Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 58 posts

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#11

Post by konimex »

deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

Speaking of which, I wonder what Chris would think of OpenRCT2 and OpenTTD, which reimplemented his games with different programming languages and outright different graphics (which allowed the latter to reach its 1.0 milestone not requiring the original Transport Tycoon assets).

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#13

Post by reddalo »

konimex wrote: post #11
deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

Speaking of which, I wonder what Chris would think of OpenRCT2 and OpenTTD, which reimplemented his games with different programming languages and outright different graphics (which allowed the latter to reach its 1.0 milestone not requiring the original Transport Tycoon assets).

I can't recall the source so take this with a grain of salt (I think some members of the OpenTTD forum managed to contact him), but I remember him not being happy about it.

He perfected the games according to his vision, so it makes sense for him not to like people rewriting his code and adding new features.

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#14

Post by reddalo »

naths88 wrote: post #9
deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

You just made my day. Today is going to be really productive.

Beware that you still need a copy of the original RCT2 game in order to play OpenRCT2. You can still buy it on GOG [1] though.

[1] https://www.gog.com/en/game/rollercoaster_tycoon_2

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#15

Post by reddalo »

Chris Sawyer is my hero. I spent countless hours on his games when I was a child, and maybe that's the reason why I've became a programmer.

I'm sad that Chris Sawyer is such a reserved person, his public appearances are super rare [1] and he has no internet presence, except for a website that hasn't been updated in ages [2].

I wish he had a blog where he shared how he made his games.

[1] One of the few: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UU73g72NTHc [2] https://chrissawyergames.com/

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#16

Post by deanc »

konimex wrote: post #11
deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

Speaking of which, I wonder what Chris would think of OpenRCT2 and OpenTTD, which reimplemented his games with different programming languages and outright different graphics (which allowed the latter to reach its 1.0 milestone not requiring the original Transport Tycoon assets).

The are no direct statements but one from his agency [1]

> The project has no blessing or support from Chris Sawyer and our view, it is both unethical and unlawful, involving infringements that may in some territories be criminal as well as a violation of Chris Sawyer's rights and those of his licensees - all of which remain reserved.

> RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic, distributed by Atari, contains RCT and RCT2 rebuilt for modern operating systems under Chris's own direction.

[1] https://forums.openrct2.org/topic/5646-how-is-openrct2-legal...

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#17

Post by dwroberts »

HippoBaro wrote: post #3

> It actually took a lot longer to re-write the game in C++ than it took me to write the original machine code version 20 years earlier. Is the most interesting quote IMO. I often feel like productivity has gone down significantly in recent years, despite tooling and computers being more numerous/sophisticated/fast.

Found this part strange because in other interviews he seemed to imply (for RCT classic) that there was almost some kind of VM-like structure that was running the original code underneath as-is

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#18

Post by haunter »

konimex wrote: post #11
deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

Speaking of which, I wonder what Chris would think of OpenRCT2 and OpenTTD, which reimplemented his games with different programming languages and outright different graphics (which allowed the latter to reach its 1.0 milestone not requiring the original Transport Tycoon assets).

He doesn't like them. Basically the games were finished as in an art piece is finished (don't tell George Lucas!) and the later projects (OpenTTD/OpenRCT2) are "remixing" those.

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#19

Post by leokennis »

deanc wrote: post #8

This game _is_ my childhood. Spent countless hours one summer doing every scenario, learning all the little easter eggs (Michael Schumacher on the Go karts anyone?). The spirit of this game lives on now in OpenRCT2 [1] - which brings the game into the modern age and is backwards compatible with all the scenarios from the original. It even features multiplayer park building. [1] https://openrct2.io/

I can wholeheartedly recommend Marcel Vos' YouTube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBlXovStrlQkVA2xJEROUNg

He is basically reverse engineering and explaining RCT's logic and design, but does it via entertaining videos.

Re: Interview with RollerCoaster Tycoon's Creator, Chris Sawyer (2024)

#20

Post by windward »

deanc wrote: post #16
konimex wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking of which, I wonder what Chris would think of OpenRCT2 and OpenTTD, which reimplemented his games with different programming languages and outright different graphics (which allowed the latter to reach its 1.0 milestone not requiring the original Transport Tycoon assets).

The are no direct statements but one from his agency [1] > The project has no blessing or support from Chris Sawyer and our view, it is both unethical and unlawful, involving infringements that may in some territories be criminal as well as a violation of Chris Sawyer's rights and those of his licensees - all of which remain reserved. > RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic, distributed by Atari, contains RCT and RCT2 rebuilt…

A user naively snitching on the project between their 2nd and 3rd posts is a really great bit.
Post reply on HN