Atari 3 manual Track-Building Interface, John WardleyTesting

Manage Excessive Speed

Don’t forget to use brakes when necessary to control speed.

Use Special Track Sections

Special track pieces like loops and corkscrews add excitement.

Add Camera Triggers to the Most Exciting Points in your Ride

Pictures of your peep group on the ride will be saved to the game directory.

Auto Complete

When your coaster is nearly complete, click on Auto Complete to finish it off.When you click the Auto Complete button, you’ll notice the game draws the track on the screen as it calculates the last few tracks. If you notice this taking too long, click on the Auto Complete button again to interrupt the Auto Complete process and return to editing your track manually. If the Auto Complete button finds a solution, it will draw the solution with highlighted track pieces. If you are satisfied with the solution, click on the Auto Complete button again to confirm. If you don’t want the offered solution, just click on the Delete Track Piece button next to the Auto Complete button.

Think Theme

When the last track piece has been laid, choose an entrance and exit that matches the nearby scenery theme.

Test

Activate the Test setting to generate a test results report. Most peeps will not ride an untested coaster.

Take it for a spin

Ride the ride to see what your peeps will experience.

Testing

After you finish coaster construction (or the contruction of any other powered ride), you should give it a test run. Most peeps will not ride your coaster until the test results have been completed. After your rides have completed a test run, peeps who prefer that ride’s excitement, nausea and intensity settings will be drawn to it.

The Track-Building Interface

The track-building interface colors the track pieces that you can add in yellow, unavailable track pieces are shown as white with a slightly visible outline. Specialty pieces appear in the right portion of the toolbox only when they may be added, and this may change depending on what piece you just placed.

Adding tracks works like this:

1.Click to select a new track piece

2.Click it again to add it

3.Click the same icon again to add another.

When you want to add a different track piece, click to select it, click again to add it, click the same icon again to add another, and so on.

John Wardley:Testing

How is a new ride tested once it’s constructed? What considerations are made before it can be opened to the public?

Once erected, the ride will be tested first component by component (running the motors and chain lifts, operating the brakes, checking the control systems etc.). Once the track gauge and clearance envelope has been checked, a train will be run round the track, normally containing a load to simulate the weight of the passengers (we used to use sandbags, but now we use special water-filled dummies). Once this has gone round the track, accelerometers and other measuring devices are attached to the train and structure, whilst the ride is run many hundreds of laps with a heavily overloaded payload. All sorts of situations are then simulated to prove the safety systems before the ride can be given its certificate and opened to the public.

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