Thrillville: Off the Rails Critic Reviews

Old fashioned to look at, but packed with invention and things to do.

Sure it's a family-oriented game, but it was so fun that its kid-friendly nature did not hinder it in the slightest from being fun for gamers of all ages. And any comparison between this game and the classic Roller Coaster Tycoon are unfair because the games have completely different focuses.

Charming and loads of fun, Thrillville: Off the Rails is a truly enjoyable gem that is a slight improvement over the original.

One of the few ideal family games on the 360, Thrillville: Off the Rails is an impressive feat. The variety of fun mini-games mixed with an excellent roller coaster creation tool, and a surprisingly fun and light theme-park sim all add up to a good casual gamer romp.

A smart and vividly simple holiday, for younger players only.

The 360 version is definitely our favorite and feels the most refined. It not only runs just about as well as the PC version, but it has the party game element that the PC lacks.

The game itself is bright and happy and optimistic, it’s well made, and it includes enough content to be well worth its suggested retail price.

Combining the cutesiness of a Pixar flick with the depth of a theme-park tycoon game, LucasArts' Thrillville series smoothly transitions onto the Xbox 360 with Off the Rails, a souped-up and entertaining follow-up to last year's Xbox release.

The game's youngster charm ultimately ends up as its greatest strength and weakness. Off the Rails does a great job in appealing to a younger crowd, which is encouraging for those looking for a good holiday gift; however, its cheesy style is lost on anyone over the age of 12.

Thrillville: Off the Rails is aimed squarely at mid-teens and under, which is no bad thing. The management side can be toyed around with, but it otherwise practically runs itself while you’re off planting rides, indulging in mini-games and trying to turn teenaged guests into your love slaves.

Thrillville: Off the Rails makes every part of building and running a theme park great fun.

For what its worth, Thrillville does a fine job of offering more amusement park managing fun while also adhering to the kid in everyone. It’s still a little too kiddy for its own good, but if you are a fan of the series you will no doubt have a great time.

If you can put up with some repetition and the simplicity of the management system, you'll enjoy yourself. Most of the mini-games are quite a bit of fun, too, and they make for some good multiplayer sessions.

Thrillville remains an easy franchise for casual gamers and youngsters alike to pick up and jump right into.

Like last year’s Thrillville, Off the Rails, requires some research on the part of the player to discover which things are fun (designing faulty rides) and which are a waste of time (talking to guests). Unfortunately, even the content that survives the cull isn’t enough to make the whole experience more than a diversion.

The concept is better than the execution, but that doesn’t stop this being a good game that provides more than enough choice to justify its price tag.

As a collection of excellent multiplayer mini-games, Thrillville is stunningly good fun. As a cohesive single-player park-management campaign? It's just not quite there. Yet.

If you’ve played the original, Thrillville: Off the Rails is very similar and only features a few basic improvements. That said, it’s the superior version.

You shouldn't buy Thrillville Off the Rails for the mini-games - there are much better social video games out there. But as a theme park creator it's not bad, and has literally hundreds of options to tweak and manage.

Although there is a lot to do in Thrillville, it is really designed for the pre-teen crowd. It's pretty easy to successfully manage a park, the missions aren't challenging, the carnival games and arcade games are simplistic, and the options for building rides and coasters are limited. Roller Coaster Tycoon this is not.