silver2005

Batman has darker stories and themes to work from that, IMO, works better to add a dark ride or elaborate queue than other heroes. I think with Flash, you could do some clever lighting packages to give the feeling of speed in queues or on ride. Having the themes play in the station would help too, especially in the cases of Batman and Superman. SFGAdv wasn't perfect on theming either. Their Superman Ultimate Flight and, at the time, Bizarro just had a few images of comic panels and character history in their respective queues. I do like what they did to retheme Bizarro back to Medusa though.

I would also like to add to the opinion that I would be alright with any DC theming being added. Granted I've only been to one Six Flags park in SFGAdv, but I thought what they did on their DC line up was pretty decent, at least on par or in some cases better than any of CF's attempt at theming. I really dig the queues for Batman :The Ride and Dark Knight, and while I didn't get to ride it back on my first visit in 2000, I did go through the queue of Batman and Robin: The Chiller and was okay with that.

I'm for just taking the TRTR box down and doing something more akin to Rivertown there like a decent water ride or a flat ride.

As much as I'd hate it, I wouldn't blame them in all honesty and SFOT is in dire need of a big coaster. They haven't had a big installment since New Texas Giant.

I feel this is another knock against going with coasters with a 100+ mph launch speeds- low lifespans. I have heard random unsubstantiated swirlings of Superman at SFMM also being eyed for removal.

Another thing about not having AE open at Winterfest- Arrow brakes hate any sort of precipitation. That's why they always go down during any significant rain.

I might not do a TR on my visit for the 90% last day, but I'll throw out a few observations- - Mystic Timbers was absolutely HAULING at night, it's the kind of ride I've been hoping for as it's aged. Hopefully it's not too much of an outlier - Loved the marches and Dixieland music in Coney Mall, please keep that KI - The KI Haunt music lineup is abysmal this season - I hope the lighting at night was only indicative of Haunt and not during normal operations and they just didn't change it to normal lighting out of convenience, otherwise- the park needs better lighting at night.

You guys, Winterfest has already started.

The park playing marches in Coney Mall for the last full operations day was not on my bingo card.

My giga rankings are as follows- 2. Fury 325 8. Millennium Force 10. Orion 15- Project 305 I was fortunate to ride Fury 325 on a particularly hot and humid day, which, I am of the belief that makes steel coasters run faster, so Fury 325 was absolutely hauling the day I rode it and blew me away. I feel Fury's first drop is almost identical to Orion's, but everything after those drops is better on the Fury side for me. Orion feels too much like a scaled up hyper to me (and I have a bunch of the hypers I've ridden ranked above Orion because they have more meat to them despite being around the same length), I want a little more layout creativity and low areas that help give you a sense of speed when you're going that fast, which is why I have MF as my 2nd favorite giga of the ones I've ridden. Fury has those low seeping curves between the 2nd hill and the treble clef turn around as it screams above the entry. MF has some nice drawn out parts close to the ground with a lot of trees around as a reference which lets you appreciate its speed (especially at night, MF is the best night ride of the gigas I've ridden). The length of Fury and MF also put them on top for me with both being over 6K ft long. I will give Orion some credit as it has 2 giant hills in the neighborhood of 200 ft that get you up at a good altitude while also incorporating a good mix of laterals and airtime and the helix is decent. Project 305 is my least favorite. It feels like a 2 trick pony to me. A decent first drop as trick one, and a high speed course as trick 2. It's the least re-rideable of the 4 I've been on for sure. It does get pretty intense, but there isn't much else to it than that and with so much of the rest of the ride being so small and low to the ground, it felt it was over too quick. The transitions are a bit too quick for my liking as well (not as bad as Mavrick's quick s-curves to me, but still not appealing to me, and yes, I think Maverick is good but overrated).

Kings Dominion's FB page did just like a random coaster fan page who posted the leak, so they might not be all that mad.

If true, did Dan Snyder return to Six Flags and is naming things as well as he named his former football team?

Something with a horse comes to mind...

The other thing about SOB that makes it worse for me is that it practically had modifications done to it every year (including multiple modifications in single seasons) of its existence and still had the incidents and dwindling ridership, and on top of that, no company worth a crap (GCI, CCI, etc) would touch it and it all had to be done in house, including the loop removal work in 2007. Werner Stengel even designed SOB and I've heard he distances himself from it when it's brought up.

As bad as the TTD incident was, Son of Beast had way more of them (not just limited to the 2006 and 2009 incidents), so its SOB being worst by a mile. TTD had a far better safety record. RCCA were complete frauds in my book. I actually respect Intamin and Zamperla. They've done good work aside from TT2. All of RCCA's coasters are/were garbage. I should also correct something- the loop on SOB wasn't the problem. The 2006 incident happened in the first helix and part of it was lighter trains that made the track flex less, but the lighter Gerstlauer trains that replaced the heavier Premier trains weren't approved to do loops and probably couldn't due to the lack of weight.

^I like Kings Island more, too, but I have the opposite problem- if there was an opposite side of Ohio from Sandusky, I'm pretty close to that point. I live 5 minutes from the Ohio River and about 40 minutes from the Indiana boarder. It's a good 4-5 hours to Sandusky for me depending on how driving through Dayton and Toledo go (I go north up I-75 and east on OH Route 2).

I posted a picture of the repaint in the KD wing coaster thread, and its going to get orange track and black supports which leads me to believe it may be a tiger theme.

So the last year for me has been rough. I got diagnosed with a major digestive condition which required a lot of various treatments and patience to get better, and I had to leave my job thinking I may not be able to do Skyline again, but then got better and returned to another one after much struggle (finding a job was SUPER stressful), but I got through it and finally found grounds for some stability again. Got a gold pass that'll eventually have all the odds and ends (still waiting to get dining and a big maybe is all season FL as I plan to do CP next season but KI and CP are looking to be my only 'normal' CF parks next year). Anyways, I knew I was doing at least 1 trip to KI this October and I already had it in mind to do Fast Lane regardless of crowds. I have a really fun October lined up this year on top of that with a few band/concert gigs, probably doing Blink in a few weeks, and possibly other shenanigans. Last night was kind of the way to get the ball rolling. So I got there at about 6:05 as traffic on I-71 was sus, and I came straight from work at the Skyline in Ft Wright (just south of Covington). Got my pass processed, got the FL bracelet, and made a bee-line for Banshee as I wanted to knock it out given the 1 train situation. Well, I lucked out there as at the time, the FL line was absent and I got up the stairs right as they were about to load the next station full and nabbed a front seat ride. Made my way to Racer and Orion, meeting up with @pianoman for a few hours and eventually got to the Rivertown trio. It was quite crowded as well, very packed midways and fairly long lines. The one I knew of for sure was a fellow rider at Beast clocked it at 90 minutes for the main line with the 3 switchback sections opened. Some rides felt they were taking a bit long to load and unload as I did pick up on a lot of trainees through the visit. The FL lines weren't bad except for the fact all those users gravitated towards Beast. The FL line fluctuated to being as short as just down the station stairs, to as long as the curve the exit takes around the first set of switchbacks. The next longest FL line I saw was MT, DB and Orion being just down their respective stairs. Even FOF's FL line was really short. Drop Tower was the only non-coaster I did. I felt the coasters were running rather interestingly. This could be the fact that it can take me a few rides to get used to the forces again combined with me taking my first rides while the rides are a few months warmed up, but a lot of coasters felt they were running pretty hard and fast last night (in a good way). I got some good ejector air on Diamondback near the front and even a little bit further back. I also felt the trims were taken down a notch as the section after the 2 trims was really forceful as well that night. I'm bummed Banshee was in its state as it was running really good for the 1 ride I got, and MT was really wild. I got my usual Beast 1-1 ride out of the 3 rides I got on it and it was pure nostalgic bliss for me. I also felt the fog machines affected the weather a bit as the air felt more humid at the tops of the coaster lifts and felt cooler closer to the ground, especially for Drop Tower, Orion and Diamondback. Mystic Timbers felt more wild given, again, this was my first time riding it in nearly a year, it was running fairly fast, and the fog machines + night made it near impossible for me to anticipate things, in a good way though. Didn't do any mazes as it's not my thing, but the fog machines were set to 11, pretty thick in places. The scare-actors were fairly nice for what they are and I kinda liked the more chaotic choice in music, especially in Coney Mall. It also warms this amusement park history buff's heart to see people genuinely enjoying Racer again. I know we harp on the park for various things, especially this year, but I have to give kudos to the maintenance department for always doing stellar work making the woodies run so well year after year. I know its particularly hard with wooden coasters, but the re-track on Racer and Beast are holding up great and even though MT is entering its aging phase for GCI's, its one of the better GCI's I've ridden given its additional age factor from a ride quality standpoint. Also nice the shed stuff still works. Overall great night, something I needed given what I've been through lately, and hopefully a sign for a great October for me.

@pianoman and I spotted smoke coming from outside the front of the park in the direction of Congo Falls and Timberwolf. Has anyone else here seen it or know what it was?

I got to KI at 6:05 ish and lucked out on my timing for Banshee as there was no FL line yet and I walked up the stairs right as they were loading the next train and got front seat.

So it's a wee bit crowded tonight, Beast FL queue 2/3 of the way down the exit.

Diamondback is running nice and fast tonight, getting good ejector air this evening.

Along with the wing coaster, Project 305 seems to have a repaint underway- orange track and black supports. Perhaps a tiger theme? Pics courtesy of Carowinds Fans Only via Facebook. (go figure).

Hopefully, SIX gets Vekoma to build this faster than Flash at NJFTP.

Might want to let them know SOB's loop is taller than Mystic Timbers.