WoodVengeance

I think it depends on the parks they're from. It seems new Six Flags is going in a more Cedar Fair-centric direction when it comes to things like passes, add-ons, food, maintenance, additions, etc. so I don't expect the former Cedar Fair parks to change all that much post-merger unless we begin seeing DC or Looney Tunes IP introduced to those parks. I think the most notable changes will come from the former Six Flags parks, especially larger parks like Magic Mountain, Great America and Great Adventure. I believe those parks will change a lot for better or worse if they begin adopting Cedar Fair's method of running their parks and the general public will notice the changes greatly. Other than that, I think the most obvious difference for people throughout both of the chains is that the all-park passport can be used to go to both former Cedar Fair and Six Flags parks. For people who have Kings Island as their home park and want to buy the all-park passport for Cedar Point since it's nearby, they will also gain access to Great America as well. Likewise, people who have Great America as their home park will now be able to visit Kings Island and Cedar Point if they get the all-park passport.

If I'm going to be honest, this addition doesn't seem like it was added to make Soak City a competitor for the best water park in the area. More like "well it's been nine years since we added Tropical Plunge so we might as well add something to Soak City so it doesn't look like we forgot about it".

To be fair, there was a shipping document that was posted online a month or two before AlpenFury's announcement that showed that the manufacturer was going to be premier rides, so it wouldn't exactly be accurate to say "nothing got out". Also, we've had Notice of Commencements and blueprints found in public records for several past additions, so I'm not sure if that's going to stop with a new director of communications. However, I do hope that future additions do become more "secretive" from now on to help fuel speculation throughout the season. I feel as if the decoding season for Orion back in 2019 was somewhat ruined by the fact that the blueprints were posted on here very early in the season. Going back to the 2020 decoding thread, there was only a period of 19 days between the start of the speculation on passholder preview day (April 19th) to when the blueprints were posted with the full layout (May 8th), so at that point there wasn't really much left to decode other than debating if the name was going to be Polaris or Orion.

I would also be heartbroken if The Bat were to get removed in the near future. It's a coaster I try to ride every time I go to the park and I don't really mind the long walk it takes to get there. It usually doesn't have that bad of a wait and it's a pretty enjoyable ride experience even if it is a bit short. I would be shocked if it got removed before Invertigo.

In the event of a ground-up RMC coming to Kings Island, I would expect the park to use an all-steel support structure similar to ArieForce One. Kings Island has played it safe with their recent coaster additions as of the time Cedar Fair took over, and I think that would apply here as well by minimizing the risk of any potential structural issues like we've seen with Steel Vengeance for example. I wouldn't be surprised if no wood ended up being used at all. However, it's also because of the park playing it safe with their coaster additions that I believe an RMC at Kings Island is unlikely to begin with.

It's not related to the hot chocolate, but I did encounter an issue last week when I used a single meal plan and was told I couldn't get a drink because it's not on my plan (which if you go on Kings Island's website or on the app, it says clearly that it does in-fact come with a drink). Again, it was just a drink so it's not the biggest issue in the world and I also acknowledge that it was likely the employee was just mistaken. To reference what @DJSkyFoxx said, I really do not like the precedent that the park can tell you no for something you paid for, especially at a park like Kings Island where you'd expect the service to be exceptionally great given the park's reputation.

I personally haven't visited the Express hotel (yet), but that definitely looks rough considering it wasn't that long ago that they remodeled the hotel. I did stay at Castaway Bay a few years back after that hotel got remodeled. The water park was fine, but the rooms weren't really that great. Very small table that hardly had any space to put stuff on and I also wasn't a fan of the hard floor throughout the entire room. I have visited all three of the waterpark resorts in Sandusky with my most recent trip having stayed at the Kalahari, and I personally think Castaway Bay is the weakest of the three in my opinion. It's nice that you get early entry to Cedar Point, but that's really the only benefit you get as there's no transportation to and from the park. I can't really comment on Sawmill Creek since I haven't stayed there yet personally, but from what I've seen, Cedar Point could definitely improve their hotel properties not located on the peninsula. I'm sure Hotel Breakers is fine since that's located right next to the park and is the flagship hotel for Cedar Point, but it's definitely the most expensive resort you can stay at if you plan to visit Cedar Point.

If a lower height requirement is one of the goals for our next major addition, that actually does make Gerstlauer more favorable over Mack since Hangtime has a height requirement of 48", whereas Copperhead Strike has a 52" requirement.

I imagine Cedar Point will still be the favorite child of the Ohio parks. It's also worth noting Six Flags Great America is only about 5 hours away from Kings Island (6 if you want to factor in Chicago traffic) and that's now a park in our chain too. It's too early to say which of the two will get the most investments between Kings Island and Great America. Apparently it was brought up in a recent Tower Topics that Mike Koontz wanted Orion to appeal to families, hence the reason for the smaller stats. I can't confirm it personally but if it is true, I really have no idea what he was thinking with that. Giga coasters are supposed to be some of the most thrilling coasters out there and to try and turn one into a family coaster just seems like the wrong way to go about it. They can minimize the height or length as much as they want, at the end of the day it still has a 54 inch height requirement. Again, this is not confirmed to be the reasoning and I still think Orion is a great ride, but it is a baffling thought.

So if we were to enter this mindset for our next major coaster, thrill coasters should still be on the table if he considers Orion to be a family-friendly addition. Would that make it more likely that we could see another B&M since the rides they put out are more on the graceful side? Or perhaps a Vekoma launch coaster since those have a lower height requirement (A.K.A. more family friendly). We'll probably just have to wait and see what happens.

The park is currently going three years in a row of adding new family attractions to Adventure Port, Camp Snoopy and next year with Soak City. When the park stated they are going to make the park family friendly, I don't think that means they're going to completely alienate the thrill market entirely. After all, the reason I'm even talking about a 10-inversion coaster for Kings Island is because the park itself did include it as an option on one of their surveys.

The way I look at it is that the Mack Stryker was developed to be Mack's take on a Gerstlauer Infinity. If they can do 14 inversions on a Gerstlauer Infinity, then it shouldn't be difficult to do 10 on a Mack Stryker.

I believe Carowinds runs Copperhead Strike during Winterfest from what I've seen online. However, it is in a different climate so not sure if that would apply here if we were to get a Mack.

I would also still love to see a Mack Extreme Spinner come to The Vortex plot as well, though I am concerned if a portion of the general public is put off by a spinning coaster, especially one that has launches and inversions. If the park is looking at Mack for their next coaster, then I think it would be safer to build a Mack Stryker and market it as a first-of-its-kind coaster in North America and the most inversions of any coaster in North America (10). If Cedar Point really wants to, they could build a Mack Extreme Spinner for themselves, that way it's a win-win for both Ohio parks. Though I do admit a lot of this is just wishful thinking. For all we know, it might not even be a Mack and it could be a Gerstlauer or B&M. Heck, we might not even get a new coaster in 2026, we'll just have to wait and see how things play out over the next several months. I imagine we'll know pretty early in the 2025 season if there's a coaster coming in 2026 by means of land clearing, blueprints or anything else of the sort. Also, I'm probably going to make a coaster concept for The Vortex plot over the next several days, and it will likely be my last concept for that plot. (which I've done several of over the past five years, so I'll be sure to give my best effort for this final concept)

Going back on-topic to what kind of ride I could see going in The Vortex plot, I find it interesting that out of all the Six Flags parks that have put out surveys over the past several months, Kings Island was the only park that I'm aware of that put out two different surveys as opposed to just one. Interestingly, the second survey had an option for a 10-inversion Infinity coaster that I believe did not appear on any surveys from the other parks. I think a Gerstlauer Infinity on The Vortex plot would fit pretty nicely there, though if Kings Island wanted to get something more unique while also delivering a similar ride experience to that of an Infinity coaster, I feel a Mack Stryker would be an absolutely incredible fit for that plot of land. It would be the first-of-its-kind in North America and the park could still go for 10 inversions if they wanted to. However, it would likely be more expensive compared to a Gerstlauer Infinity so I could see the park continue to go in that direction if they don't want to spend $25+ million on a Mack Stryker. Whatever the case, I hope we'll get our answer soon if the park indeed is planning to put something in that plot for 2026 so we can put these kinds of discussions behind us. Though I'm aware speculation like this won't end with The Vortex replacement and there will continue to be speculation for future additions even beyond that, like Action Zone for example.

Although it isn't technically a Coney Mall addition, I would argue Orion's prescence behind The Racer has impacted Coney Mall quite a lot, especially towards the back of the midway where if you're walking in by BLSC and Jukebox Diner, the lift hill is right there in your face. But if we're counting just Coney Mall attractions, I would say the biggest changes to that area in recent years were mainly Vortex getting removed, KMAA and the repaint of Racer.

Yeah, of course it wouldn't be the same ride if they were to resurrect the IP. I was specifically referring to the people who think they are going to bring back the ride in the same state as it was before.

I think whatever goes in The Vortex plot should have an early 20th century theme to fit in with the rest of the Coney Mall area, hence why I suggested naming it "Shooting Star" or something else relating to Coney Island. I also thought a 50's hot rod theme could also work, but I think the park could go with something more unique than a car theme, especially with BLSC and KMAA right next door.

Possibly. This is just a thought I've had and I don't really think it's entirely feasible budget-wise for a coaster year, but could it be possible to retheme Coney Mall into Coney Island? Mainly with remodeling some buildings to look like this picture below or retheming some of the shops and restaurants to fit in with a Coney Island theme. Have the cherry on top be a new coaster in The Vortex plot themed to Shooting Star. I think it would be a really nice way to pay homage to Kings Island's predecessor. With the actual Coney Island being shut down, I don't think the park would need to contact them in order to use their name but I could be wrong.

Of the people who advocate for bringing back Son of Beast, I wonder how many of them have actually ridden it back in the day. I rode it once in 2008 (after the loop was removed) and it's easily the worst coaster I've ever ridden to this day.

What time did you go on ET? I went up on it during sunset and the line was only like a one elevator wait.

Probably. I mean, it was just a drink so it's not the biggest deal in the world. I was just baffled a bit because this was never an issue I had with the single meal deal before. I only get food at the park a couple times a year, so that's why I elect to buy the single meals and it's nice that it comes with a drink too, something you don't get included with most of the all-day and season dining plans.

So I got Coney BBQ tonight using the single meal pass. The person at the register said that drinks aren't included in the single-use dining plan even though it clearly says in the app that it does. Did they change it without updating it in the app or was it an error on their part? I did not have this problem when I used one two weeks ago. I suspect what might have happened was that they misinterpreted my plan as an all-day dining plan, because they said I needed to upgrade to the premium dining plan to get a drink. Wouldn't the system tell them that was not the plan I had?

Thinking back on it, I don't think this was the first time we saw the back of Timberwolf removed like this. Perhaps they could just be doing work on it? I saw that Music in the Parks already has an event scheduled for the park next year.