Planet Coaster 2: Quick Tips & Tricks Guide for the Ultimate Park

Part 1: Your First Day on the Job 🔰 (Beginner Basics & Getting Started in Planet Coaster 2)

Your first hours in Planet Coaster 2 are super important! 🕒 This section will get you up and running with a stable, happy park. It’s all about building a strong foundation so you can start creating without any worries. 😊

Choosing Your Path: A Planet Coaster 2 Game Mode Guide 🗺️

Before you place your first hot dog stand 🌭, you need to choose how you want to play. Planet Coaster 2 has several awesome modes for every type of manager.

Start with Career Mode. It’s the Real Tutorial. 👩‍🏫 The most important tip for any new player is this: start in Career Mode. These scenarios are the best hands-on training ground. You’ll get parks with specific goals, teaching you everything from new utility systems 💧⚡ to coaster building 🎢 in a fun, controlled way. Think of it as your theme park flight simulator! ✈️
Embrace Unlimited Creativity in Sandbox Mode. 🎨 This is where the magic happens for many players. In Sandbox Mode, you have unlimited money 💰 and everything is unlocked from the start. It’s your pure creative canvas to build the park of your dreams without any limits. Go wild! 🤪
Test Your Management Skills in Challenge Mode. 💪 If you love a good tycoon experience, Challenge Mode is for you. You’ll start with limited funds on a blank map and must build a profitable park from scratch. You’ll have to research new rides, manage your budget carefully, and complete challenges for extra cash. 💵
Understand Franchise Mode for Global Competition. 🌍 Franchise Mode lets you build a whole chain of interconnected parks. You can share research and resources across your theme park empire! 👑 This mode also has online leaderboards, so you can compete with players worldwide.
Try Asynchronous Co-op. 🤝 In Planet Coaster 2, you can team up with friends to build a park together! One person builds for a while, saves the park, and sends it to a friend to continue the work. It’s a great way to collaborate on massive projects. 🏗️

Laying the Foundation: Park Layout & Guest Flow 🚶‍♀️🚶‍♂️

A well-designed park is a joy to explore. A bad one is a confusing maze. 😵 Plan your layout from the start!

Plan with Paths First. 🛤️ Before you build that giant coaster, sketch out your park’s main walkways with paths. This helps you visualize the flow and avoid building yourself into a corner.
Choose a Classic Layout: Hub-and-Spoke. 🌟 A super effective layout is the “hub-and-spoke” model. Create a central plaza (the hub) near the entrance, with main paths (the spokes) leading to different themed lands. It’s super easy for guests to navigate!
Consider a Looping Layout. 🔄 Another great option is a large loop that takes guests on a grand tour of the whole park. This makes sure they see everything you have to offer!
Make Main Paths Wide. ↔️ Your main paths will be busy! Build them wide (8-10 meters) from the start to prevent crowds. Unhappy guests stuck in a crowd are no fun. 😠
Use Heatmaps to Spot Bottlenecks. 🔥 The management menu has powerful heatmaps. Check the guest density map regularly. Bright red areas mean big-time congestion! 🚨 That’s your cue to widen the path.
Create Small, Efficient Hubs. 🍔🥤🚻 Group your shops and facilities together. Placing food, drink, and restrooms near popular rides creates an efficient zone where guests can satisfy all their needs in one stop.
Think About Sightlines. 👀 As you lay out paths, think about what guests see. Create “weenies”—huge, iconic landmarks like a castle 🏰 or a massive coaster—that draw guests deeper into your park.
Use Placeholders to Plan Ahead. 📝 You don’t need to build everything at once. Use the terrain painting tool to mark out future zones, coasters, or backstage areas.
Hide Your Backstage Areas. 🤫 Real parks hide their utility buildings. Plan a “backstage” area behind your main street and connect it with staff-only paths.
Elevate Paths for Space and Views. 🌉 Running out of ground space? Build elevated walkways! This saves space and gives guests fantastic views.

Guestology 101: Mastering Guest Needs in Planet Coaster 2 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦

Happy guests 😄 spend more money 💵, stay longer, and give your park a better rating. Keeping them happy is your main job!

Guest Need	Negative Thought	Primary Solution	Pro Tip
Entertainment 🤩	“I’m bored.”	Build more rides; hire entertainers.	High scenery ratings boost Entertainment big time! ✨
Energy 😴	“I’m tired.”	Place plenty of benches.	Benches in shaded, scenic spots are the best! 🌳
Hunger 🍔	“I’m hungry.”	Build food stalls.	Offer a variety of food to make everyone happy! 🍕🌮
Thirst 🥤	“I’m thirsty.”	Build drink stalls.	Vending machines near ride exits are a quick win! machine:
Toilet 🚻	“I need the toilet.”	Build toilet blocks.	Place them near food courts & keep them clean! 🧼
Nausea 🤢	“I feel sick.”	Build First Aid facilities.	Place benches near intense ride exits for recovery. 🚑
Panic 😱	“I’m scared.”	Build less intense rides.	For pools, make sure you have Lifeguards on duty! 🏊
Luxury 🛍️	“I want a souvenir.”	Build gift shops.	Happy guests love to shop! Place shops near popular ride exits. 🎁

Prepare for the Weather. ☀️🌧️ Guests are affected by the elements! They can get sunburnt or soaked in the rain, which makes them grumpy.
Sell Sunscreen and Umbrellas. 🧴☂️ This is a great way to make money and keep guests happy. Stock them in your Information Kiosks.
Build Covered Queues and Plazas. 🛖 Don’t let your guests suffer in the sun or rain! Use roofing pieces to cover queue paths and plazas. This makes a huge difference.
Keep an Eye on Individual Thoughts. 🤔 Click on any guest to see what they’re thinking. If lots of guests are complaining about a long queue, you know exactly what to fix!
Don’t Make Queues Too Long. Guests waiting in line aren’t spending money at your shops. Keep your queues a reasonable size.
Place Toilets Near Food Courts. A simple but crucial tip! After eating and drinking, guests will need the restroom. 🍔➡️🚻
Acknowledge Dietary Preferences. 🥗 Some guests want vegan options! Stocking a variety of products will keep everyone happy.
Hire Entertainers to Boost Moods. 🥳 Entertainers and mascots provide a big happiness boost to nearby guests. Place them in busy plazas.
Use First Aid Stations. 🚑 For parks with lots of high-nausea rides, a First Aid station is essential to prevent guests from getting sick on your paths. 🤢

Hiring Your First Crew: Essential Staff Management 👷‍♀️

Hire the Essential Trio. At a minimum, every new park needs a Janitor 🧹, a Mechanic 🔧, and Ride Attendants 🎟️.
Build a Staff Room Immediately. 🛋️ Your staff need a place to rest, or they’ll get tired, unhappy, and quit!
Train Staff to Improve Efficiency. 📈 As staff gain experience, you can pay to train them. This makes them happier and way more efficient.
Pay Your Staff Fairly. 💵 Keeping pay at Fair or High is crucial for a happy, efficient workforce.
Don’t Forget to Hire Vendors. 👨‍🍳 When you place a shop, remember to open its menu and hire a vendor to run it!

Part 2: From Builder to Architect 🏗️ (Creative Fundamentals in Planet Coaster 2)

With your park stable and guests happy, it’s time to unlock the real magic: the creative tools! ✨

Your First Thrill Ride: Coaster Building for Beginners 🎢

Start with a Family Coaster. 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Don’t try to build a giga-coaster on your first try! Start with something smaller to learn the controls and physics.
Understand the Holy Trinity: EFN. 🤩😱🤢 Every coaster is judged by Excitement, Fear, and Nausea. Your goal is to maximize Excitement while keeping Fear and Nausea in check.
Mind Your G-Forces. 🌀 Use the G-force heatmaps to analyze your track. High lateral (side-to-side) Gs are a big cause of Nausea.
Bank Your Turns. ↪️ Never build a flat turn at high speed! Bank the track to make the ride smoother and more exciting.
Use the Smoothing Tool Liberally. ✨ The single best tool for improving your coasters is the “Smooth” function. Use it over and over on your track to make it buttery-smooth.
Don’t Over-Smooth Hills. Be careful not to flatten out your airtime hills, or you’ll lose that thrilling tummy-tickle feeling!
Test, Tweak, and Test Again. 🧪 Run a test every time you add a new major element. It helps you spot problems early (and it’s fun to watch a test car fly off an unfinished track 😂).
Use the “Autocomplete” Feature. ✅ When you’re close to the end, the “Autocomplete” tool can automatically connect your track back to the station. Lifesaver!
Don’t Forget Brakes. 🛑 Build a final brake run to slow the train down before it re-enters the station safely.
Add a Chain Lift to Your First Hill. ⛓️ This will pull the train to the top of the first hill before gravity takes over.

Theming Your World: Scenery, Blueprints, and Atmosphere 🎭

Scenery Is Money. 💰 Adding scenery around a ride increases its Prestige score, which means you can charge more for tickets!
Aim for 100% Queue Scenery. ⭐ Your goal for every major ride should be a 100% queue scenery rating to maximize your profits.
Use Blueprints to Get Started Quickly. 📜 The game comes with tons of pre-made blueprints. They’re perfect for making your park look great fast!
Explore the Frontier Workshop. 🌐 This is an in-game browser where you can download incredible creations from other players. It’s an endless source of inspiration!
Learn by Deconstructing. 🧐 Download a cool building or coaster, place it in your park, and take it apart piece by piece. It’s the fastest way to learn advanced techniques.
Create a “Palette” of Scenery. 🎨 Place one of each piece you plan to use often off to the side. Then you can just duplicate it instead of searching through menus.
Use the Scenery Brush for Nature. 🖌️🌳 To quickly fill areas with trees, rocks, and bushes, use the Scenery Brush tool.
Don’t Neglect Audio. 🔊 Place hidden speakers to add music and ambient sounds (like jungle noises 🦜) to your themed areas.
Group Objects into Buildings. 🏗️ This allows you to move, rotate, and duplicate an entire structure as a single object. Super efficient!
Save Your Own Blueprints. 💾 When you create something you’re proud of, save it as a blueprint to use again later!

Making a Splash: Your First Planet Coaster 2 Water Park 💦

Build the Water Park Trinity. 🏊 A pool area needs three essential things: a Changing Room 👕, a place to sell a Pool Pass 🎟️, and at least one Lifeguard Chair ⛑️.
Install Water Pumps and Filters. 💧 Every pool and lazy river needs a Water Pump and a Water Filtration System to stay clean.
More Guests Means More Filtration. A busy water park will need multiple filtration systems to keep the water sparkling blue. ✨
Use the Pool Stamp Tool for Easy Shapes. 🔵 This tool lets you quickly place perfect geometric shapes to create your pools.
Use the Draw Tool for Freeform Pools. ✍️ For more natural-looking pools, “paint” the shape directly onto the terrain.
Be Patient with the Rounding Tool. This tool is key to creating smooth, curved edges on your custom pools.
Add a Wave Machine. 🌊 Turn a standard pool into an exciting attraction by adding a Wave Machine!
Don’t Forget Poolside Essentials. 🔥 Place Body Dryers near exits and build a Splash Emporium to sell fun inflatables. 🦄
Build a Simple Lazy River. 🏞️ This is a great first water ride to build. Just lay out a gentle, looping water channel.
Ensure Full Lifeguard Coverage. 💯 Make sure your entire pool area is covered by the watchful eyes of your lifeguards to keep guests safe.

Part 3: Becoming a Tycoon 🎩 (Advanced Management & Park Optimization)

You’ve mastered the basics. Now, let’s turn your park into a money-making machine! 🤑

Mastering Your Park’s Finances in Planet Coaster 2 💰

Use the Prestige Pricing Formula. A good starting ticket price for a ride is its Prestige score divided by 35. So a ride with 700 Prestige can easily charge $20!
Enable Dynamic Pricing on Popular Rides. 📈 This will automatically adjust the ticket price based on how long the queue is, maximizing your profit.
Sell Priority Passes for Your E-Tickets. 🎟️✨ Build a shorter Priority Queue for your biggest rides and sell Priority Passes at Information Kiosks. It’s a fantastic new revenue stream!
Take Out Loans to Grow Faster. 🏦 Don’t be afraid to take out a loan early on. The cash injection can help you build a new coaster that will quickly pay back the loan.
Charge for Everything (Reasonably). 🚽 You can add a small fee ($0.10) for toilets or body dryers. It adds up across thousands of guests!
The Career Mode “Sell-Back” Trick. ♻️ In Career Mode, after you complete an objective, you can delete the ride you built for it and get a 100% refund. This gives you a huge cash injection for the next goal.
Run Advertising Campaigns. 📺 Use marketing to attract more guests to your park or drive traffic to a new ride.
Place ATMs in High-Traffic Areas. 🏧 When guests run out of cash, they leave. Place ATMs near food courts and souvenir shops so they can keep spending!
Raise Park Entry Fees Strategically. 🚪 Once your park is awesome, you can charge a higher entry fee. A high entry fee with cheap or free rides is a great strategy.
Add On-Ride Photos to Coasters. 📸 This is another excellent source of passive income. Guests love buying pictures of themselves screaming! 😂

The Well-Oiled Machine: Advanced Staff & Ride Operations ⚙️

Master Staff Zones. 🗺️ This is the most critical tool for efficiency! Create zones and assign staff to them. This stops your janitor from walking across the entire park to clean one spill.
Place a Staff Room in Every Zone. ✅ This ensures that when an employee goes on break, they can get back to work quickly.
Hire “Floater” Staff for Break Coverage. 🧑‍🤝‍🧑 A pro tip is to hire a few extra staff who only work when other employees are on break. This keeps your shops open 100% of the time!
Use Work Rosters for Vendors. 📋 This gives you the most control and guarantees your most profitable shops are always running at peak efficiency.
Understand Block Sections for Coasters. 🚦 To run multiple trains on a coaster, you must use Block Sections. These are pieces of track (like a brake run) that can stop a train until the next section is clear.
Use the Block Section Rule of Thumb. The formula is simple: Maximum Trains = (Number of Block Sections) – 1.
Increase Throughput with More Trains. 🚆 Running multiple trains dramatically increases how many guests can ride per hour. This means shorter queues, happier guests, and more money!
Adjust Ride Sequences on Flat Rides. 🔄 You can customize the ride cycle on many flat rides. A shorter, more thrilling sequence can often increase a ride’s throughput.
Set Mechanic Inspection Schedules. 🧐 Proactive maintenance is always better than reactive repairs. Set a regular inspection schedule for every ride to prevent breakdowns.
Train Your Mechanics. 🔧 A highly trained mechanic will inspect and repair rides much faster. Investing in their training is a great long-term investment.

Power, Water, and Security in Planet Coaster 2 ⚡💧👮‍♀️

Power Your Park. ⚡ All rides and shops need electricity. You have to build power generators to produce it.
Use Power Distributors. 🗼 Generators don’t power things directly. You must place Power Distributors, which create a radius of electrical coverage.
Connect Your Water Systems. 💧 Pools and water rides need to be connected to Water Pumps and Filtration Systems.
Combat Crime with Security. 🚓 If guest happiness drops too low, some guests might become pickpockets or vandals.
Deploy Security Guards and Cameras. 📹 Hire Security Guards to patrol and place Security Cameras in busy areas to catch the culprits!

Part 4: The Master Creator’s Toolkit 🎨 (Expert Design & Theming)

You’ve built a successful park. Now, it’s time to build a masterpiece. ✨

Engineering Marvels: Expert Planet Coaster 2 Coaster Design 🎢

Build with the 4-Meter Method. 📏 For the smoothest possible coasters, set your track piece length to the shortest setting (4 meters). It takes longer but gives you incredible control.
Master Heartlining with Banking Offset. ❤️ Real coasters rotate around the rider’s heart. You can simulate this with the “Banking Offset” tool to create incredibly smooth and realistic inversions.
Practice Building a Custom Zero-G Roll. 🌀 This is an excellent first custom inversion to master. It involves a specific banking pattern and lots of smoothing.
Pacing Is King. 👑 A great coaster tells a story. Alternate between high-speed turns, floating airtime hills, and intense inversions to create rhythm and flow.
Use Tunnels and Terrain for a Sense of Speed. 🚇 A coaster feels much faster when it flies through a narrow trench or a dark tunnel!
Study Real Coaster Manufacturers. 🧐 To achieve true realism, watch POV videos of real coasters online and try to replicate their signature styles.

Coaster Style	Max Positive Vertical Gs	Max Negative Vertical Gs (Airtime)	Max Lateral Gs
B&M Hypercoaster	4.0g	-1.2g	±0.5g
Intamin Giga Coaster	4.5g	-1.5g	±1.0g
RMC Hybrid	4.2g	-1.8g	±1.2g
Mack Multi-Launch	4.5g	-1.0g	±1.5g

Build Realistic Support Structures. 🏗️ For a master-level build, create custom supports using beams and columns from the scenery menu.
Add Transfer Tracks and Maintenance Bays. 🔧 For the ultimate touch of realism, add a maintenance bay next to your station where trains can be stored.
Synchronize Multiple Coasters. 👯 Use “Sync Groups” to launch two coasters at the exact same time for incredible near-miss moments!

Bringing Worlds to Life: Hyper-Realism and Detailing ✨

Embrace the Backstage. 🤫 Use fences and dense foliage to create realistic backstage areas. Add details like dumpsters and crates to sell the illusion.
Layer Your Buildings. 🧱 Add depth to your buildings with foundations, columns, window sills, and decorative trim.
Add the “Boring” Details. 🔩 Realism is found in the mundane. Add air conditioning units, gutters, and electrical boxes to your buildings.
Use Real-World References for Everything. 🖼️ If you’re building a pirate tavern, search for pictures of real historic taverns. It’s the best way to improve!
Tell a Story with Your Scenery. 📖 Don’t just place objects; arrange them to tell a story. A crashed spaceship should have a debris field and scientists investigating! 🧑‍🔬
Vary Your Foliage. 🌳🌲🌿 Mix different types and sizes of trees, bushes, and flowers to create a more organic and believable landscape.
Think in First-Person. 👀 Regularly “walk” through your park at guest-level to see it from their perspective.
Use Custom Colors. 🎨 Almost every piece in the game can be recolored. Create custom color palettes for your themed areas.
Master Non-Grid Pieces. 🧩 Learning to combine freeform scenery pieces is the key to creating custom shapes and unique architecture.
Light Your Park for Nighttime. 🌃 A park can be magical at night! Add dramatic, colored lighting to highlight your buildings and create an incredible mood.

The Animatronics Workshop: Custom Shows & Special Effects 🤖

Use Moving Platforms as Your Base. ⚙️ These are the key to custom animatronics. They can rotate, move up and down, or slide.
Attach Any Scenery to Moving Platforms. 🗿 You can make a statue wave its arm or a sea monster emerge from the water!
Stack Platforms for Complex Animations. 🥞 You can attach a moving platform to another moving platform to create incredibly complex movements.
Use the Trigger Sequencer for Coasters. 💥 Place triggers along a coaster track to activate animatronics, fire jets 🔥, or water sprays 💦 as the train passes by.
Use the Display Sequencer for Park Shows. 🎆 For shows not tied to a ride, like a fountain show, use the Display Sequencer to create a timeline of effects.
Customize Billboards with Videos. 🎬 On PC, you can upload your own video files to play on the in-game billboards!
Create Custom Ride Skins. 🎨 You can attach scenery directly to the moving parts of many rides to create completely custom themes.
Use the Twinning and Symmetry Tools. 👯 These tools are huge time-savers when decorating coaster cars.
Hide Your Mechanisms. 🤫 The art is in hiding the moving platforms so guests only see the final, magical effect.
Combine Animatronics with Particle Effects. ✨ Combine movement with fire, smoke, water, and bubble effects for a truly dynamic show!

Part 5: Pro-Level Secrets & Technical Tricks for Planet Coaster 2 🤫

This final section has the high-value tips and clever workarounds discovered by the community. 🤓

Optimizing Your Planet Coaster 2 Experience 🚀

The Blurriness Fix: Check Your Resolution. 👓 If your game looks blurry, check your graphics settings and make sure the resolution is set correctly.
Disable Depth of Field. Many players prefer to turn this off for a crisper, clearer image.
Update Your Graphics Drivers. 💻 Make sure you have the latest drivers for your graphics card!
Use DLSS or FSR. These technologies can give you a massive FPS boost! 🚀
Lower Shadows and Screen Space Reflections (SSR). These are two of the most demanding settings. Lowering them can significantly improve performance.
Limit Your Guest Count. 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 The biggest strain on your CPU is the thousands of guests. If your frame rate is suffering, consider setting a guest limit.
Beware the Console Complexity Meter. 📊 On consoles, there’s a limit to how many objects you can place. Be mindful of this as you build!
Optimize for the Complexity Meter. Use larger single pieces instead of many small ones to save space on the meter.
Enable V-Sync for Stability. ✅ This will lock your frame rate (usually to 60 FPS) for a smoother, more stable experience.
Install on an SSD. 💾 This will dramatically reduce your loading times.

Hidden Mechanics & Clever Workarounds 🧠

The Exponential Duplication Trick. ✨ To quickly make a long line of objects, place one, duplicate it, then select both and duplicate them, then select all four, and so on. You can create a line of hundreds of objects in seconds!
Use Invisible Paths for Open Plazas. 🚶 This lets you create large, open areas where guests can walk freely without ugly path edges.
Reset Guest Happiness for Easy Objectives. 😄 Stuck on a happiness objective? Close your park, wait for the unhappy guests to leave, then reopen it. The new guests will arrive happy!
Sculpt Terrain Underneath Paths. ⛰️ You can now use terrain tools directly under paths to create much more natural-looking landscapes.
Spam Speakers for Easy Scenery Rating. 🔊💯 Need a quick way to get a queue to 100% scenery? Hide a bunch of ambient speakers inside other scenery. They stack!
Edit Queues with the Path Tool. ✍️ For finer control over a queue’s shape, switch to the regular path tool and use its “Edit Path” option on your queue.
Create Custom Billboards with Scenery. 🖼️ Build a custom frame around a standalone video screen using non-grid scenery pieces.
Use Basic Shapes for Everything. 🧊 The simple shapes in the scenery menu are the most powerful tool for advanced creators. You can build anything with them!
Sink Large Objects into the Ground. ⬇️ Don’t be afraid to sink big scenery pieces into the terrain to use just a part of them.
Turn Off Snapping for Fine Control. 📐 Turning off snapping options gives you complete freeform control over an object’s placement.
Use Lights to “Paint” Your Park. 🌈 At night, use hidden, colored lights to “paint” your buildings and landscapes for a stunning atmosphere.

Conclusion: The Park Gates Are Always Open 🎉

You’ve done it! From an empty field, you’ve built something incredible. You’ve mastered management, coaster design, and created a world from your imagination. 🥳

But the story doesn’t end here. The beauty of Planet Coaster 2 is that there’s always something new to design, a new technique to master. So keep experimenting, keep learning, and keep sharing your amazing creations with the world. 🌍

The only limit is your imagination. Now go build something amazing! 💖

Disclaimer: This is an unofficial fan work, all trademarks and copyrights for Planet Coaster 2 belong to the developer Frontier Developments.

Find the game here! Planet Coaster 2 – Create a Splash!