Overview
In Planet Coaster it can be difficult to turn a profit from your custom-made park. Apparently the theme park start-up business is a pretty unforgiving and competitive one, but luckily I’m here to help you with my tips and tricks showing you the easiest ways to earn more money profit faster in Planet Coaster.
Introduction
If your rides are too crazy guests will puke all over the place and complain. If your rides are too dull, guests feel bored and cheated. It’s a careful balance to strike and something all successful players need to track of, along with setting prices, developing the park’s scenery and hiring the right staff. Of course, none of this is possible without cash. So how to maximize money making in the game?
1. Juggle The Entrance Fee
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Being able to control the entrance fee to your park is key to early game success. When you’re just starting out a game, you shouldn’t actually have any fee for entering, since your park’s reputation is low, and no one wants to pay for something they haven’t heard about.
Keep it at a minimum early on, or you’ll be very lonely when treading the walkways of your theme park. Visitors are essential to the development of your park, and a guest paying for an amusement ride and a milk shake is better than a guest turning around at the entrance because the fee is too high.
Later on, when your park is filling up, raise the entrance fee and retain a healthy balance between it and the number of visitors in your park.
- In short: Make your entrance fee free when starting out. When you get more visitors, slowly raise the fee for entering.
2. Manage Your Ride Fees Well
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Like the price of the entrance, the price of individual rides makes or breaks your park. Unlike the entrance fee, you should charge big dollar for your rides from the get go, since this is actually your primary source of income in the early stages of the game. $10 to $15 should be a reasonable price for your very first ride.
When guests start complaining that the ride is too expensive, lower the price. If they’re expressing it was well worth the money, raise it. Be aware of your visitors; if they’re silent, they’re content. Which leads us to the next point on the list.
- In short: Set the price for your first ride high. It’s your main source of income in the early stage of the game. When you build more rides & stores, balance out the pricing.
3. Be A Heartless Business Man
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If you want to succeed in Planet Coaster, especially on the tougher difficulties, you can’t get soft. The business of running a theme park might seem a bit childish, but in no way does that translate to you running the place in an easy-going way. That will be your downfall.
Very early on in the game, you’ll need a janitor to clean up your park, and a mechanic to repair any broken rides. These guys sadly want some kind of pay. Luckily, you can abuse their gullibility and just pay them $1 dollar a month until they eventually quit. Which they do rather fast, but guess what? There’s plenty of other, naive mechanics and janitors out there.
Another cheap business trick is to never be satisfied with happy costumers. Are your guests expressing how much of deal a particular ride, food stand or your entire park is? It’s time to raise the prices and squeeze the guests for both dollars and happiness.
- In short: Don’t think too much about the feelings of your guests or employees. There will always be others, and being soft will cost you.
4. Work The Scenery
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Another way to generally charge a bit more for whatever’s in your park is to spend some time tidying the place up. Some flower here, a bench there and a nice broad walkway in the park’s most crowded place.
Your guests expect two basic things from your park: space and cleanliness. In any circumstance you should provide that through proper infrastructure and expansion when necessary as well recruiting an unreasonable amount of trashcans and slave-salaried janitors.
More scenery allows you to charge a higher rate for your rides and food. Guests in line for a burger or a carousel are simply willing to pay more for whatever they’re waiting for if they’re standing in a scenic place. So it’s essential, especially when it comes to your park’s more popular attractions, to consider where you place that oak tree, hedge or ornamented fence.
- In short: Build your park as neat as possible to earn more scenery points. It helps guests accept higher prices.
5. Target The Right Market
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Planet Coaster is about how you advertise and sell your park to the world, and it’s important to coordinate this effort with the vibe of your park. Think about what kind of clientele you want to attract, depending on what you research and which rides you’re going for.
You don’t want to build the most sickening and possibly lethal roller coaster ever, only sell burgers and milk shakes and at the same time target families with small kids in you marketing efforts. Instead, advertise your park to the inconsiderate who’ll take any ride to impress their friends.
As the game progresses and your park grows, you can begin targeting different kinds of guests, as you’ll inevitably broaden your appeal while building more rides and food stores. But start small, find your core guest and make sure they know that your park is literally made for them.
- In short: Be sure to let your marketing reflect what’s in your park. Crazy rides and junk food for teenagers, slower rides and souvenir shops for families.
Time To Relax
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If you follow these steps, you should succeed in creating a profitable business sooner or later. At some point, you might even be able to pay your janitors and mechanics a decent salary, so you don’t have to find new ones all the time.
Then you’re free watch the money roll in and enjoy the park for yourself, which is, after all, the best part of owning an amusement park. Free rides for you and your friends!