Atari Auction Ends with No Buyer for RCT Series

More bad news for RCT fans: The Atari auction held last week in New York City ended with no buyers for the popular RollerCoaster Tycoon video game series. Several other Atari franchises were sold including Star Control and Total Annihilation.  While the RollerCoaster Tycoon series is probably Atari’s most valuable franchise, the minimum bid price of $3.5 million dollars was apparently too high. There is a possibility that Atari will try to auction off RCT again but at a much lower price. Fans hoping for another developer to pick up the IP to create a RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 game will have to continue to wait and see, though this latest news makes it even less likely to happen now. The RCT mobile game that was in development will also probably never see the light of day. Luckily, there are some great RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 alternatives in development that could fill the void.

But there could be a small glimmer of hope. Some Roller Coaster Tycoon fans have dreamed that one day Chris Sawyer would reappear and take back control of the franchise he created and return it to its former glory. That wish might have became a little more plausible after Chris Sawyer recently reappeared and announced Transport Tycoon is coming to mobile devices. Transport Tycoon uses the isometric grid employed in RCT 1 & 2 and looks amazingly similar. Chris Sawyer has stated it will not be a free to play game and that “it’s probably the most complex game ever to be launched on mobile platforms.” It’s not PC, but maybe the best we can hope for is a new RCT for mobile devices. What do you think?