Limbic Entertainment’s Park Beyond promises an unconventional approach to roller coaster building as players design the theme park of their dreams. It’s another business building simulator that tries to combine “boundless” creativity with financial responsibility. In an intimate pitch with a slightly whimsical setting, you’ll create your own custom coasters, build drag-and-drop shops, and hire staff to start a successful business that’s profitable and exciting – but most importantly, profitable.
Despite a full-length tutorial on building bespoke roller coasters, Park Beyond’s campaign starts off strong, letting you continually tinker with exciting new mechanics and empowering you to unleash your wildest creations across dusty deserts and lush alpine forests. However, as I began to adapt my building to the proposed financial and space constraints, I felt my creativity was quickly being bogged down by frustrating enforced goals.
Simulations are always a balancing act between resources and imagination. However, the intricacies and over-complication of some of Park Beyond’s quests resulted in gaming sessions where I mostly sat at my desk and fast-forwarded through the gaming months, trudging through boring, unskippable work. Surprisingly, the profitability of my toilets wasn’t on my Build Your Dream Theme Park bingo card.
Not all building systems are created equal in Park Beyond, as different types of customization come with different rules. While the prefab buildings and custom coaster designs use a modular placement system and require specific amounts of space, various decorative items such as trees and rocks can be freely placed on top of your structures. This made manipulating space an accessible process and encouraged me to create organic and engaging environments. A nice addition was the ability to fully customize shops by building extensions around a base structure, which with significant effort can result in a truly bespoke creation. However, this method comes with some limitations as it can get a bit tricky and time consuming when dealing with roofing and signage work.
The success of your park depends on three main requirements: money, fun and amazement. Every ride, shop, restroom and employee donates different amounts, which means you spin plates to keep the lights on. Amazement is the most compelling currency, as it allows you to “impossify” your rides, shops, and employees, adding visual flair and increasing their efficiency. It’s a useful way to evolve and personalize your setup, but slowly filling up the meter eventually became a chore.
Despite its slow pace, Park Beyond succeeds with its adorable animations and dramatic ride designs that made my stomach turn. There is also a wonderfully sparkling atmosphere in the evenings, and this has allowed me to overcome my financial fears every now and then and quietly enjoy the crazy world I’ve built. However, it all collapses when the next morning the sun rises and you realize your margins aren’t enough to fund your latest silly venture.
Sandbox mode became a refreshing alternative that allowed me to focus on my own design dreams without constant interference. Here you can decide on a starting budget and location, and set specific goals to curate your own challenges. While one still has to achieve one’s dreams, I finally felt like I was my own boss. I could build and experiment with greater depth while accepting financial defeats – which feels like a better distillation of the game’s ambitions.
Despite its twisted take on nostalgic ride designs and plenty of whimsical fanfare, I felt let down by Park Beyond’s business-centric goals and lack of investment in players’ unbridled creativity. For a game that pushes the limits of your imagination, it’s a little too much about whether you’re tall enough to ride.
