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Elizabeth Nadeu, The digital marketing manager has announced she is leaving Kings Island to take the social media and community manager position at P&G: https://www.instagram.com/p/DUo86ZCDIpJ5QSkQbDTE6spzt7I1Y64vNya3PA0/?img_index=1 I know some of you have mixed feelings about her, but she was always nice to me and I will miss her around the park and I wish her nothing but the best moving forward.

I recommended that she be the one hired for the seasonal digital content coordinator position prior to the start of the 2023 season. I wish her well in her new position at P&G.

I've been told this is on the park's Instagram page I believe. So if anyone has any burning questions about the original PT, now's your time to ask!

You can see the back of the castle top from the Camp Snoopy and Planet Snoopy cam on their website.

New rides, in general, are often bigger and more complex than they were back in the day, and the off season is as short or shorter than ever for many parks, with Halloween and other holiday events. I think that, in combination with parks realizing that it's not essential to have a ride open when the parks aren't even that busy (the bulk of business is done in July and August), means rides opening during the season has become the new standard.

At this point, I know no reason of this attraction not opening "on time," whether it's at the very first day of the season or further into April or even May.

The name may make you chuckle. But the Texas-sized story behind the Judge Roy Scream are anything but a joke. https://themeparksbydon.com/judge-roy-scream-six-flags-over-texas/

To my pain, I don't know if the plan is to open it with the park (though it seems odd to me that it would open the weekend after opening instead of having a soft opening with minor effects or adjustments being made during the weekdays the park is closed) but I also don't think it's likely for it to have been delayed. For reference, two months before their opening, RiverRacers hadn't been fully assembled, and the trains for Soapbox Racers hadn't arrived. Though I suppose I'm just "defending" the April 18th opening date because if manifest it enough I'll be able to ride it sooner. I think the reddit source is trustworthy, but I'm more inclined to believe the April date that has remained on Sally Dark Ride's site. Perhaps this is more of a personal want, but whether it opens with the park or if they hold a charity event, it would be a shame to me if there wasn't a clearly communicated opening day and if it randomly soft opened without notice a few weeks into the season. The crowd energy from fans at the last performance of Encore and the last day of Boo Blasters (and probably the Rick Bastrup Q&A, I'm still salty about having to miss that) was very fun to experience and I'd love to have it for the theater's grand reopening.

I think the main question is if we will see a return to the standard of a ride opening with the park or not. We'd been so used to new attractions opening with the park that the recent trend of delayed openings have not been sitting well. It might open "on time" but it'd be good to know when that is going to be. It would be much nicer if the parks would start giving a set opening date again. I feel like they're so scared of setting an opening date only to have to push it back, even though that wasn't an issue for years.

A fossil was found during the construction of PT: ON... (a relic of a forgotten time perhaps? 🤔)

They're still there whenever I look at the Planet Snoopy webcam. I've been looking every so often and the most I've seen is a truck or two parked outside of the facade. Whatever is supposed to happen with the facade, I don't think we'll see much of it from the street or the webcams. We're about 2 months and 7 days away from Opening Day. As much as I hope it's open by then, the likelihood does feel low now. It also looks like there are more opera box doom buggies in front of the Bandstand. I hope we see an update this month. I'd hate it if they did well PR-wise for January only to completely fall flat for February. The shareholder meeting might prompt them to release some updates to pad any bad news that might decrease their stock prices.

Historically the facade’s been worked on once the interior of the ride has basically been finished (as in that happened with Scooby Doo, that’s really the most recent example). I am doubtful at this point that the facade will see much of a facelift besides a repaint, but I’d love to be proven wrong. I’m very curious if we’ll see anymore updates this month from the park. The two unlisted videos have been removed from the YouTube playlist. There’s a Six Flags shareholders meeting on the 19th, but I don’t think the opening date or anything would be released because of it.

Could have been delayed to the mass snow storm across the state.

I've been driving up periodically to see if I can still see the spires of the old castle that was BBOBH, can confirm as of last weekend they still exist. My issue with the current situation is that I remember distinctly that they said work on the exterior would commence after the new year, which it is well into. That being said, we have like what practically 2 months from Opening Day? Plenty of time for the park to get everything done and get some testing in. As, with this attraction it is all indoors thus the progress seen from outside the park is slim to none. I remain cautiously optimistic that it opens on Opening Day, previews even.

I agree, it being the 2020s VS the 1990s, technology is a lot more advanced especially with the screens and the laser guns. I am confident Kings Island will keep PT:ON better maintained than Boo Blasters On Boo Hill.

It would be interesting to know. Obviously the original animatronics were probably more simplistic and the special effects didn't include screens or laser guns. So my guess is less programming but they could have run into some interesting problems just from the standpoint that it was a new ride and pretty good for its time

I honeslty wonder if there was any problems that arose with the construction of the original PT? 🤔

It is amazing on how complex these rides are, even if they appear at times to be just simple on the surface. They are so incredibly complex. Thanks @DispatchMaster for a description of how much actually goes into it. I do theater work and most would think lighting is just as simple as plugging in the lights...but it's so much more than that.

I have no information nor opinion on when the ride will open, but coming from the world of industrial automation, which this ride essentially is, it would not be the least bit surprising that it would take a couple of months to program and debug this thing. It's a very complex machine, with hundreds, if not thousands, of sensors, relays, contactors, pneumatic and/or servo actuators, safety systems, audiovisual hardware and software, PLCs, HMIs, etc., all subject to hardware infant mortality, all of which is designed to be efficiently and safely operated by minimum wage operators. No small task! When automated systems are complex, the number of failure modes skyrockets to the point that debug alone can take quite a while (think ~10 engineers & technicians working 6 or 7 12-hour days for weeks), to say nothing of the programming itself. For example, a typical automotive automated production system will run in debug for ~3 weeks once the hardware is "on its feet" to try to identify the myriad ways in which it can fail. Plus, even with those failure modes addressed, it will go on to exhibit dozens more failure modes once released to the wild.

I'm very glad parks like Holiday World and Kings Island take care of their wooden coasters as much as they do! There's a segment of the population that thinks it comes at the cost of other new additions to these parks, but it's not an issue for me and it helps keep the park's charm.

I'd think the "dropped objects" and slick floor issues might be fixed with some transparent panels or nets (they're more likely to install nets) attached to the top of the deck, would they not? If it works well enough over the pathway under Diamondback then I'd think they could also work for the Eiffel Tower. There's probably also a solution for blocking the walls, but I think they'd be fine as is to start back out. The elevator access is by far the hardest to fix, but it's not impossible to complete. I feel like it could be part of a park improvements year where they improve the park with little things instead of one major addition. While both elevators could probably be retrofitted to access the 50' deck, I think the park would only choose to install it for one of them. The cafe idea would be nice, but I don't think it would work outside of special occasions since the most they could feasibly put up there is a snack cart and some tables. Maybe bump that Sunrise Tour price up a little and include "Breakfast on the Eiffel Tower's 50' Observation Deck" as a perk. Does anyone know what the observation decks on the Oil Derrick at Six Flags Over Texas are like? It's also an Intamin observation tower, so I'm curious as to if it has 3 decks as well or just 1 or 2 at the top.

Please, I’d love to be able to see what things look like at 50ft

What if we get a line on opening day similar to when Banshee first opened for PT Opening Nightmare? 😅

This place needs to be shut down immediately for having zero integrity when it comes to guest safety.