In our sociology class we are giving a report on the past couple of decades. My group is doing the nineties. My job is to show off the entertainment that the decade had to offer, and naturally I'm doing coasters. I have a lot of the record breaking ones, but I wasn't really old enough to know which rides were ground breaking and industry changing.

Can somebody help me out with the innovative rides and stuff like that?

First of all, cool project. Next, one record breaker in the 90s was Steel Phantom, it had one of the largest drops at the time.

Thank you, I did not have that one.

Was there anything in the 90s like Harry Potter at Universal was to our past decade?

Hmm... Well, at the very least, the 90's were a pretty big time for wooden coasters. You've got the whole Dinn Corp.->Custom Coasters->Great Coasters progression to work with. (Each was a product of the one before it.) Dinn was building some of the world's biggest and most innovative (for the time) wooden coasters, like Mean Streak and the original Texas Giant, towards the beginning. CCI brought on a new, modern twist on the wooden coaster, one where the ride didn't have to be the tallest but had many exciting elements and much faster pacing, like Raven, Outlaw (Adventureland), Cyclops (Mt. Olympus), and Megafobia (Oakwood). GCI, from the very little I've heard, wanted to specialize in twister-style rides, and thus got its start with fairly compact rides like Hersheypark's Wildcat, both the Six Flags Roars, and Busch Gardens' Gwazi. By the end of the decade, GCI modernized Prior and Church's train design for use on their rides, thus creating Millennium Flyers and constraining their ride designs far less. So, in 10 years, we've gone from Mean Streak being the latest and greatest thing to the modern GCI coaster, a pretty big industry change, if you ask me.*

You've also got the rise of B&M's to work with there, too.

(*Which, by the way, I don't pretend to be an expert on. Everything I said there is either based on observation or what I've read from other people online, so I might very well be mistaken in some aspects.)

Certainly one of the biggest innovations in the coaster industry in the '90s was the LIM (linear induction motor), which was used for the first time on The Outer Limits: Flight of Fear at both KI & KD in 1996.

EDIT: Since you mentioned Harry Potter, the greatly themed Islands of Adventure opened in 1999, just barely making it into your decade! And then there was the opening of WDW's Animal Kingdom in 1998 too.

I was going to say, Islands of Adventure is a great place to start. Spider-Man revolutionized dark rides and was astounding from top to bottom when it opened. Dueling Dragons is also a technology that came to a head then, with the precise train weighing that automatically adjusted brakes to have the two meet up. Don't forget Drop Zone opened in 1999 as the world's tallest gyro drop - still is!

One I would include is Batman: The Ride at SFGA: First inverted roller coaster.

One I would include is Batman: The Ride at SFGA: First inverted roller coaster.

You've also got the rise of B&M's to work with there, too.

As an unabashed B&M fanboy I have to agree with these two posts. From Iron Wolf in 1990 through Hulk and Raging Bull in 1999, there is a lot there to write about.

1993-Kumba ( Bush Gardens at Tampa)-the first B & M that I rode and I have been hooked since

1994 Raptor ( CP) -if I remember right was the second invert that B & M built after Batman at SFGA ( America that is.). Improved the experience by adding something that Batman didn't have which was the cobra roll, which is my fav part of the ride.

1996-Mantis ( CP) - tallest and fastest stand-up until Chang and later Riddler's Revenge. In my opinion, one of the most under-rated coasters but, what can I say, I love stand-ups. The floating sensation felt at the crest of the vertical and dive loops is sensational.