Roller Coaster Tycoon was originally released on March 31, 1999, 5 months after Google became available to the public. The game was a sign of the times: no online multiplayer, no updates, no downloadable content. You’d just take the disc out of the case, pop it into the CD drive, and wait approximately 37 minutes for the title screen to load.
The game was a revelation. The title screen would load, and pixilated roller coasters would fly down the tracks, and screams of glee would boom through the tinny speakers. Everyone of a certain age remembers clicking on the first map, Forest Frontiers, and being placed in charge of financing, researching, and building an amusement park.
The gameplay loop was addictive. You’d place rides, research new rides, place those rides, and so on, until you finally unlock the steel roller coaster. Then, get the opportunity to create your own roller coaster. (Anyone who built the preset Crazy Caterpillar, you’re a monster.)
People spent hours making these roller coasters. Once you had the perfect one, you would test it to see how it worked. The game gave three grades to determine how well the public will receive the coaster: excitement, intensity, and nausea. If the grading system is good enough for Roller Coaster Tycoon, it’s good enough to grade the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The excitement levels around the Wolves have to be at an apex after they thumped the Oklahoma City Thunder, 123-111. That marks their third win in a row, after losing five straight. Before that, they won six of seven after a stretch in which they lost three of four.
Minnesota has been streaky all season.
Ups and downs have defined Minnesota’s season. Every time they climb up the standings, they fall back down. Just like on a roller coaster, each win can represent the click of the chains pulling the cart up, and fans, just like the riders, are always anticipating the drop.
Like the ride, the Wolves always seem to have a drop after a climb to the top. It creates anxious excitement. If a coaster just went to the top of the track and stayed there, it could seem boring. Sure, it might be breathtaking to see the landscape of the standings from atop the league. Still, if there are no drops, is that really all that exciting?
To drive the metaphor home, on a crazy roller coaster with twists and turns, rises and falls, you get to understand the fellow riders. When they scream, do they pass out? Are they an eyes-closed person or an eyes-open person at the peak?
For fans of the Wolves, this season has been similar. Who rises to the occasion? Who blinks when things are going good? And who passes out when the coaster is sliding straight down? Ultimately, part of the excitement is learning the ins and outs of a team and understanding the players more deeply.
Intensity in Roller Coaster Tycoon terms refers to whether the player sends people on an extreme or mild ride. Where excitement relates more to joy, intensity correlates more with fear. If you build a coaster with 713 loop-de-loops, no one will ride it because that’s insane. The pixilated people will approach the blue pavement in the game, and their eyes will bug out of their heads before they walk away.
Arguably, Minnesota’s season has induced a similar reaction.
When the Wolves are on a downward spiral, fans demand trades and believe all is lost. They vow never to watch another game. Then, when the ride is going back up, and the suspense builds, fans come back to the ride that is Minnesota’s season.
Players have had similar intensity ratings. Randle can look like an All-NBA caliber player, or he can turn the ball over at an alarming rate and lose focus on defense. Edwards will hit a fast break pull-up three, and the crowd goes wild. Or he can miss it off the front iron, and a groan creeps across the arena.
Every player on the team has these ups and downs, sometimes just minutes apart. At other times, they have a slower rise and fall that can last months. All the movement means Minnesota’s intensity rating must be high. The volatility of the team’s successes and failures doesn’t necessarily manifest as the team exploding or flying off the tracks. Still, it makes fans feel an eye-popping, pixilated sense of “This is too much for me.”
The last rating in the system is nausea. In the game, this is more of an annoyance than an actual problem. The more nausea rides create, the more the guests vomit, meaning the more janitors you need to hire. While Minnesota’s season has been a whirlwind, it may not be vomit-inducing. However, there are games lost to incredible mental mistakes, but the nature of the Wolves team is more hope than nausea.
Edwards always gives the team a chance, and Jaden McDaniels and Naz Reid’s growth has been inspiring. Rudy Gobert and Julius Randle‘s reinvention has been a sign of resolve, and Donte DiVincenzo and Jaylen Clark’s effort has been anything but nausea-inducing.
Although they are occasionally frustrating, the Wolves execute well and have top-ranked offenses and defenses, a sign of incredible balance, rather than the dizziness a team in the top ten in one category but not the other can cause.
Truth be told, if you evaluate the Wolves as a roller coaster, they are nearly the perfect form of entertainment. It’s exciting to watch the team beat anyone and lose to anyone, despite their talent and overall play. It keeps you on the edge of your seat, just like on a good ride, waiting for the next drop, twist, or turn.
The intensity of the season has been top-notch; the Wolves play like heavyweights when they need to and have real human stories that captivate fans and make them root for their players, which has meant not feeling nauseous nearly as often. The Wolves are on another climb, winning three in a row, and everyone is bracing for the next drop, but one thing is for sure.
Minnesota’s roller coaster ride would get an A+ back in 1999.