SITE: Guides, Tips, and Tricks to ORCT2's features

[imlegos]

So, an idea came to me while reading over someone's questions, and I thought that maybe someone with knowledge on such things could post several topics related to specific features, what they do, and how to use them; for instance, a topic called "Arbitrary Ride Types" which would detail where to find the cheat, how to use it, and (specific to this topic) what different values do to the ride, such as "Crooked House" changing the ride to invisible, and changes rating values. Another one could probably be related to the Tile Inspector and it's many uses and features. Just a thought to give a bit more resources to those looking to build in this game.

This could also act as a source of sharing specific information, like the previously mentioned effects of "Arbitrary Ride Type"

Edited March 31, 2017 by imlegos

[SpiffyJack]

That's a great idea! 

I have to be honest here: I'm a CAD guru in 7 drawing platforms plus.... I don't say that as WOW look at me! I say it as I have lots of resources to remind myself because its can be difficult to keep it all strait... so if I can make a 2-3 minute phone call or message, it's much more efficient than it is to search for 30 minutes and possibly still not get the answer. So this condensed source would be nice.  

[imlegos]

It was definitely meant as more of a way to clear up people asking how to do things with ORCT2 tools, and could easily be used by more experienced players to add their own discoveries of the tool, for instance what putting in different arbitrary ride types actually does. Currently everyone just uses Crooked House and doesn't question it, however it does reduce ride rating, and it is known other rides can also remove track sprites, but isn't really known how exactly they function.

Some plausible topics to address with this idea are Tile Inspector, Arbitrary Ride Types, Sandbox Mode, Object Selection, Cheat and Debug menu overviews, Disable Clearance Checks and Merging, among other things.

[X7123M3-256]

15 hours ago, imlegos said:

what putting in different arbitrary ride types actually does

It changes the ride type. That's literally all it does. Anything that is different for different rides will be changed, but the most prominent thing is the track style and that's what most people use this cheat for. Another use of it is as a workaround for the lack of a "disable track piece restrictions" cheat - for example, if you want to build inversions on the vertical drop coaster, you can change the ride type to twister, build the element, and then switch back to the vertical drop coaster.

The reason crooked house makes the track invisible is because it's a flat ride and doesn't have any track sprites. In OpenRCT2, you can build any track piece on any ride but that doesn't mean there's sprites for all of them - any track pieces not included will be made invisible (in vanilla, it was a bit different, most uses of missing track pieces would crash the game and crooked house was an exception).

 

15 hours ago, imlegos said:

 isn't really known how exactly they function.

Yes it is. With OpenRCT2 we can see exactly what these hacks do.

[Broxzier]

6 hours ago, X7123M3-256 said:

if you want to build inversions on the vertical drop coaster, you can change the ride type to twister, build the element, and then switch back to the vertical drop coaster.

One addition to this, you also need to select correct type of vehicle for the missing track parts to become available.

[X7123M3-256]

If the vehicle you're using doesn't already enable those pieces, yes (or check "select rides by track type" which disables all vehicle specific restrictions).

[imlegos]

I was thinking more of how the ratings are affected. Since it's clear that A.R.T. does affect the ratings.

[X7123M3-256]

Yes, it affects the ratings, because the ratings are calculated differently for different ride types, and you are changing the ride type (not just the track type, as it's not possible to set that separately).  All that cheat does is set one byte in the ride structure  (here's the implementation)

If you're changing a tracked ride to a flat ride type, I wouldn't expect sane rating calculations - flat rides are really an awkward hack in RCT2, implemented as a special case of tracked rides with almost entirely hardcoded behaviour.  Most flat rides have very little you can customize, so the rating calculation is very simple. As far as I can tell, the only thing that will affect the ratings of a crooked house is the vehicle type and (strangely enough) the air time. This is all in ride_ratings.c if you want the details.

Edited April 2, 2017 by X7123M3-256

[Tune]

I like this idea a lot. 

There's various RCT guides on the internet. Either in text of video format. But it would be nice to have one official wiki or something like that on the website. 

I know there's already a wiki on the OpenRCT Github, but that's more about technical stuff, not about playing the game.

Take the OpenTTD wiki for example. Or the official Factorio guide. It would be awesome if we'd make something like that. 

Edited April 3, 2017 by Tune

[YoloSweggLord]

I was going to mention the wiki, but I see Tune already has, and he made a good point about it. We could probably find a (hopefully free) wiki hosting site to use, or create a new website altogether, in which case we could use Github to collaborate on it.

[SpiffyJack]

On 4/2/2017 at 10:04, X7123M3-256 said:

Yes, it affects the ratings, because the ratings are calculated differently for different ride types, and you are changing the ride type (not just the track type, as it's not possible to set that separately).  All that cheat does is set one byte in the ride structure  (here's the implementation)

If you're changing a tracked ride to a flat ride type, I wouldn't expect sane rating calculations - flat rides are really an awkward hack in RCT2, implemented as a special case of tracked rides with almost entirely hardcoded behaviour.  Most flat rides have very little you can customize, so the rating calculation is very simple. As far as I can tell, the only thing that will affect the ratings of a crooked house is the vehicle type and (strangely enough) the air time. This is all in ride_ratings.c if you want the details.

@X7123M3-256 So if Splash Boats is using Water Coaster lifts for increased speed, this will affect ratings as well correct? I'm using a current splash boats in Group Park 5 that went rouge once I changed the lifts. But the bigger bug I see the rating stats will not show up as usual, but the ride still has the ability to open and track design can not be saved. Coincidentally, the car ride next to it has the same problem yet has no cheat modifiers at all.. From looking at the code you mentioned above and elsewhere, i'm thinking this should be fixable... I'm most certain until the rating are illustrated, the ride nor the park isn't being updated completely and peeps will not react until the park updates the ride listings. 

[X7123M3-256]

2 hours ago, SpiffyJack said:

So if Splash Boats is using Water Coaster lifts for increased speed

 

No, the ride type that matters is the one for the ride whose ratings are being calculated. Track merges don't change that, they just redirect the trains onto track belonging to a different ride. Merges will not affect ratings, but increasing the speed will (though not to an extreme degree unless you make it ridiculously fast).

 

2 hours ago, SpiffyJack said:

But the bigger bug I see the rating stats will not show up as usual, but the ride still has the ability to open and track design can not be saved. Coincidentally, the car ride next to it has the same problem yet has no cheat modifiers at all..

It may be nothing to do with the splash boats. Ratings are queued up and calculated sequentially - if you have a ride somewhere that has not finished calculating the ratings (usually because the trains are stuck and not returning to the station), then no subsequent rides will get ratings until it has done so.

[SpiffyJack]

56 minutes ago, X7123M3-256 said:

It may be nothing to do with the splash boats. Ratings are queued up and calculated sequentially - if you have a ride somewhere that has not finished calculating the ratings (usually because the trains are stuck and not returning to the station), then no subsequent rides will get ratings until it has done so.

@X7123M3-256 .... Well I understand that perfectly! Thank you!

So now the issue becomes which ride in the park this instance began, and fix that first. Then follow the trail to clear them up one by one (not knowing how many are involved), until the sequential process starts again. 

*Wish list... A sequential bypass loop  

That certainly explains why the cars ride (which I modified after the splash) followed the sequential abyss. 

Edited May 3, 2017 by SpiffyJack