RCT Discussion / The Macro Style Plea

^^ You're right about that i.m.o.

The huge amount of work is a big downside.
After a few months you start to lose interest and you have to keep pushing yourself to continue the park.
That's why you see more and more designs.

Okay, I was going to type up a bunch of stuff, but I decided to go with this instead:

Macro = Forest
Micro = Trees

Don't lose sight of the forest for the trees.

This is not to say, don't look at the trees, but rather, so many people are getting caught up in the trees, even though the intent of parkmaking is (usually) to "build" a forest. And posix's real message, I think, is that the trees don't matter if the forest isn't even there.

Why dictate when you can #RCT.

^well said

I find it curious that you seem to have an understanding of the "macro style", when this is a concept that I do not recall anyone use to analyse RCT work with other than myself, and that I find rather difficult to pinpoint in the first place.

I think it's fairly obvious what you mean when you say 'macro style.' It's not something that you really need to draw a line between either.

Okay, I was going to type up a bunch of stuff, but I decided to go with this instead:

Macro = Forest
Micro = Trees

Don't lose sight of the forest for the trees.

This is not to say, don't look at the trees, but rather, so many people are getting caught up in the trees, even though the intent of parkmaking is (usually) to "build" a forest. And posix's real message, I think, is that the trees don't matter if the forest isn't even there.

Don't forget a forest is more than just trees.

Personally I always thought RCTNW was pretty good at not falling victim to the micro detailing and has amazing productivity.

Good read posix. I'm curious to see what others have to say.

RCTNW is definitely the best example of Macro style. However I can only enjoy his park from that perspective. Zoom in to normal level and then it looses most of it's charm. There are multiple levels of layers in making a park.
Macro is just one of them. The issue is however that pretty much most parks can't answer too all of them or at least don't answer them properly.

I'll make the example in the manner I have to deal with it making my designs in my study: urban scale, building level and detail. There could be some in-between forms, but basically this is the division. The thing is all of them are important and all of them generally have to be answered, otherwise your design is not complete. In practice I can't give them all equal time, which is not a problem, however how spread that time depends on your choices and the intended goal. Most of the time they don't need equal time. You put most focus on the element that is most important for your design, but keeping all the other scales in mind. In the end though I have a limited amount of time when I need to be done, and I can't have the other scale level's questions left unanswered. The trick is to determine the amount of detail required to make an appropriate answer.

Now to link this back to RCT, a lot of people start out with their goal to build an entire park, but focus on one and only one scale most of the time. A lot of people focus on the micro level. I personally like that one well. The thing is however most people forget to address the bigger scale of the area and further on the park scale. The thing is that if you want to do an entire park with that much detail most you have to pay more attention to the other scales, because if you only look at the detail the bigger picture is not gonna work. Even more important it is going to increase your workload several times because you lost focus on what's important for the park to work as a whole. Detail is a manner of making an area work. On it's own it does barely anything because it isn't cohesive as a whole.

Personally I don't care too much for work that only has one noticeable scale into it. One work I like to mention is El Encierro, a masterpiece that works on all scales. You might say; but that's a design and not an entire park! True, but then ask yourself this question: does is feel like it is belonging to something bigger? It has the biggest scale incorporated in it without even having that part of it physically in it. How awesome is that?
Personally I'd like to more work like that. I think people with high focus on detail should start considering not building the entire park, but just build that area and keep the image entire park into you head while building the sub-area.

One last personal example of how you can make things tick. This might surprise you, but it's not EGAS I want to talk about. Actually I want to take you to the first park I build when I got rct2. Some of you might remember Shady Oasis. There is something I still love very much even today. It's the entrance square. It's the first thing I built in that park and I still think it's the strongest thing I ever built in that park. Back then CSO was almost non-existant except for some early fodder objects (Toon Blocks didn't exist at that time). I didn't craft with detail in the current day sense. What I crafted with there was atmosphere and composition. It didn't need detail to work. Could it be better with the detail I can now add with current day tools? I believe I can make it even more magnificent with it, but that's not the point. The point is that it was great even before I even could add such detail. It already worked on the bigger level, now I could take it to town improving the detail layer. Start with defining your atmosphere, your shapes, your composition, your coloring. Focus on detail if only if it is really of major importance for your design (hint: most of the time it reaaaaaly isn't, start realizing that). You know what the first thing I did was when I started to think about making Nostalgia Vale? I started putting objects together. Not to make a park or a building out of it, but to find out how I wanted to craft the atmosphere. My first work was literally just some walls, flowers and trees just thrown together to find out what worked and what to understand for myself what feeling I was going for.

Too busy to reply for days. Now it's a bit overwhelming to re-address this. I'll try.

A couple of years ago geewhzz told me he sees the game as a modelling tool, kind of like playing digital railway modelling, just with coasters. So the goal really is to replicate accurately. Obviously this can best be achieved with very fine and flexible objects. I can also understand why large projects are unimportant, or why even just a few screens will do. After all, it's mostly about recreation.

My goal is/was completely different. I just want to create atmospheres. I want to see something in game and be put into a mood. Something that stimulates me emotionally, for whatever reason. This is only possible on large enough releases. I don't really care for realism all that much. It does play a factor, but a certain amount will do. Other things are more important. Back in the day, experimenting with colours or seldom used objects to create new effects was common. I don't see this very often today. People only seem to work off images, desperately trying not to miss any details. So the innate RCT aesthetics are no longer played with. They're pretty much abandoned which to me is a sad thing. The only recent example I can think of would be Liam's Escapist Experience, and that was considered a nostalgia project.

I don't understand quite well why this happened. When did people decide to become modellers? I'm feeling pretty lonely with my RCT ideals.


Wanted, interesing categorisation. I was very torn on Götheburg. I don't think it is as strong as his other releases because it lacks cohesion. I remember talking with him about the park and he said it wasn't his goal to create another park that would follow the "rules of realism", and that he wanted to try something new. I think there's nothing wrong with that, but whatever new thing he tried with Götheburg did not resonate with me very well. It just lacks the cohesion I expect of macro style play.

Rob, I was worried you might get offended. I just wanted to voice a strong opinion. It's a German thing. Poor excuse, I know. It's still my opinion. I would love to understand where those feelings went you had when creating Excalibur, or when planning a classic style LL duo with me. I guess micro stuff is just more fun to you, oh well.

Nevermind

I'd be one to suggest that if it doesn't look good from every angle, it doesn't look good. But that's just how I look at parks.