If you like theme park games, it's a good time to be an Xbox owner! Today sees the release of a major free update for Park Beyond on Xbox consoles, and we're also getting a new Rollercoaster Tycoon release in two weeks' time.
Let's start with Park Beyond Update 2.0. This promises to bring "major improvements" to the game across a variety of areas including "performance optimisation, camera behaviour, rollercoaster creation, element placement and more".
We had a chance to go hands-on with Park Beyond back at launch in June, and found it to be a great Theme Park World style experience that was only held back by its various bugs and glitches. Here's hoping Update 2.0 will finally help the game realise its true potential - it's rolling out today (October 18th) for Xbox.
If you want to try it for yourself, there's actually a free trial of Park Beyond on the Xbox Store as well!
"Even though the release of patch 2.0, Community Content and the Beyond eXtreme DLC took longer than we had planned, we hope that you will enjoy it! Thanks to all the feedback brought forward by many of you. We took your feedback to heart and took on the goal to bring improvements into Park Beyond that you have been asking for. For all those new to Park Beyond: Welcome! And to all others returning: Welcome back!"
If Rollercoaster Tycoon is more your thing, then you'll want to keep an eye out for the Xbox release of Rollercoaster Tycoon Adventures Deluxe on November 1st. The original version of RCT Adventures actually launched on Nintendo Switch back in 2018, but this new version has been spruced up and brought to more platforms.
Compared to the OG Switch release, there are various new features including 80 new rides and attractions along with a modernised interface. Our sister site Nintendo Life gave the 2018 version a "Not Bad" 6/10 in their review a few years ago, so we're hoping this Deluxe edition will be an even greater effort from the teams at Graphite Lab and Atari.
"RCT Adventures Deluxe is an all-ages treat for players who love theme park simulations and fans who like to build coasters. The intuitive coaster builder lets you create wild, death-defying coasters that twist and turn, swoop and swirl.
Three in-depth game modes mean countless hours of gameplay, including Adventure Mode, Scenarios Mode, and the open Sandbox Mode."
Of course, these aren't the only options if you're into theme park games on Xbox, with Planet Coaster being the obvious alternative - although we'd suggest waiting for a sale on that one as it often drops to a very low price these days!