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Regarding a coaster doesn't have to be the tallest to be an airtime machine. Maverick is one of my absolute favorite rides ever for the intensity and airtime. The first time I rode Lightning Run, I was floored how much airtime and how much fun it is in a small footprint. Fury is in a class by itself. I rode it 25 times the day I was there last. It is a truly incredible ride, and I traveled all the way there just to ride it (and my former Eagles too). Saying that, I love Orion's height, quick lift to the first drop and the speed it keeps up throughout the ride. Out of the hundreds of times I have ridden it, no one riding with me has been disappointed afterwards. It's just a lot of fun and I am happy to have it in my home park.

the same way that 47 years after it's construction, The Beast is still a top 3 (maybe even 1 or 2) at KI- and is usually featured on a majority of their marketing pieces. It always has a wait, high on guest reviews.... and that popularity has endured the pandemic, droughts, hot weather, terrible summers, bad ride attendants, GMs, and countless recessions. It is a a textbook definition of a "Great Coaster". It is remarkable, out of the box, and not available anywhere else. People come, sometimes specifically, to ride the legendary Beast.

It is after all a flat ride.

It is a great ride. I just think it fell into the trap that we were expecting the next best GIGA as far as height, length, etc.. Just seemed like each GIGA, at the time, was bigger than the previous install. So we kind of thought it would be 330' or 335' to beat the last record. I can remember in the message board here on KIC and someone got the leaked blue prints and the disappointment based on the numbers that the lift hill was probably around 280' and the track length was so short. Seemed the air was let out with all the previous hoopla. Starting the the word GIGA written in the snow. So it was often referred to GIGA-light or "Is it even a real GIGA". But at the end of the day, it is a world class ride in one of the best Amusement parks in America.

Okay—keep the skepticism if it helps you win your day.

In 2026, Cedar Point’s pioneering looping coaster marks 50 years since it opened in 1976. http://sanduskyregister.com/go/6c78ba01489fd

We do? As an enthusiast I’m pretty aware that my opinion on rides and parks will be vastly different compared to the GP. And I think we often sell the average guest short on their opinions and feelings.

Meanwhile Stardust Racers is/are small all things considered in height… but packs a ton of airtime throughout the entire duration of the experience. Definitely shows you don’t have to have a record breaker to draw crowds. I agree with you about Orion. It’s missing something, and for me personally it ends too quickly. It doesn’t have that “final act” moment.

There was no concern it wasn’t record-breaking. That’s marketable until a ride opens and then it doesn’t matter if the ride doesn’t live up to the hype. People who were at the park at the time knew that, and knew it well. (Son of Beast) The decision to make it more family oriented so more guests would want to ride it was based on who the majority of the visitors to Kings Island have been, is now, and will always be: families. So, where does that come into play? The height. At 287, it looks less intimidating from the midways than 300-plus would have been. It still hits speeds over 90 mph and just 4 mph slower than Fury 325. It’s not because the height is only 287 that Orion ranked outside the top 40 in the 2025 Golden Ticket Awards for Best Steel Coasters. It’s not because of the length of the ride. It’s not because it opened during the pandemic. It’s because it’s missing an element that Fury 325 and Diamondback both have that riders absolutely love about those rides: an abundance of airtime. If Orion had Diamondback’s airtime, the sentiment about the ride is dramatically different. More parkgoers would be talking about it as one of the best.

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And those who refer to it as GIGA-Light or "Is it even a real GIGA" are those who post on online forums/thoosie pages/etc. I have yet to hear average day-to-day guests say either about Orion.....only are those who are you can spot from a mile away as an "enthusiast."

Zephyr usually goes down to the ground every year as does Cedar Point's (usually stripped to bare bones).

I'm one of those that look at CP and KI cams every morning. Interesting things are going on at the KI cams this am. 1) Crews are quickly tearing down Snowflake lake to complete the task before the weather hits this weekend. They are almost 2/3 of the way done since starting on Wednesday. 2) Zephyer seems to be taken down all the way to the ground (2 cranes are on the pad). I've never noticed this in years past hopefully it's just a routine 10-20 year maintenance. Would be interesting to know if CP's is doing the same thing. 3) Action on the Monster pad. About 4 employees with what looks like an arm for the ride were there this am. 4) The lights on the Eiffel Tower are still up. If I remember correctly these are usually down by now. I'm looking forward to seeing the snow on the KI cams later this weekend.

Wow, that is crazy to think about. I rode Revolution the 2nd year after it opened. I was so scared to ride it. My uncle, who lived in Los Angeles, was the person who encouraged me to ride it. It was my first 'big' coaster that catapulted me into the joys of my love for rollercoasters.

So real. IMO it's just a giant waste of space. The building is pretty big too and I can only name a few people who actually like that ride. On my last visit this past summer, I chose to ride Mummy a 7th time in the single rider line over riding Supercharged just once. Thank goodness their getting rid of that awful ride. Kong is so much better. Anyway, hopefully they can use that gigantic building for something good. But I'm not gonna do what everyone else is doing right now and guessing what it's gonna be. Sometimes I get tired of watching the same "Ghostbusters and Back to the Future are coming!" videos. I get it. I like creating ride concepts, but some of those people act like they know what's gonna happen. I remember just a few months ago a guy on YouTube claimed that Ghostbusters was confirmed because of some green goo-themed scare zone nearby (IYKYK). I get so tired of him sometimes. Anyway, end of rant lol. Happy with the new addition overall. I was never the biggest fan of Rockit. Oh and I'm hearing people saying this thing is gonna have a 170ft tall spike??? That would be insane

I believe it was a mix of both. Yes there was a pandemic and a heavily restricted season Orion's inaugural year. At the same time when people did in fact get the chance to ride it outside of like the first weekend, the reviews that came in on social media were mixed. A lot of people (including me) praised the ride while a large number of people (including the general public not just coaster enthusiasts) were underwhelmed and prefered Diamondback. If the reviews were on the level of lets say Fury 325 or Steel Vengeance we probably would've seen a huge bounceback in people flooding to the park to experience Orion in like 2021-2022 post restrictions but we did not see that and I think a lot of that has to do with the mixed sentiment about the ride which didn't really draw people from far outside of the general market to experience it. I think in Mr. Koontz and the big wigs in Sandusky/Charlotte's mind when planning this ride was "We could get the same ROI on a 300 foot coaster that appeals to a broader audience as we would a Fury 325 style ride that breaks records while only spending 30 million instead of 35-40 million." And I think they found out that it doesn't quite work that way. Im not saying Mr Koontz and them regret building Orion, but I definitely believe the whole "family giga" idea came back to bite them a bit. Im honestly wondering if there was any pushback from those within the park/corporate in the planning meetings on the whole "family giga" idea or if everyone was fully on board. Personally if I was in those meetings I definitely would've fought back against the family giga thing and pushed for something more thrilling or even record breaking.

I'll grant the sentiment angle, but I would like to hear more about how the attendance and ROI conclusion was reached. It's not as though public companies go out of their way to share data that demonstrates they made a poor 8-figure investment. In fact, public companies are always inclined to do the exact opposite - perform logical acrobatics to spin poor financial performance as the fault of anything other than their decision making. But more to the point, as Losantiville Mining Co. points out, Orion did not debut in a vacuum! Instead of getting the normal first year bump in attendance - and thus a huge chunk of its expected ROI - Orion debuted during the pandemic, operating a fraction of the expected hours its first year, with limited attendance and capacity. Even in its second year when those restrictions were lessened, a nontrivial number of people simply were not traveling, depressing the park's attendance, and thus further depressing ridership and ROI. There is no way to definitively untangle those effects versus the effect of the supposed guest sentiment that Orion is "just OK".

I believe all of this could be done without leveling any of The Vortex plot. Instead of an entirely new themed area, it might be easier to bring back the "Old Coney" name and realign the midway. That frees up space for a larger indoor dining location, fixes the kink in the midway brought on by KMAA, and could still allow for a new flat ride to go back there depending on how everything is placed. Jukebox is replaced by the new indoor restaurant and Coney Potato Works could make a comeback to give purpose to that seating area (and provide another dining location). This all could probably happen for much less money while killing a few birds with one big boulder. Here's a mock-up I've been working on for another topic thread to better show the idea. It does include the removal of WindSeeker and the addition of a new dark ride in Action Theater, but that would come at a later time.

I don’t know where they get their data but mine comes from sentiment reports — the same kind of reports used by theme parks throughout the industry and decisions get made from. I’ve done several sentiment reports on Orion since it debuted in 2020. The sentiment is it’s a good ride, but not a ride that drives attendance. It hasn’t delivered the expected ROI. The Beast on the other hand continues to drive attendance going on 47 years since its 1979 debut.

What does it even mean and how would it be enforced? Are they gonna watch you eat the meal?

I honestly love the new animatronics compared to the old ones and I've actually ridden the original PT. These animatronics look a lot more lively and interactive more so than the original PT animatronics. I'm just hoping it's going to be more of a dark ride than Boo Blasters meaning less bright lights. 😅