H2H4 WEST SEMIFINALS: Tycoon Bandits vs Hurricanes

Right:

Shadowlands, where to begin.

I should love this park really and upon first glance i did! The custom flat rides, the microscopic details and the architecture.......however going back again a couple of times for voting's sake i've changed my mind a bit.

Custom rides:

I'll start with the custom flat rides, of which there were plenty. The windmill was the first i saw and i fell in love with it, it looked just like the concept art i've seen for said ride. However everytime i look at it i notice something i don't like. The platform looked messy and at first i wasn't sure which was the entrance/exit. It's location was just a bad choice, squashed between bald mountain and spirit mountain when it should really be on the otherside of the park with near the black cauldron. It's a complete waste when you spend so much time on custom rides that you tuck it out of the way (with the uninteresting side at the front) and then fill in space with the in-game twist! why?

The Siege hammer was by far my favourite and i've been longing for someone to do a Screamin Swing since i attempted mine. It looks great and i love the fact that it looks very primative (wood) however i would argue the fact that you haven't approached it realistically. Rather then install a Screamin' Swing and then dress it up to look wooden (as i'm sure would be the case in real-life) you've done the opposite and gone for theme first and then try and fit the ride around it. This looks better in the game becuase you get the feeling of immersion but for a park that's Disney Realism or whatever you want to call it, i can't help but keep thinking it's more of a structure then a ride that could actually work. For example where are the pressurised air cylinders either side of the columns and why is the queue that close to the ride without any overhead netting to protect them if any object falls from the ride?

The Virus and Boomerang were the best of the four. I love the paintings on the floor of Boomerang and it is constructed well although it could of benefitted from a strong supporting column in the middle. Virus looked amazing and you ahve put a lot of thought into it's construction. My only qualm would be that it could have used a slightly bigger footprint but that's nothing major.

I know this all sounds very critical and indeed you could retaliate and critique my custom rides and point half of these things out as well, for instance my suspended flying carpet had it's rotating arms too close together! However that wasn't a disney park and i expect higher quality here then in my parks. Don't get me wrong these are the best ones i've seen so far in RCT but i can't help give harsh criticism becuase they could have been peferfect, but are a notch lower becuase of the above.


The coasters:

Bald mountain: By far my favourite coaster. The huge statue is very creative and whilst watching it i could hear the story going over in my mind where there would ahve been 'themed' sequences in the mountain. The duel station wasn't needed but a nice addition i guess. The queue was horrible though, it was boring walking round it.

Spirit Mountain: Great woody, although why was it hacked with the BM coaster, i didnt' see what it achieved apart from the break-downs. Lovely interaction with landscape as well.

CyberSpace Mountain: Interesting. I liked the booster bike idea and i think it could work in real-life. My only problem with this is that you could have themed the whole interior rather then segments which have been opened up.

Dragon Tower: It was a good coaster but out of place. It reminded me of Indy and raging spirits with less themeing. The placement is horrible, right next to the front of the castle? I understand the idea of one of the towers was the dragons but perhaps if more of the ride was hidden (in the castle if it were bigger) then it would have been great. I love the entrance sign and teh station was good although i didn't like the use of the stone corner walls as gates. Nice Treasure cave as well.

The rest:

Okay there were loads of little touches i loved in this park. The shadow of the lettering on the wall at the parks entrance, the horse and wagon and carts, benches using the cornice pieces, the stage areas, etc. You have wonderful ideas and the execution is mostly excellent with some exceptions. Lastly the layout could have used some work methinks. The Tron area was too large and definatly in the wrong place, in fact i didn't want it in there. When i think of Disney villains i think of The witch from snow white, etc all the 'storybook' villains and i think that the park would have been better just sticking to the fantasy theme that the front half of the park follows. In fact perhaps just make that area with the castle rather then attempt to squeeze a park's worth onto such a small map.

Overall i do like the park and it will remain a favourite for many years to come i expect, however i can't help but fell upon closer inspection that it isn't a huge improvement on his last Disney park and some details whilst conceptually imaginative, could have been executed better.


Alice review up very soon.

Upon closer inspection, my vote went to Shadowlands. Both parks were exceptional, a really tough decision.

I made a huge post earlier but as i went to post it, NE went down... again. So i guess its lost now.

To summarise it, i said that both parks were extremely good and both in my top 5 for this season. Alice in wonderland had some amazing architecture and the burrow was magnificent. Shadowlands was extremely good aswell, there was more ideas than space on this map, which i have always thought is great lol. I loved the futuristic area, and the awesome custom ride.

My vote went to shadowland, both parks were very tighly matched in most areas, however i felt it had the better rides overall.

-X-

Hmm... I think the decision is quite clear here. While AiW is a solid park in most aspects (although quite weak in the coaster department) as Pyro said, I feel like I've seen this theme too many times before. The theming was good, but nothing spectacular, and to be honest, it paled in comparison to the Shadowlands. It's not necessarily a bad park, but it just doesn't have enough quality to beat the Shadowlands.

On the other hand, the Shadowlands wasn't much better in the coaster area, however, the ideas were much more original and unique. Not only this, but the theming is superb, with amazing details everywhere. Definitely a park of the year candidate, an excellent Disney park.

Although I honestly thought the Hurricanes had the better park here, I'm still going to vote for AiW since I'm on the Bandits.

Edited by Jazz, 30 November 2006 - 01:50 PM.

I expected more votes than we have so far after about a day... at least at the beginning of the season, we were racking up total votes like a storm. Where is everyone?

Two of the best parks i've ever seen. I was honestly open-mouthed throughout viewing.

im surprised that alice isnt winning. the idea was new and inventive. that park my have been alot of foliage but it was very big for a H2H park and its archy defintly made up for it. it had great detail and was very creative. i have to saqy i love the new inside build technique that is shown here(i wont say names but it certainly is ovious)

i like the other park but felt is kinda fell apart. the monster on bald mountain was AMAZING. the coasters were good but sometimes hard to follow or slow. the different ways for makeing sigsn were all great and the dragon was pretty cool as well. i thought that it had TONS of detail in some places and in other it just fell apart. there were great constom rides but beside that and coasters....

both parks were Great. i sorry to see alice's wonderland not winning but everyone has different aspects


FK+Coatermind

Ah, we're halfway through anyway, as playoff parks AT LEAST should make 100 votes imo..
That's what the parkmakers and teams deserve as the whole season till now depends on this match-up.. Bit weird the second team elimination depends on one match.. Next season should also be a best of 3 imo.. Some results in past rounds don't even make sense anymore now, so Maybe just keep it to 5 match-ups for the regular season, and best of 3 for playoff and finals..

SF

Actually had some good coasters? Did you look at the park? Ok, Disney Shadowlands first. This had a nice atmosphere, theming, great realistic touches and some brilliant custom flat rides. It's nice to see that the parkmaker knew the subject area and tried to match the theme. From the overview this was my vote. In game however, I was disappointed by the roller coasters, specifically the (intamin?) looper (Dragon Mountain?) and Bald Mountain. Both of these rollercoasters had long periods when they crawled through their layouts. I can accept that the Bandits B&M had a slow spot in the final helix but at least that was coming up into the break run. Both these rollercoasters on the other hand have long slow points midway through the ride that would completely ruin the ride when you come out of a big drop into a long slow straight section of track. The best coaster in the park was Cyber Space Mountain, nice attempt at a Vekoma Booster Bike.

Alice in Wonderland on the other hand was wonderful. While nothing in the park stands out in the same way as Bald Mountian, the theming is great, the rides look fun and exciting and the whole park has a nice atmosphere. While I've seen and prefer more realistic parks, the coasters in Disney Shadowlands spoilt the park for me so my vote is going to the Bandits. I am worried however that a park can have 2 poor, slow coasters and lots of pretty theming and beat a good all round park that's maybe not quite so spectacular on the theming front, which is more important the rides or the theming?

Yes. I did look at both parks. While both rides did have a few slow sections, I prefer that roller coasters have greater acceleration to those with lesser acceleration and a greater minimum speed. I never said that all the coasters were good. I thought that the woodie was mediocre at best, but would you rather go to a park with one great coaster a park with three really good ones? Plus the slightly better theming in Disney's Shadowlands combined with the incredibly detailed custom rides pushed it over Alice for me. The rabbit hole was admittedly a very cool feature.

Fair warning, someones gona loss a vote as it seems Old Red voted once under his normal SN and has another one called Tex.

Problem is we got a glitch and I don't know who he voted for, so we will need to fix it or he will need to tell us. He can still have his vote under his name, but the Tex one does not count.

Same goes for the other match-up.

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Edited by Old Red, 03 December 2006 - 11:49 PM.

Well like I said we can't see who voted for what so I did not know they were null. This will be cleared up soon tho when we are able to see that.

Relax, your innocent till proven guilty

You say that but you pretty much accused him of cheating in your other post.

Chernabog.

Hahaha First thing I noticed too.

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Edited by Old Red, 03 December 2006 - 11:50 PM.

Now I know why they say don't mess with Texas...

Ok, im sorry, now lets talk about the parks please.

So our first matchup of the season had 125 total votes.

We're "only" at 72.

What gives, people?

It's probably just the summer vacation factor.

....




Do you live in the Southern Hemisphere? Because I coulda sworn you're from Washington.

It's possible he could have been talking about Week 1 and how many people voted then Corky...