Hi! Of course the Build Challenge will continue now that the game is properly released, so here's this months edition!
The Build Challenge tasks you with building a certain type of ride within a given footprint and with a limited budget, with a new challenge starting every month.
The top 5 entries get included in the game as default ride blueprints.
December 2018 Build Challenge Results
All submissions can be found on the Workshop - thanks for everyone participating!
These are the 5 winning entries:
For January 2019 the new Build Challenge is to build a Splash Battle ride!
To switch things up a bit there's a new rule this time: you can only use Generic scenery items plus items from 1 additional theme that you can choose freely (if you use more than 1 you won't be able to submit your entry, so pay attention to this! Below the scenery budget limit it tells you which theme you picked).
The top submissions get included in the next game update as default blueprints.
Korean + Dutch, Soundtrack Download
Parkitect has an official Korean translation now, and the Dutch translation received a complete overhaul.
The game is by far the most popular in Germany, the US and Korea currently, so we hope the addition of a Korean translation and Korean font support will make the game more comfortable to play.
Parkitect also always had a large amount of players from the Netherlands since the beginning. The Dutch translation had become very incomplete over the years, so it was time for an update :)
We know there are still some very common languages missing, and of course we will continue adding support for more languages over the coming weeks and months.
Soundtrack
We had some requests to make the soundtrack available as separate download, so if you want to listen to the games music outside of the game you can do so now.
If you have backed our Kickstarter at the Soundtrack tier or bought the Soundtrack Edition directly from our website you can find the soundtrack as a separate download in your Humble library now. If you're not using a Humble account and lost your download link please use the Resender to retrieve it.
Changelog (Version 1.2a)
added Korean translation
updated Dutch translation
added stripe pattern to sources of bad decoration rating to make them easier to distinguish from undecorated areas
small campaign adjustments
made info pips (no resources, no path connection etc) click-through while building something
improved ghost train visibility when a visualization view is enabled
fixed a case where water could disappear in unexpected places when terraforming
fixed very short rides being more exciting than they should be and 1-2 other small exploits
fixed a memory leak
Version 1.2
Hey look, it’s another update in time for the weekend/holidays!
The full changelog is at the end of this post. The highlights are:
Track segments automatically snap to each other if the height difference is reasonably small: This makes reconnecting track ends easier after editing a ride, and should resolve the troubles new players had with getting track heights to match when being misaligned by 1/8 height unit.
Existing guest/ride/shop info windows automatically get closed when clicking a different guest/ride/shop (unless you pin them): This should reduce windows cluttering up the view.
Added the park ratings to a tab in the Park Info window: The park ratings are quite important but could previously only be found by hovering on the ratings bar in the main menu, which is slightly hidden. This will give people a second way to discover them, and there are also some additional tooltips explaining the ratings a bit.
The research menu button received an animation to reflect the current research state: The fill state of the vial tells you the research progress without having to open the research window, and it looks nice I guess.
And there’s a little something for the winter season :)
See you all next year!
Changelog
Version 1.1
Phew, that was an intense ride :)
There have been 2-3 slightly bigger issues for some people that had to be hotfixed, but overall I’d say the launch went pretty smoothly!
It has been great to watch all of the reactions, ratings, feedback and reviews (you can leave one here by the way :D).
Thank you!
We have an update to Version 1.1 for you today to resolve most of the more pressing small bugs and confusing things you have reported.
For the next update we will focus on improvements to the coaster track builder to make finishing tracks more comfortable.
Changelog
Release!
Here we go! Version 1.0 is OUT NOW :D
Changelog:
Known Issues
These problems have been reported so far and are being investigated by us:
Devlog Update 221
Just three more days until launch!
As a quick reminder, the price of the game will change to USD $29.99 / EUR €24.99 around November 28th, so this is the last chance to grab the game at its current Early Access price.
Devlog
We’re happy to announce that in addition to the existing English and German translations the game will fully support French, Russian and Simplified Chinese at launch!
We don’t have a lot of experience with translations yet, so if you notice anything weird with them please let us know. We will also consider adding more translations in the future.
And if you took a look at the Steam store page recently you might have noticed that the 1.0 update will also add a whole bunch of Achievements :)
Devlog Update 220
Hey! If you haven’t seen it yet - the 1.0 version of Parkitect with the campaign mode will release next week on November 29th, and there’s a trailer for it here!
We’ve been working on the campaign mode for about a year now and planned it for much longer, so let’s talk a bit about it now that it’s revealed!
Design
All the way back in 2014 we knew that we wanted to have some sort of map for the campaign instead of just a list of levels, but it wasn’t clear yet what that would look like. Initially we thought about doing a globe, but then another game did that :)
Then for the longest time we thought it could work like a rolling pin, sort of like the world in Animal Crossing games. But bending the map like that would have made it much more complicated to build, and it would also not have fit the rest of the game too well. So we decided to roughly match the look of the terrain and decoration that you find inside the game itself.
Now it became a bit like the overworld maps you can find in Mario games.
We didn’t want players to be able to see all of the levels from the start and wanted the map to be obscured in the beginning and only get uncovered as you progress, to make you wonder a bit about what’s still to come.
To pique your curiosity even further we wanted the map have multiple themes and biomes that would roughly match the scenarios you’d find. Fitting all of the different scenario settings into one connected map in a way that somewhat makes sense was pretty tricky, especially since the campaign should also start easy and get more difficult as you progress. So we couldn’t simply move some scenarios to a different place on the map where they would have fit in better geographically because their order was somewhat fixed.
We went with clouds for obscuring the map, simply because it made sense. We also like how there sometimes are holes in the cloud layer that let you get a small glimpse ahead at what’s yet to come
At one point we thought about changing the map to look like a blueprint that gets turned into reality. We liked the look of the effect, but there would have been so much animation and movement going on that it was distracting from the important part, which is the next level getting unlocked.
We slowly started having a nice landscape, but the map was still feeling a bit empty... we wanted a bit more visual feedback showing which levels you have already beaten.
So we added these buildings - each building resembles a scenario you have completed and can be found within that scenario. It is like a trophy that you unlock as reward for winning the scenario, to remind you of the level you played and to make the map feel more alive thanks to you.
The way it slams onto the map with a shockwave that pushes away the clouds is pretty satisfying too!
And we think now it’s also looking a bit like the park maps that you can find at many theme parks, with the main attractions being drawn it at unrealistically big proportions.
Gameplay
Due to the branching paths there are usually 2-3 different scenarios you can choose from to progress, so if you get stuck somewhere you have the option to continue with a different level.
After you have beaten a level you can play it in sandbox mode, so if you want to revisit it and build a more complex park with unlimited money, goals disabled or to build some rides that are usually not available in that level you can do that! We hope this will give creative players a small incentive to give the campaign a try.
You might have seen the little coin pop up in the level unlock animation above. You get one coin for beating the scenario (and you can’t buy them with real money or anything like that, just to be clear about that). Additionally, you can get a second coin by beating all of the optional goals of the scenario. You don’t have to beat the optional goals to move on to the next scenario, but it can still make sense to go for them if you feel like you need an extra challenge or to get the second coin, because at some points you will need a certain amount of coins to progress.
So if you beat some of the optional goals this can also allow you to skip some levels.
Every level has at least an optional time challenge goal where you need to complete the scenario by a certain date (and might have to restart if you miss it!) and sometimes a couple of extra challenges.
This adds a hard mode to every level for players who like this sort of challenge with a reward that’s actually useful, and without blocking people who prefer taking their time or simply aren’t that fast from progressing to the next scenario. It’s hard to please everyone, but we hope this will be a good compromise to let as many players as possible enjoy the game in the way they want to play it.
Version 1.0 with Campaign Mode launching November 29th!
That’s right, the 1.0 version of Parkitect will release on November 29th.
Most notably, it will add the Campaign Mode to the game!The campaign spans 26 scenarios with unique and varied settings and is played on a world map with branching paths that gets gradually revealed and comes to live as you progress.
All of the campaign parks have been designed by Silvarret and Joshua Tjarks, so you can be sure they are very nicely decorated.
Launch price
As announced previously we will increase the price with the release of this update. Our final price will be $29.99 / €24.99 and should come into effect across all stores around November 28th.
Since this has been asked before: of course the 1.0 update will be free for you if you already own the game or buy it at the current price. You won’t have to pay extra for it.
Future
So what will the 1.0 release mean for the future of Parkitect?During December and early January we expect to be 100% busy with talking to press and players, the inevitable hotfixes and taking a bit of time off over the holidays.
Beyond that we will of course continue to support the game with patches and updates - there’s some more features and content for both creative players and management players that we’re excited to start working on as free updates! However, these updates will happen whenever we have something ready to show instead of on the fixed weekly devlog/monthly game update schedule that we’ve used for the past ~4 years.
Thank you!
Finally, a HUGE thank you to everyone who has helped us to get this far! This game wouldn’t exist without all of the Kickstarter supporters, and it would have been a much smaller game without all of the Early Access supporters.
Thanks <3
Devlog Update 219
Garret added some new flags that should fit nicely into most parks, and we updated the old flags with a bit of animation too:
And the terrain generator is getting a small update. You’ll be able to select which types of trees exactly it should plant:
It will also give trees some slight color variations.
Devlog Update 218 + Beta 12
Beta 12 is now available for download! The full change log is at the end of this post.
Devlog
During this months Art Stream, Garret added a set of new generic building pieces and deco items that should fit into most parks. Here’s a preview of some of the new pieces:
Beta 11 Build Challenge Results
All submissions can be found on the Workshop - thanks for everyone participating!
These are the 5 winning entries:
