I will never forget the time my older brother built a coaster that was just called "wait in line: the ride" and it was a kid's coaster in the form of a circle where you stopped every second because there were too many carts on the track. I remember this one specifically because a guest went on this one with a kid and then spent one in-game year on the track. He got off and the first thing that came to his mind was "eh, not really for me."

Contrary to its name, Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 is best played as a sandbox game. I have yet to talk to anyone who's played this game as intended. Perhaps it's not fair for me to judge the game at all, then. But facts are facts: I've spent an absurd amount of time playing this and I have no regrets.

What makes RCT3 such an enjoyable sandbox game all of these years later is that it eschews realism. As a kid, I thought that your guests being immortal was a flaw. But now that I'm older, I can recognize that this game wouldn't be half as much fun if you weren't able to launch an air-powered coaster at a crowd of people with practically no repercussions. The game may ask you to care when it tells you you're running a notoriously unsafe park; I see it as a badge of honor. Who cares about things such as ethics? Rollercoasters and food are free but our bathrooms cost $10 per person. We purposely host extremely nauseating coasters and are withholding medical assistance. If dried out vomit isn't your cup of tea, too bad. I have the money to make everyone on earth a janitor, but I chose to make them all cute elephants instead. Who said that kids coasters have to be slow and boring? Our kids coasters have drops that make even the most extreme of our tracks weep in envy. And supervision? Who needs supervision? Our supervisor has a backstroke so strong that 2,000 feet of water can't drown him. Logrides crash into pools and rollercoasters trap guests in mountains. Half of our coasters are too intense for the layman to indulge in. We let dangerous animals out of our zoo on purpose so we can practice our aim on helpless guests. We are the number one theme park in America. Despite our disasterous reputation, we still get hundreds of customers every day.

Holy shit, this game is stupid. Holy shit, I absolutely adore it.

The first resource/management simulator I ever played!
I have very fond memories of this game. Just playing in sandbox slowly constructing a big theme park. Watching the guests walk around. Figuring out how to zigzag the queue so that the maximum number of people could line up in front of the ride. It's a super chill game with a surprising amount of depth.
And it had a campaign mode that was plenty of fun too.

Writing this review is making me want to play it again. I gave it a try a few months ago and at 4K the buttons were way too tiny.

Before Planet Coaster released a few years ago, Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 carried the concept of tycoon games squarely on its shoulders. RCT3 was a major step from the earlier entries in the series, given the game full 3D graphics, the option to actually ride the rollercoasters, and more complex customization with buildings and resources. RCT3 also offered a great sandbox mode and campaign to provide for different ways of play. For a time, RCT3 also had a bustling community that created really impressive custom scenery.

Unfortunately, RCT3 started to show its age once Planet Coaster was released. The controls are clunky, the grid system is highly limiting for designing the park, and between the two there is a hardly a reason to play RCT3 over Planet Coaster (unless you want to make a water park). RCT3 will always be a well for nostalgia, though, and for people with weaker computers RCT3 is an easier to run option for a park management game as well as cheaper. It just doesn't hold up like it used to.