Thrill_Biscuit

LOL! Someone beat 'em to the "draw"! ...and Hey! what's with the monochromatic, yellow-bulb marquis, eh?

The line for The Bat has been consistently longer -- at least from my perspective -- this year than in recent, "Flight Deck" years. I love the orange track color scheme, which stands out and looks somehow "faster" than the old gray one.

Ok, friends, time to introduce a "Growth-Flex" pass, for those who know their kids will grow an inch during the upcoming season...

Both! Ah! Yes! Stuckey's - I remember it well! (And the little prize machine, with the (I kid you not) 'cigarette-smoking dog' toy as one of the prizes! ) Composite based on memories of the place.

Which you can find at any Cracker Barrel restaurant ... -Tb, here all week.

I can envision the 90's store... The Mrs. Pac Man/Galaga game would be replaced with "Mortal Kombat," the Breakfast Club shirts would give way to "Scream" and "Buffy, the Vampire Slayer" apparel; Cyndi Lauper and Depeche Mode music would become Nirvana, Korn and Mariah Carey, Rubik's Cubes would be replaced with POGs and Furbys..."Friends," "Jurassic Park," and "Seinfeld" posters everywhere!!! Aaaaagh... time marches on.

The price of a game of "Galaga". It's only a quarter; but in 1981, most "new" video games in the arcades at Kings Island required 3 quarters to play!

Chrome plating would be nice! No, no PhotoShop... not enough time. Just use your "immmmaginaaaaationnnn!"

The Diamondback splashdown kinda reminds me of the Red Sea in Exodus. I dreamt the seats on Banshee were 100% flexible rubber (like the restraint part that goes over one's torso), and we were flung around like yoyos. Fun and scary!

"Our" Royal Fountains really are world-class. They don't have to compete with other fountains; they have a charm and grace all their own. The lights play on the sky tones and hues almost magically (certainly by design). The only thing left to change is the music. Maroon 5 or Katey Perry are great for Action Zone or Coney Mall; it can fit well in those areas. These magnificent dances of water and light, however, demand something that is very different - as far removed from the "day-to-day" ambience you can get at a shopping mall, with charm and elegance that matches the artistic wizardry of the visual presentation.

It has been worse. When I first entered the park on opening day, 2009, and they had "American Woman" by the Guess Who blaring over the speakers so loud that the speakers rattled, I almost puked. Great song... but NOT for amusemet park ambiance. It kept getting worse, too; like someone had taken the soul away from the park. While waiting in line for the then-new Diamondback, the beauty of the spring day kept getting shot down by out-of-place rock "classics" like "Round and Round" by Ratt, "Girls Girls Girls" by Mötley Crüe, and worst of all, the psychotic, sad strains of "Hey You" by Pink Floyd, which was the soundtrack that moment for... the Kid's area! It was very, very surreal to me to hear "..and the worms ate into his brain..." while watching unhappy-looking people meander through the bright, colorful landscape of that area of the park. I was not impressed. It was just not right at all.

Aaron Copeland's Hoedown from Rodeo, On the Beautiful, Blue Danube by Johann Strauss, Valdres March by Johannes Hansen, Selections from West Side Story by Elmer Bernstein, to name a few that I can remember.

The Royal Fountains are fine, in my humble opinion. The experience was much nicer when International Street had the symphony music and/or movie themes playing over them. Something is lost with contemporary music blasting over them (sometimes).

I'm not an engineer, but I understand that sometimes very small flaws in the composition of metals can lead to failures ranging from simple malfunctions to catastrophes. As many as 30 years ago, I watched something like "That's Incredible," or some such show, where they talked about robots that existed even then, that could crawl about on things made out of metal, and alert on any cracks, stress or fatigue that could lead to collapse. Is this kind of thing done on rides, restraints, etc.? I'd be fascinated to know what kinds of meters/tools are used to test the metal (or even carbon or plastic) components of my favorite rides.

We saw it from the Kroger parking lot! Didn't see the actual contact with the tower, but we were sure it hit somewhere in the park. It was cool to come on here and see you caught it on video! Excellent!

Well, the Zodiac/Flight Commander pad won't be lonely, at least for a little while.

Pure fusion of entertainment! Can't wait.

If "our" Eiffel Tower were built in front of the original, it would look something like this:

That is precisely true. There is an opening through to the second tier, which is already 377 feet from the base of the Paris Eiffel Tower, that would accomodate the Kings Island tower head with room to spare. EDIT - 63 feet of room! http://french.lovetoknow.com/How_Tall_Is_the_Eiffel_Tower

Amazing quality; they look like they could've been taken a couple months ago, vs. the 40+ years ago that they were taken!

I guess we can never really celebrate someone's (individual) 100,000,000th ride on Racer. They'd have to be 387 years old, and have never done anything in their lives but ride Racer non-stop, round the clock, on-and-off season, since they were seven years old, with no stops between circuits.

Well, on behalf of the 78,235,409th and 80,124,343rd riders, I'll say congrats to whoever hits that first, nine-digit milestone! Sweet package, though. Good luck, riders!

Beautiful pictures!

Good points. Still, science has gotten us to a point where memory storage is getting more and more compact. $100 can buy a Kit-Kat Bar-sized, 2 Terabyte external drive with data transfer rates up to 4.8 Gbps via USB 3.0 today, and the improvements to that are halfway through beta already! ...and that's off-cloud. ( ). It just seems like we're past ready for much clearer, smoother private video surveillance capabilities at this point.