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On episode 181 of MuggleCast, we introduced our "Wizarding World of RollerCoaster Tycoon" contest, where listeners could construct a Harry Potter-themed amusement park using the popular video game RollerCoaster Tycoon by Chris Sawyer. Listeners were permitted to use the additional two expansion packs and the contest ran approximately one month, ending on Thursday, October 29th. Below are the top five theme parks and a runner-up. Also, each theme park is available for download as a save-game file (but you will need the video game and/or expansion packs to play). Click the thumbnails next to each description to see a larger picture of each park. Thank you to everyone who entered!
"Harry Potter World"
by Brittany F. (Honorable mention)
Of particular note in this desert HP park are the three guests that the creator has chosen to name and follow. The funniest, by far, is "Poor Little Draco Malfoy" whose inner thoughts are presently about all of the rides he does not find thrilling enough to go on. He's heading out to leave the park, but if you stop him he'll find happiness on "Apparition." This desert scenario from the original RCT came with a mine-cart coaster which remains in this park as the Gringotts Coaster, and other rides such as "Flight of the Phoenix" and "Basilisk's Revenge" fit well within its borders.Required to Play: Rollercoaster Tycoon (Scenario: Dynamite Dunes)
Download Now (Size: 431kB)
"The World of Harry Potter"
by Becca L. (Fifth place)
This quaint park is very fun to see in action. Based on a scenario where your park is spread across a highway, this park's creator has managed to build some genuinely fascinating attractions. The largest ride is a Wooden Reverser Roller Coaster called "The First Task," with a train for each of the four dragons in nice colors and a solid layout. Even the log flume travels in reverse at times, an unexpected yet fitting characteristic for a magical adventure land! The tallest ride in the park is the "Astronomy Tower of Terror," a wonderful, giggle-inducing name. The park turns quite a profit, and has a surprising amount of guests for this being the fourth year of production. This park shows how solid construction and organizing pays off (well).
Required to play: Corkscrew Follies Expansion Pack (Scenario: Funtopia)
Download Now (Size: 557kB)
"The Wizarding World"
by Jon S. (Fourth place)
This creator has taken an old favorite - no, the original favorite - and made a wonderful Harry Potter park out of it. The first scenario from the original RCT game, a setting in the middle of the woods, has been transformed into a magical park with quite a high popularity rating and number of really neat rides.With a scrambler ride named "The Mad Cauldron," Bumper cars called "Bludger Bash," a Log Flume called "Into the Chamber of Secrets," and the serpentine steel rollercoaster called "Avada Kedavra," we are drawn to this park and it's no wonder guests are too. Also, this creator lets his handymen mow the grass. We thought it was worth mentioning.
This competition's "top three" parks used a scenario in which money was no object - and, as it was from the second and final expansion pack for the game, it also includes a great deal more rides than the original. That is why this park is fourth on our list of must-plays: it is from the first level of the original game, uses nothing but wit and surprising approaches to problem-solving, and the creator has felt the real tug of (sim) money in constructing what we feel is a highly inventive castle wall and lake. Our favorite thing about this park, though is probably the color scheme (unsurpassed) on its Ferris Wheel, called "Zonko's Wheel of Misfortune." The joke's on us.Required to play: Rollercoaster Tycoon (Scenario: Forest Frontiers)
Download Now (Size: 565kB)
"Gusman's World of J.K. Rowling"
by Anthony G. (Third place)
It's pretty funny to open this park and have the first message that greets you be "The Boy Who Lived has broken down." Some of us have been waiting seven books for that to happen. It took Anthony G. 23 years (game time) but he did it. He has built the most intense Harry Potter-themed rollercoasters we know of. The "Boy Who Lived" coaster itself is insane, and also insanely popular. Each of the park's 10-odd coasters boasts a very high excitement rating and low nausea rating (something that's not easy to achieve, but this creator makes it look easy.) Rival coasters Gryffindor and Slytherin emerge from a castle and duel to the finish - while the much taller, vertical rollercoaster "Grindelwald" shuttles to the skies nearby. 
Old wooden coaster "Bloody Baron" is no less fascinating than the park's tallest coaster, "Dumbledore." Where would Rollercoaster Tycoon, or our HP RCT challenge be without coasters? Not very far in any direction, which is why this park is a solid bronze. Also of note in this park is the "Kiosk of Requirement" (Information Kiosk), a bathroom called "Moaning Myrtle's U-Bend" and a 200-ft Woah Belly tower called "Voldemort's Downfall." This park is a must-play.Required to play: Loopy Landscapes Expansion Pack (Scenario: Arid Heights)
Download Now (Size: 927kB)
"Harry Potter World"
by Jennifer B. (Second place)
This park is attractive, busy, complex and endearing, making it very deservant of second place in this competition. There are solid achievements in ride construction and a good variety of places to go within it.The rollercoasters in this park are spectacularly conceived - with names that match everything from the type of coaster to its color scheme. A Crazy Rodent coaster named "Runaway Wormtail" is next to a ghastly Flying coaster called "Dementor" (which boasts an 8.46 Very High Excitement Rating apart from being scaaaa-ry). A coaster touting Horse-Shaped cars lies secluded in what must be the Forbidden Forest and is called "Thestrals." There are rival coasters present called "Team Ireland" and "Team Bulgaria" which play in a simulated Quidditch pattern. The park's largest coaster, "Priori Incantatem" is completely surrounded by a twisting, green coaster called "Nagini." We concur that the Enterprise ride likely feels most like a Portkey, for which it is named.
Perhaps our favorite rides in this park, however, have entrances and queue lines within the central castle, our massive beloved Hogwarts complete with lake! There is a single-track rollercoaster with lying-down swinging cars called the "Owlery," which is the ride we most want to see exist in reality someday. The ride "Flying Ford Anglias" is fast, cyan and whippy. And, by far the most orange of the rides in a park, "FiendFyre" lies above water in a secret cavern in the corner. This "Harry Potter World" park took 55 simulated years to construct, and not-a-one of those seconds seems wasted. Little tid-bits like a sphynx in the middle of the hedge maze are what we're talking about. Oh, and we like the mountains.Required to play: Loopy Landscapes Expansion Pack (Scenario: Arid Heights)
Download Now (Size: 922kB)
"Harry's Wondrous World"
by Chris B. (First place)
This park is the most well-rounded, detailed, and clever park received in this competition and, therefore, receives our highest praise. We recommend you play it for yourself and pay close attention to every detail, which it is evident that the creator of this park has certainly done already.This park's strongest attribute is a feature of the game that is not easy to master: scenery/theming. Immediately upon entering the park, guests have the choice to explore the Muggle World, which includes tours of Little Whinging where they can find Privet Drive, Magnolia Crescent and Wysteria Walk (And a tall skyscraper labeled Grunnings!) and then leads to a brilliant "zoo" featuring a Reptile House and eventually gets one to London to hop aboard the Hogwarts Express (or pay a visit to Grimmauld Place). Instead, guests can also turn right at the park entrance and head into the Wizarding World, where they come face to face with two of the most fantastically realized places, the Burrow and the Lovegood House (signs in front of which say "Keep off the Derigible Plums!" and "The Quibbler: Editor X. Lovegood"). These places make up 1/4 of the park if that. The attention to detail of this park is, simply put, astounding and unsurpassed.
It feels as though this park fully captures the magic of J.K. Rowling's world. Behind the Burrow is the graveyard of Little Whinging, where the only thing scarier than the dead trees and headstones is the coaster hovering above. Diagon Alley's most prominent structure is Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, surrounded by tons of crazy gizmos, a well-named Inverter Pirate Ship, and a pizza stand on the top floor. Hogwarts itself sells tee-shirts of each house color and offers a trip to the dungeons (with boiling acid floors) and to the life-size chess set from Year One - where you will meet a life-size knight answering to the name of Sir Cadogan, boldly wandering the chamber.
Hogsmeade at the peak of its beauty (in winter time) is captured here and Hogsmeade Station connects the park guests back to London. The rollercoaster by the entrance called "Jelly-Legs Curse" feels like it achieves that affect rather easily. Some other strokes of genius: "Professor Carrow" is the name of two actual babboons (Entertainers) wandering the Hogwarts area, and the Muggle World receives just as much attention and care in this park as does the Wizarding World, with rides like Mini-Golf and the Carousel remaining on the Muggle side.Required to play: Loopy Landscapes Expansion Pack (Scenario: Arid Heights)
Download Now (Size: 660kB)
Also, you may download a zip file or an rar file of all six parks featured here. Click here for the ZIP and here for the RAR. (1.5mb)
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