Why is this game so overcomplicated?

[dragon808tr]

So, I used to play this breifly on an old pc of mine years ago until frames became a problem. I made a sandbox park and just put down a few flats and a log ride. Cut to this Christmas where I get a shiny new PC that can run anything and me being all excited to make my own park in Planco. I even bought all the non-IP DLC's on sale price! Sadly, upon actually playing my own stuff more, this game has been one of the most frustrating games I've ever played. Everything feels like you need a damn engineering degree or coding degree to figure out what the hell to do! Though, i'll organize my thoughts so hopefully someone can help me.

First up, the camera! I know how the ride camera works, but for park overview, why is it not RMB? It's nearly impossible to put together a good looking park from basically a locked RCT1 perspective! (and yet scrooling works on the wheel as it should...)

Second, the coasters themselves! Why are there so many things going on that you almost need an engineering degree for? Even the simple coasters are just impossible to assemble! Yet I know they aren't supposed to be that hard to do! They also don't give hill hight, so most of my coasters valley and require me to redesign the entire damn thing!

Next, why the hell do I need to care about staff in sandbox mode? Its SANDBOX mode! Like, I hire them, put vendors RIGHT IN FRONT of the shop, and yet they don't man it! Then i get spammed with notifactions that "NAME is not happy" or "Name is thinking about quiting" or "employyes need more break rooms" ♥♥♥♥♥ this is MY park not yours! Is there any way to turn this off (and the other annoying notifactions for guests, like the ones about food and crime and junk).

Also, why is the menu size (for selecting rides/scenery and stuff) ant sized? Like, to get anything going I need to lean into my moniter and squint, which caused eyestrain after only one session. (as I was trying to see what all the flat rides are).

Additionally, there seems to be some errors with the blueprints (the offical ones and not workshop) where I tried to place a pretzel darkride called "Jailers judgement" or something, and it was floating above the ground and looked horrid, so I bulldozed it, but ALL the scenery stayed! Meaning i had to MANUALLY delete each piece, and I gave up after not finding a mass delete button. Why is that not a feature?

Honestly, the only things that work well in this game are the flat rides, as they pretty much tell you how to set them up and are pretty faithful in their recreations. I only noticed a few errors with a few rides, but that's just beacuse i'm a mega theme park fan and don't expect a coaster focused game to have the same eye that I do IRL.

You may think i'm writing in anger, but I'm not. I spent well over $120 for this game (base game and all EA-style DLCs) and for that price, I expect it to work as intended or I WILL refund! I mean, any sane person who spends a large amount of money on a game expects it to work well and have a lot of fun with it. Money dosen't come easy, especially in the midst of the Coronavirus Economic Depression. I bought this game since it best had the creativity and features I wanted in a game like this, one where I could create pretty much anything from my imagination, hence why I was willing to pony up the extra cash for the DLC's (which should have been already included in the base game, but I digress).

I honestly, truely wish to enjoy this game, as it is nearly perfect for me. I was so excited for it! But after last night, if thing's dont improve, I will strongly consider refunding. Thanks for any help!

[grampers62]

There are things in the settings menu that can adjust everything you've talked about.
I suggest go there and first go to the interface tab and set scaling to something more suited to your liking. Also while there confirm that your game resolution is set correctly. From there you should check out the various tabs and set things to be as you like.

[dragon808tr]

Would you mind showing me where it is in the once again overcomplicated options menu? Like seriously, with this much complexity I feel like i'm running a nuclear reactor, on the Enterprise, in a black hole!

[grampers62]

from the main screen click on the gear icon in the upper right of the screen.
On the top row are tabs for other menus. click on camera. on that page try these settings
invert y -none
focus on scenery - checked
rotation behavior - center focused
zoom behavior mouse focused
edge scrolling - unchecked
Right mouse drag - set to grab drag.
noclip - checked will allow the camera to pass through terrain.

Coaster height
In the coaster build menu settings tab the third row down you should see a group of three icons the first is markers off, the second is height above terrain and the third is height above sea level. also use of the option to snap to angles helps tons in coaster creation. That's the top slider in the same menu.

Staff in sandbox mode
Back to the main settings again which are accessible from any map as well.
In the game tab towards the bottom you should see staff management features. un-check that to disable staff quitting and such. I suggest tinkering around with that page to see what those options do.

If you have questions about any of the options in settings just search for it here in the forums.

[Banjotails]

Not really seeing the point of the post and comes across as you just having a sook 5 days after installing it. It seems you just cant play with patience and have not spent some time learning how to do things or researching the 4 years worth of videos/blogs/images/forums out there or try changing some simple to use settings in the settings menu. It's not a complicated game at all to play. Once you work it all out you will get hours of fun logged. Happy gaming!

[MrHappy]

When I first saw the game I remember feeling like the new levels of detail were amazing - Yeah it is a complicated game of patience sometimes though.

[Trakehner]

This have can be frustrating and complicated at first. But with patience it's like anything else you can learn and will become second nature to you.

Felt just like you when I first got the game. Pushing towards 5,000 hours invested now.

P.S. PC kind of works like a computer animation program like Lightwave/Maya....IMO.