Hello NLC! Since NLE is now going to be left abandoned, I wanted to archive the work me, iSatnav and element115 did in the weeks before we were announced 3rd in roundup 200

The Marketing

The Finished Video

Right, Paragon, what a journey this has been. It started about a year ago with an initial layout design from COASTERGUY246, featuring essentially what you see today (although it was initially supposed to be themed to the Fallout franchise). The concept of the ride was based on a tweaked version of the Energylandia hyper with a launched lift hill. The second portion of the layout was developed after a short break, which was designed with the goal of rivalling the Energylandia hyper mentioned previously with a non manufacture-specific style. The layout has been designed to attempt to give a more unique and varied hyper coaster layout with more unusual forces, such as the almost unheartlined dive loop, which is designed to maximize the feeling of being pulled around at the top of the inversion.

Details

Next came the detailing work, which was primarily Element115's concern with a massive helping hand from Elyani in the way of his incredible (functional) sensors. They have been placed with basic block setups in mind, (block entry, parking, block release etc). The LSM modules are also custom designed alongside all of the details within the brake runs and throughout the launch tunnel. A future post will go in-depth with all of the details of the ride, including the custom transfer table. These little things add up around the ride to provide what we think is one of the most realistic NoLimits environments ever created.

A e s t h e t i c s

Key in the 2000s aesthetic that this ride carries is the station building and surrounding support structures. We took heavy inspiration from the Black Mesa research facility from the 1998 game Half Life 1 (keen-eyed people will notice that the newspaper at the top of the thread is dated to the release of the game). The buildings feature imposing, metal texture with pipes so show that this is definitely a working and active site, run by a technology company at the forefront of global development. The basic storyline is that Aether Systems is a technology firm specialising in the design of transportation systems. With the basic design of LSM elevators under their belt (as can be seen in the park and the news article), they went on to use this technology to attempt to design a sleek new transportation system known as Paradigm. After the testing of Paradigm proved “inconclusive”, they went on to produce Paragon, with the findings of Paradigm still in mind. The area is designed to act like a public test site and has basic amenities that enable the area to be functional for public use around the clock. The ride felt somewhat empty in previous iterations so after some consideration, we elected to add onboard audio to the ride (video coming soon) and tie it into the theme somehow. With assistance from Joseph Pojunis, we decided to add a radio broadcast tower near the site which would “interfere” with audio transmission going to the test vehicles during the ride cycle.

The Environment

As for the surrounding area, we wanted to have the ride situated next to a lake surrounded by steep, wooded hills. This lead us to develop the terrain that is around the ride, heavily inspired by the Welsh hills. Next is the functioning train we implemented as part of the story of the ride, as a way of getting test participants and staff to Atlas Lake, a remote facility in [REDACTED], North England. This used the train model from the sketchup warehouse from user MasterChief and the tunnel and associated area from Element115. The surrounding area is also being used by the US Military for high-speed jet testing (much akin to the Mach Loop in Wales), hence the inclusion of an F16 jet periodically flying past. We thought these additions would make the ride area feel a lot more dynamic rather than just sticking a coaster down in a greenfield.

So that's Paragon's development summed up, if we have left anything out that you would like to know about then let us know, we will be “happy” to oblige (the file takes a good 10 mins to load at this point). Please be aware that we are doing another post for the details, uploading a future POV featuring the soundtrack and (hopefully) releasing the project once we have optimised it a bit more.

Looks really good! My only issue is that the trains look really bulky and therefore would probably lead to a lot of rattling if this ride was ever built.

So opening the file up after it was uploaded reminded me of the sheer number of details and stupid little easter eggs and jokes that we crammed into the ride. Below is a video summing them up.

Since I forgot to include a couple and couldn't be bothered to rerender, enjoy them in image form.

Following a joke that we had spent more time making the plane/train accurate than the ride itself (found behind the statues in the shop):

A fire extinguisher because why not (found in the photo booth):

A screen cycling Aether Systems propaganda advertisements.

psshhhhh, you post about your easter eggs?

Oh there are a few more we haven't said anything about... these are the more obvious ones.

To go along with the release, I recorded some UHD 60fps POV's for people who are unable to run the ride well. Check them out, My CPU would appreciate it!

Yeah lets forget about Strathmore and Terra

Well, I had a go as well, and I was really impressed (a video doesn't do a ride justice). Of course it's not the scale of Strathmore or Terra, but it did very well. That's a great mix of creativity and realism, and I especially love that.
Realism both in the creation of the layout and the neat details everywhere. Big things like the working (!) MCBR elevator, or small things like the spare fences hanged up there or the electrical tracks.

^^Strange that "best" and "biggest" seem to be the same to you.

^ Erm... interesting opinion. I’d easily regard it as one of the best NL2 rides out there, but that’s just me.
Back to Paragon - the level of detail in there is incredible, kudos to you. This ride definitely deserved it’s Roundup 200 place (if not a higher place...). Next time though, for the sake of my CPU, make the trains less polys. :P