Losantiville Mining Co.

I hope they choose to paint that BUB (big ugly building) or do something to try to hide it better from part of the skyline. There's no chance the park opts to put a mountain or anything else that could actually hide it around it, but some leafy green and sky blue paint could go a long way. Open up that entrance plaza just a little more into the grass right there to put a photo op in. And please, please, please do not get rid of the foliage on top of the entrance. There has already been enough taken out of Rivertown. I know the planning and theming team got laid off, but I will hold out hope that whoever is designing this ride will do something more than just an unthemed flat ride in a box with all of the Madame Fatale's pre-show decorations still put up. The nightmare scenario for me is something like a Zamperla Nebulaz shoved in there with the overhead lights turned off during the ride cycle. I wouldn't be opposed to something like a 4-table Demolition Derby (Mater's Junkyard Jamboree) with more theming than just the ride vehicles and operator booth. Best case scenario for me is something like a Vekoma Madhouse (Villa Volta) or an Intamin Dynamic Motion Stage (Danse Macabre). That last one is specifically classified as a "Family Thrill" attraction on Intamin's website, btw. Let's hope Six Flags budget tightening doesn't ruin this ride opportunity. Does anyone have a fun idea of what this "family thrill" attraction could be and what could fit in that building? I believe it is 90ft x 90ft square floor (not including any remaining TR:TR rock theming or anything else). I have no clue about the height.

The event as a whole definitely felt bigger than it did last year. If the park will not open the festival up to the rest of the park, I'd like to see it expand to the outlined space. Serene space in Tower Gardens, a show and seating in the festival tent, additional food and wine stands near the floral clock, and additional activities around the Eiffel Tower. It would be nice to not have any big sheds in the circle around the Eiffel Tower since the pathway feels cramped with them there. I would personally prefer to not see F&W decorations across the whole park. Leave that for Haunt and Winterfest. If it's something where festival food options can be found at existing stands around the park then I'd be much more open to it. Same with Grand Carnivale and any other summer festival Kings Island hopes to host.

The advertising thought was mostly just wishful thinking I do think we got some decor from Kings Dominion, but I agree that increasing setup time would hurt events. That's why any clearly visible "empty" building in the park is permanently used for Haunt mazes. I think the park should build more backstage/easily hidden infrastructure (like Slaughterhouse) for that purpose so we can get some additional space activation — I'm looking at you, KillMart. I also think their Grand Carnivale parade floats also went to Fiesta Texas this year since they weren't using them, though I'm less sure about that. On a similar topic, I have reason to believe that both Carowinds and Canada's Wonderland are receiving their own dedicated festival areas. Carowinds already has a little astroturf area across from Thunder Striker, and it looks like a new one is going in to the left of Harmony Hall where their Snow Flake Lake usually is. I haven't seen if they're getting a tent like ours, but I'd assume it'll be similar. All of the site prep has reflected KI's so far. Wonderland seems to be getting a festival area to the left of their Moroccan Bazaar under AlpenFury's Skyflyer Loop. That one has pavers (since it is also a viewing area for AlpenFury) and a stage. I'll note that Wonderland is also hosting a Food & Wine Festival, so I'd be interested to see what happens with theirs. They seem to be one of the best sources for Kings Island info! If only the park would acknowledge their existence...

A few coats of paint and a nice little planting of flowers around the front outside of the curb would make it look so much better. Bonus points to the park if they put a little sign up near the path. Also some more trees around the spots where they cannot put a small flat ride or small buildings. Realistically the park should also put a little post & chain fence up all along that whole pathway.

Wristbands with a QR code would have been a fine enough replacement, but I would hate to have to pull out my phone every time I wanted to see what was coming next in my day. All of the events I've been to where the decision was made to use either phones or lanyards, I enjoyed the lanyards 100% more than I did my phone. Some decisions Six Flags has made make me wonder who up top has set foot inside most of these parks, even just in either legacy chain. The number who have spent meaningful time in all of the parks is probably much less than that.

I have some hope for Grand Carnivale now that I know we got some of Kings Dominion's stuff from their Food & Wine Festival last year. It would not be a surprise to see even more Carnivale decorations since Kings Island is the only park having it this year. That event has also always been much bigger than the Food & Wine Festival. The park doesn't even need to move the festival dates if they don't want to. They just need to schedule their show times to actually alternate. There is no parade for F&W, so it's not like Winterfest where no shows can run for two hours while the parade is set up and run. I can't imagine why someone would schedule every performance to run at the same time. That being said, moving the festival dates toward the beginning of the season would give the park something to advertise and get guests to visit in late April/early May.

The system seems very poorly set up. It would be nice to see this be fixed as part of whatever new system gets implemented as everything continues to be merged. Looking at how this company is run though, that probably won't happen.

I'd love to see more single rider lines at parks across the US since they work so well for the most part! The only downside is people who use it as an express lane and get unreasonably mad when their party is split. Kings Island could definitely use a few on coasters like Banshee and Orion since they have those 4-across rows.

Not to mention the fact that the top brass probably haven't seen much of a cut in their pay I hope it doesn't come to it, but I wouldn't be opposed to a number of the parks spinning off and re-forming KECO if it meant overall improvement to those parks. (The name slaps and it's nostalgic for some.) Six Flags may be too big right now, but we'll have to check back in after Six Flags America and California's Great America close. Then maybe again after one or more parks are possibly sold to other chains. I don't want the situation to come to that though. The HFE parks are all wonderful, but they now own at least 22 amusement/water parks (not including other attractions such as zoos, aquariums, theaters. etc.) compared to Six Flags' current 41. They don't seem to have much room to expand for a little while. A new Prestige Pass perk: two free* absences from Spreadsheets of Terror!

Very much agreed. Can anyone explain to me how the company could reasonably fix their situation without drastically reducing every single operation they run down to a skeleton crew? It feels like something went wrong when the finances started to be pulled into the same booklets, and now we're all seeing the fire it has caused. Is there an issue with the executives? Were the Legacy Six Flags parks in worse shape than originally thought? My doomer-ist tendencies are coming up with a ton of theories so I would like some reasoning if anyone can provide. Personally, I think I could hold out for a couple more years of no major $30m additions across the board if it means the chain gets to right itself. I don't know what I would do after that.

It seems that unfortunately this is the strategy being used by Six Flags corporate at the moment. I've heard about news outlets in Charlotte hearing only crickets after requesting a comment on the layoffs from the corporate offices as well. Only releasing good news and keeping everything else confidential is not good when entire departments are being rearranged and let go. It makes the company look shadier and feel even more desperate than it already is. I personally refuse to fault Grace Peacock for this, but it seems clear that Six Flags is trying to do damage control while setting themselves up for hardships in the near future.

I miss the stores that got removed when Starbucks took over the big room of the Swiss building on International Street. Mostly because I would rather see anything that is not an oversized Starbucks go in that space. It would be awesome to see a real indoor sit-down restaurant go in there, but the likelihood that the park moves Starbucks to a smaller location is super low. All that indoor dining space is currently being wasted on a third-party vendor that sells drinks that fit in one hand. I'd hesitate to make it another store since the Emporium is right there and all of the stores seem to sell the same products now.

I'm certain it has been said here before, but is the boiler prop the same one from Phantom Theater Encore? I love seeing all of the pictures from these backstage tours!

The old Beast Canyon Cold Drinks sign has been there for the last couple years, however the Kings Crossroads sign got put back up a few weeks ago (IIRC). The Kings Crossroads sign is definitely there now.

Just got this Six Flags Over Texas ad while scrolling through an article. I noticed the "Over Texas" part is a lot larger than normal. Is this a new change or has Legacy Six Flags done this for their banner ads for a while? Other Six Flags parks have also shown this formatting in recent ads. I like it a lot more than the logos where "Six Flags" is gigantic while the rest of the park name is tiny. I'm still wishing for some park name changes (reverting away from Six Flags) and/or getting some new park logos that aren't like what we've seen since 2023. The original Six Flags wordmark goes so hard. Bring that back for SFOT, SFOG, and SFSL at least.

Six Flags recently revealed a concept for a Regional Park Passport during their Investor Day presentation. This system would, if implemented, offer access to select parks in each region at a lower cost than the All Park Passport currently in effect. Some parks were circled together as examples during the presentation, such as Kings Island and Cedar Point. It was not clear to me whether the park groupings were set or not, or if there would be some changes as the idea developed more. What are your thoughts on the Regional Parks Passport idea provided during Investor Day? What parks would you pair/group together? Provide your thoughts below! For this offering to be worth buying, I would suggest allowing guests to pick their parks rather than being forced to go with one or two region presets. Maybe having a base price where guests can choose any five parks to add to their pass would be better than the preselected groupings. Someone who lives in Indiana and visits Cedar Point, Great America, and Kings Island would have to choose which region to go to if the system was as I understood it. Any changes will need to be clearly marked during the pass buying process. Legacy Six Flags customers already had to contend with pass structure changes when buying for 2025, would it be too soon to make them learn a whole new structure again for 2026 or 2027? Personally, I think Six Flags should keep the current pricing for the All Park Passport (maybe go up $50 at most), and find other ways to attract more passholders. They locked themselves into this price bracket when they released the 2025 pass offerings. The new company has proven itself to be untrustworthy so far with some aspects of park quality, and I believe too much is on the line for there to be major increases in pass prices right now — especially as some guests perceive a noticeable decline in how things are run and with rides being retired without notice. No amount of shiny new rides across the chain will help to improve A.P.P. sales when people's home park is struggling because of cuts mandated by corporate.

Kings Island has introduced a new Food Punch Card for the 2025 Food & Wine Festival! Simply pick up a card, purchase 5 different food items (from a list of 10), and head over to Sweet Spot to pick up "...an exclusive Food & Wine dessert...". I haven't seen them in person, but I am happy that Kings Island decided to bring a card to this event. Participants should expect to spend at least $50 on festival food offerings to receive the special dessert. This is certainly better, in my opinion, than having nothing available that might encourage guests to participate in the offerings. I am excited to see what this expanded event looks like on my next visit! Would a tasting card that offered five foods for $45 have been too much of a loss for Six Flags? I don't know. Budget cuts and cost synergies for the shareholders. [Massive shrug emoji goes here.] What are your thoughts? Would you welcome the Food & Wine Festival back for 2026, or would you create a whole new event? (that would cost a lot more money than reusing the current event and possibly improving on it). What [realistic] event would you suggest the park put on? I would opt to bring the Food & Wine Festival back, and expand it by having some more offerings under the Eiffel Tower. It could eventually grow to have some specialty offerings in one or two dining locations per park area, but that may need to wait until the new Six Flags is more stable than they are now. The current festival areas (Tower Gardens, along the path around the Eiffel Tower, and the new festival tent) are nice and keep the event contained. I enjoy the size of this festival for what it is.

That would depend on if there is anyone left in Six Flags higher ups that cares to cater to adults and thrillseekers anymore! Kings Island is going to be deemed 100% a family park while Cedar Point will be the major thrill park. (this is a joke) I think the park could probably squeeze a swim up bar/adult pool over near the entrance to Splash River. That pathway leads to nothing except Splash River and Zoom Flume, and it isn't under the power lines. It also gets it out of the way from the rest of the waterpark.

Are lanyards a terribly huge expense for events like Coasterstock? That feels like something that could have been factored into the ticket price.

I think the Skyline Pavilion would be a lot better if they cleaned/painted it and replaced the lights/fans/tables with newer versions. It always seems a bit disjointed/dirty, so that would almost definitely help. A few TVs would also make it more like the covered Jukebox Diner patio. Maybe the park can put in a small food stand across the path from it, blocking the view of QCSC but giving it some more purpose. The Saltwater Circus lawn would be an awesome spot to put a new flat ride. I'm choosing to believe that is why the spot next to the Grand Carousel was chosen, in addition to being effectively right next to Tower Gardens. Kings Island still has a lot to do when it comes to improving their summer festivals. I do hope the park puts one of their little stages under the tent and has some small live entertainment there.

Hot Rhythm Nights typically runs later in the day than the other shows. I believe I saw something like 6PM, 7:30PM, and 9PM on the screen, but there is a chance that I misread it.

I am definitely (somewhat close to being) a show groupie. The current entertainment lineup does leave a little to be asked for, but I'm glad we have stuff like Country Crossroads and Hot Rhythm Nights. If Six Flags is trying to find a way to improve their parks without putting new coasters everywhere, I would highly recommend investing in awesome shows for each park. The largest initial investment would be building/upgrading stages/theaters, and continued investment would be the creation of each new show. If I had my way, a dream Kings Island entertainment lineup quick list would be: (hidden for dramatic effect) An episode about the favorite shows throughout each Kings Island era would be cool to see. Either that or (hear me out) an episode coming up with a dream show lineup / a realistic dream show lineup!

As in the slide itself was shaking? I wonder if that could just be how water coasters feel due to how the water moves, I wouldn't know though. A new rattle on day 3 of operations would not bode well for any ride or slide.

I noticed a lot of classic logo merch in the stores today and thought it was interesting to see. There are still a ton of the different books throughout the stores as well. Goodbye, Coney Island, Goodbye still has about 10 copies available in KI Collections for about $7 each, but none of them have the cover sleeve on it. I'm glad I got mine when they still had their covers. The non-park consumer products are still weird to see in the Emporium. Those would be better served to be put together in a smaller and different shop. I think someone signed a deal to get those in the park because more Kings Island merch could not be made for some reason. I'd be curious to see if any new Six Flags merch comes to the Legacy Cedar Fair parks. We don't need any Six Flags Universe stores, but if the chain really does want to make the Six Flags brand be shown in all of their parks, that seems like an easy route.

Best of luck for your trip! If you're planning to spend any time in the Loop/downtown Chicago, I would recommend looking into using their metro system. It's not as scary as some make public transit sound, and will let you explore without a car for a little bit. Not sitting in traffic would be a definite plus side. Disclaimer: I've never been in June/July so that might be different from when I was there, and it's your trip so do what you'd like.