bkroz

Phantom Theater's quality probably played into its demise. Full-motion animatronics are a lot to deal with, especially since (to my recollection?) no other Paramount Park had a classic dark ride left at the time. As for Boo Blasters, I think a Great Pumpkin dark ride would've been great. Sally's style lends well to the very simple, geometric style of the Peanuts, and their bright 2D cutouts are very appropriate for the Peanuts world. Maybe in Ouimet had come along 5 years earlier, we'd have it. He doesn't seem scared of local flavor or local park traditions. He's embracing history and going for "best day of the year" experiences. The last CEO seemed hellbent on unification (except in functional Platinum Pass computer entry systems) and probably saw a chain-wide rollout of "Boo Blasters" as equally economic and marketing-friendly. I think if the transition from Scooby were happening now, we might see a Peanuts ride... Why not? Best Kids Area in the World, right?

Another thing: a very large chunk of the folks who watched this documentary or heard enough of it to decide to never visit a SeaWorld Park probably had never visited one before and had no plans to do so anytime soon anyway. Another large chunk will carry out their boycott of SeaWorld on their next vacation and opt to spend that extra day at Busch Gardens, instead. Believe you me. Someone I follow on Twitter who is not a park enthusiast tweeted from Virginia's Christmastown: "Well, my boycott of SeaWorld lasted all of three days - turns out they own Busch Gardens!" When these kinds of things happen, companies basically decide to either stay the course and let the protesters tire themselves out, or stand up and say something definite and concrete and loud. SeaWorld opted for the former, and are now beginning to inch toward the latter. In retrospect, we can easily say "They should've countered this the second it came up!" but how were they to know Blackfish would get to this point? At what exact moment did it go from a let-it-pass to a stand-and-fight? Just myself, I can't believe they've been so relaxed. Their official replies tackle each of Blackfish's accusations in neat bullet points. To me, it would've behooved them to say "The documentary also didn't mention that we do this, this, and this" or "These whales simply can't be freed at this point - they'd die."

Concrete worked in the rest of the park for decades, and it went. I don't see it coming this year, but the "if it's old and works, use it" motto (which I've also never heard before?) doesn't seem to have saved concrete in the past. As for complex divisions of the area in terms of re-themeing, I doubt it. Here, past performance is not necessarily an indicator of future performance (given changing powers, changing times, and a possible new precedent at Kings Dominion) but I would imagine that any change in a "lands" theme would either be reserved for an off-year or very simple and straightforward. In other words, I don't think they'd go through the trouble of drawing an arbitrary line across a wide open plaza with structurally similar buildings on one side painted darkly and on the other painted brightly. It would be all or nothing, and if it's "all," I wouldn't expect Cars Land.

What's especially telling is the constant state of construction that's surrounded the property for the last decade. Ten years ago, it was to turn one lane nameless county roads into three-lane mega highways. Today, it's to turn those mega highways back into one lane roads.

Of course I understand why they'd want to unload the property. But for years its been this search for what should go there. Ultra-modern housing, outlet malls, strip maps, amusement parks... The area doesn't need it.

... Who have to pay to park at work?!

I can't imagine what the right answer is for this plot of land. Locals and their businesses lambasted the idea of a mega theme park for clogging their roads. Now half are shuttered because there's no one to visit their businesses. The idea of yet another high end outlet mall seems silly for that exact reason - the area is littered with closed businesses. The property doesn't have the accessibility to draw from the large urban areas, and the area doesn't need another outlet mall or strip mall. Certainly the goal here is for the land owner to make money, but it gets me thinking: just because a piece of land used to have some thing doesn't mean it needs some thing else now. In other words, if this parcel of land had always been unused swampy property alongside the lake, wouldn't it just be overlooked as some old grassy piece of unwanted real estate? But because it used to have an amusement park, something has to go there? What sense does that make? The area doesn't need a thing and can't support a thing, but because a thing used to be there, let's try to build some thing else?

After the CC / BCC fiasco mentioned earlier, things like the FAQ are a little disconcerting too. Free games? Terms of use on the physical printed season pass are not correct? Email links? Also odd is a really lengthy explanation of alcohol policies that typically don't need that much elaboration. The policy is apparently "no different than the standard practices at Disney Parks, Sea World (sic), Busch Parks (sic), and Cedar Fair parks (Including Kings Island)." Why is that all necessary? The final sentence of that first paragraph was also not very well composed. Seems like a simple idea to convey.

That could be suicide what with the current pricing system. Season passes are currently $15 more than a general admission ticket. That means that $60 gets you unlimited admission, rides during the fair, $1.00 soft drinks, and a 20% discount on food and merchandise across the board. My GUESS would be that season passes will be a standard like it seems to be in the Kings Island area - it'll just be more or less understood that kids will get a season pass for their birthday / Christmas, as will all their friends, even if it takes a few years to get there. At that point, having a deep discount on a front-of-the-line pass would be silly. Imagine if KI Gold Pass holders got 50% Fast Lane... I think Fast Lane would have about as many people as the regular line in that case. EDIT: And if they advertise "Upgrade Before You Leave" type deals, season passes could be big. An overwhelming majority of KK visitors will no doubt be very locally based.

In terms of scale and even layout it reminds me of Sky Rocket, just without a launch. This looks like a nice little ride, but if it's to be the park's major draw during its grand reopening, they better hope they crowds stay light (while simultaneously hoping they don't). My guess (which is of course unfair not having ridden it) is that waiting longer than thirty minutes for this would lead to quite a bit of frustration.

^ "Photo courtesy of Kings Dominion" should probably more appropriately be "courtesy of Kings Island!"

The documentary's main point waffles. I don't think it intends its core message to be that SeaWorld is evil because, in fact, SeaWorld's habitats and care for its menagerie of creatures certainly meets and often exceeds standards set by the AZA. That's why they didn't touch on the rest of the animals, really. What they're attempting to convey, it seems, is that killer whales in particular should not be held captive because they're too intelligent and too emotionally self-and-group aware to lead fulfilling lives in a false environment the way a seal or an otter can. Here and there they touch on forcing animals to perform, but again only really in the context of killer whales. It seems that their intent is not to poopoo on SeaWorld, but to poopoo on any place that holds these intelligent whales captive... SeaWorld just so happens to be the face of it. So it's a muddled message that screams "anti-SeaWorld" when I don't think that's constructive or even what they really intended.

Wait, so we collectively don't think they were going for 'barn' with this? What was their desired look then?

Unsolicited submissions aren't usually accepted by companies for that reason...

The ride manufacturer doesn't determine what a station looks like. Busch Gardens in both Williamsburg and Tampa work a great deal with B&M, and their roller coasters have stations whose theming ranges from tasteful to extraordinary. Griffon's is a vine-covered arbor with iron lanterns. Alpengeist's is a detailed Swiss chalet (with the trains being a ski-lift, complete with skis on the train). SheiKra's is a treehouse with each row of the train accessed by planks with a 50 foot drop on either side. Banshee's is an old Irish chapel. Diamondback's is a barn. Batman: The Ride's was a junkyard. All of that depends on what the park is willing to pay. Expedition Everest and Invertigo were manufactured by the same people. One simply decided to invest more in themeing around their ride. That's their choice, not Vekoma's. It would seem that Cedar Fair is getting better in regards to "theming" a station but only minimally. And probably, that's all they really need. Diamondback would look out of place in Rivertown if its station was a big metal box, but it doesn't need to be too elaborate considering it leads to a 200' hypercoaster, not an elaborate first-of-its-kind multi-sensory dark ride.

And the Disney Parks win nothing so there's that to consider. Oddly, it seems mostly parks that advertise in Amusement Today win. Huh! When questioning the Golden Ticket awards, I again ask how Cedar Point can win Best Amusement Park in the World without also winning Best Food, Cleanest, Nicest Employees, Best Waterpark, Best Kid's Area, Best Shows, Best Landscaping... You'd think the "best park in the world" would be even close to representing one of those categories if not sweeping them all! But Cedar Point...

The mountain would probably cost more than the ride.

Do we think Kings Island paid more than the $3500 list price to make our bat demon's arms hairy?

In 2013, Knott's Berry Farm completely renovated their Ghost Town area, built a new vintage Boardwalk area with three new rides, and completely refurbished the Timber Mountain Log Ride (the ride that inspired Splash Mountain) with new lighting, animatronic figures, music, sounds, etc. from Garner Holt Productions. 2014 is more of the same - the groovy Calico Mine Ride will get the same treatment as the Log Ride with new sounds, lights, 50 new animatronic figures, new effects, etc. and the park's Camp Snoopy will be entirely refurbished and rebuilt with new rides and its theme returned to a High Sierra camp (with Snoopy still included). Wow, Knott's Berry Farm in California is probably seeing the most improvement of all Cedar Fair parks with Ouimet on board. He did say from the start that coming from Disneyland, he recognized the incredible potential in Knott's. Now we see that he's actually going to bring that to life. This is also on-par with the nostalgic changes at Kings Dominion and even Kings Island. This is the beginning of what we all expected from Ouimet. Think about the parks in 2014 - new fountains, water shows, new dark ride, refurbished classic dark rides, themed areas returning, executive chefs, new food options. It's happening, people! http://www.westcoaster.net/community/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=6711

I can understand not liking Backlot's location or even it's theme, but are we really at the point where the park would be altogether stronger without it? I think that's a silly thing to think. It's a fun, well-done family coaster that was just recently updated to keep its effects working. Why would we want to remove it completely for no reason?

Even just closing the one open door would at least make it look like a thing that wasn't broken.

No, they sure haven't. One promotional image. No construction updates, story, promotional art, concept art... Just a vague description and one picture. My impression would but that it will be a roving motion-simulator dark ride like Spider-Man or Transformers (clearly not that high budget) and that it will pull up to screens that will simulate traveling through the environments. I just don't see how they could or would incorporate any roller coaster style elements into an interactive dark ride contained inside Wonder Mountain where riders are wearing 3D glasses. It may very well be 1000 feet long (that's an average dark ride) but the coaster track thing, I don't get. I'm not expected any coaster-ness though. The only other thing I can think, if we're supposed to take the "1000 feet of coaster track" literally, is that it could be like Hersheypark's Reese's Xtreme Cup Challenge dark ride that does appear to use roller coaster track and changes elevation, but is powered at the same consistent low speed throughout, even on the awkward finale that looks like it's going to be a roller coaster drop with an airtime hill (see 2:12 in ).I could be wrong. I just don't expect that this will end up being a coaster credit by anyone's stretch of the imagination. EDIT: Yep, visited the ride manufacturer's website and found this. Of their products, it's the only one that Guardian could be. Looks like it'll be like the Spider-Man ride, but budget. The final ride layout they show in the provided video looks very small, but probably about right to fit inside the mountain.

Don't expect a coaster element. Sounds more like the dark ride will pull in front of 3D screens that will simulate a mine-cart during one scene. Like how Spider-Man was advertised as including "a simulated drop from 400 feet!" Doesn't make it a dark ride / Drop Tower combo.

I swear there's a topic floating around somewhere about Kings Dominion's 2014 addition, but search didn't bring it up and I couldn't find it. New news to report today anyway, but to briefly summarize, the park's big news for 2014 (announced a month or so ago) is that it will bring back a lot of nostalgia. To Refresh Your Memory Most noticeably, the park's "Congo" and "The Grove" areas return to the names / themes they had during the park's early years, "Safari Village" and "Candy Apple Grove" respectively. Congo (now Safari Village) will receive "improvements" on Volcano and Anaconda (begging that Anaconda's improvement is new restraints). Candy Apple Grove (very much equivalent to our Coney Mall) will get new lighting packages for the rides along the midway and the park's famous "oversized candy apples" will return. Blue ice cream will finally make a come back (apparently Kings Dominion has been without it for many years) and the Royal Fountains will get a major facelift (rumored to be identical to Wonderland's from last year with a "World of Color" style water show built in). Today's Announcement Newly announced just today is the next nostalgic surprise: the park's singing mushrooms will return after being ousted by Paramount in the 1990s. The simple little garden in Candy Apple Grove looked like it just had plastic mushrooms, but every once in a while they'd "wake up," led by a pianist frog, and sing barbershop quartet songs. They'll be back in 2014 in their old spot, brought back to life by Garner Holt Productions. Here's a video of the originals: The rest of the park's 2014 plans are here and they promise more surprises are on the way. I think we can all agree that this bodes very well for all Cedar Fair's parks.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Mr. Hart basically use Six Flags as a "golden parachute" of his own to escape the financial black hole of Kentucky Kingdom only to turn around and talk a lot about how much better the park would be if he still owned it?