06-22-2009, 11:20 PM
I've been thinking about this, and I realize that I don't remember hearing anything about how this game will handle the player's own map, the one that TORCG used to monitor traffic levels, or just look at the park layout from a different perspective. I doubt we want to copy TORCG because that map was horrid. It was hard to discern anything, it was too small, it never really gave you anything that you wouldn't learn just from zooming out. I particularly want this changed as it's one thing that'll separate this game from TORCG if we can make this as commonly used as the finances tab.
I've got some ideas that I want to throw out before I forget in my sleep.
1) Make the map look different than just a zoomed-out screenshot.
And certainly not like TORCG. I figure we could base its design off of real park maps, like Sea World's which has logos for each ride plastered over it. I don't know how we'll make the logos, but tracked rides could have a shot of the ride vehicles, and flat rides would of couse feature themselves, as rendered during construction. To make the look stylized, we could highlight the borders and add a slight warping to the image, as if you shot it with a fish-eye lens. Then of course to keep the map functional, we scale each logo so that it doesn't cross over any important info like path traffic, which while I'm on that could be displayed as varying colors that represent density. Path sides would be highlighted to match the stylized look and to separate the varying path colors from anything else. The background could just be a static shot of the park, with contrails following coaster cars to match the stylized look.
2) Give the poor map some use!
When the player floats their mouse over an attraction, a tooltip is displayed giving the player some quick info on each ride like status, queue length, est. profit, and est. hourly capacity. Under the map would be the ride list, layed out like a real park map, displaying locations, also showing tooltips, and scheduled events like parades and fireworks. This could eliminate the need for a separate ride list.
Critique as you will, I just wanted to throw out some ideas while they were fresh in my mind.
I've got some ideas that I want to throw out before I forget in my sleep.
1) Make the map look different than just a zoomed-out screenshot.
And certainly not like TORCG. I figure we could base its design off of real park maps, like Sea World's which has logos for each ride plastered over it. I don't know how we'll make the logos, but tracked rides could have a shot of the ride vehicles, and flat rides would of couse feature themselves, as rendered during construction. To make the look stylized, we could highlight the borders and add a slight warping to the image, as if you shot it with a fish-eye lens. Then of course to keep the map functional, we scale each logo so that it doesn't cross over any important info like path traffic, which while I'm on that could be displayed as varying colors that represent density. Path sides would be highlighted to match the stylized look and to separate the varying path colors from anything else. The background could just be a static shot of the park, with contrails following coaster cars to match the stylized look.
2) Give the poor map some use!
When the player floats their mouse over an attraction, a tooltip is displayed giving the player some quick info on each ride like status, queue length, est. profit, and est. hourly capacity. Under the map would be the ride list, layed out like a real park map, displaying locations, also showing tooltips, and scheduled events like parades and fireworks. This could eliminate the need for a separate ride list.
Critique as you will, I just wanted to throw out some ideas while they were fresh in my mind.