In Roller Coaster Tycoon 2, you once again become the amusement park mogul you always wanted to be when you were 10 years old. Just as in the original Roller Coaster Tycoon, you build amusement park scenarios from the ground up by designing your own roller coasters, water rides, and landscaping. The major difference is in the addition of many new rides, shops, and types of scenery. You can now put a Coffee House in your park, as well as light up the night sky with a sign announcing that new, kick-ass coaster, which will draw the people from miles away. The basic premise of the game is the same, though, in that you have to meet financial, population or park rating goals within a certain time frame.

The game's main drawback is in its lack of changes to the base play engine. There is still have no medium-distance camera, forcing you to either look at extreme close-ups, or zoom out on the action to a distance that makes designing all but unmanageable. The music additions—over 15 to choose from for each ride—are a nice touch, but they play over top of one other, causing a real mish-mash sound effect. It's like blaring Led Zeppelin and Michael Jackson at the same time—not something you really want to have happen.

In the end, the game is pretty much exactly what it was in the first place: a good escape from the real world and back into your youth. It's not much of an improvement over the first RCT, though, which at the time was a breakthrough in design. I'll give Rollercoaster Tycoon 2 a score of 3 headshots out of 5.