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PKI's only "new" ride for 2004 closing


teenageninja
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personally i think it blew.

I rode it and hated it.

Short, choppy, and kinda dumb.

maybe they should format the IMAX Nascar movie or somthing.

or just not put Nascar in a darn good park.

left turn...........left turn..........left turn......right turn WRECK!

lol...oh come on, Yogi

southern accent/ Do it for Dale! #3! Gone but not forgotten! /southern accent

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I don't get people who don't see a good ride when it's right in front of them...

You mean Days of Thunder? It is a decent ride, but not great. I said I would have liked to have seen it again, but AT is not one of the can't miss attractions at PKI. They could easily tear it down and not be missed. Ok, so the kids would be upset over Spongebob, but they could put in another attraction that is themed to Spongebob.

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I found out from one of the attendants on Friday what everyone here has already figured out: Action Theatre Days Of Thunder is closed for the rest of the season due to low attendance and SpongeBob 3D will be the only film shown. SpongeBob was okay, but I would have ridden DoT anyway.

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If they added some live effects to the Spongebob ride, it could be made even more enjoyable. I believe several Six Flags parks added the Spongebob ride this season along with live affects in the theater. Having just returned from four days at Disney World, live special affects can make the show a lot more thrilling. A Bugs Life, Honey I Shrunk the Audience, Muppet Vision 3D and Mickey`s PhilharMagic are all 3D movies. They don`t utilize the Iwerks seats like Spongebob, but they feature live affects like wind, fog, water, smells, bubbles and sometimes live actors. These special affects really make one feel as if they are experiencing an attraction instead of just watching a movie. I know PKI will never be on the same caliber as Disney (there attention to detail in theming is unbelievable and makes TR:TR and FoF look pathetic). But since it is going for the Hollywood theming it would be nice to get the ride experiences similar to Disney. Theming does add a lot to the overall ride experience, IMO.

I am a little sad that DoT is closing as I haven`t riden it again. I really wanted to ride this classic ride again. I am actually a little surprised they closed it down this early in the season. Also, like others have said, the park missed an opportunity to advertise this ride. They could have gotten people interested about the ride, but they didn`t. I wouldn`t have even known it was returning to the park from my visits to the park this year, had I not visited this website. Oh well, it won`t be that big of a loss to me. It`s not like they are closing a ride that has been operating since the park opened more than three decades ago.

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personally i think it blew.

I rode it and hated it.

Short, choppy, and kinda dumb.

maybe they should format the IMAX Nascar movie or somthing.

or just not put Nascar in a darn good park.

left turn...........left turn..........left turn......right turn WRECK!

Seems to me like someone is racist against NASCAR /sarcasm laugh.gif

Personally i like Nascar and for those that do like it, it was a cool movie, unfortuneatly there werent enough people

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Well, I finnaly gave in to my "no posting" policy, after 10 years of restraint, to say that I, for one, thought DOT was the best action theatre had, as far as excitement from start to finish. Also I agree that the low attendence was in no way due to the lack of interest, but rather the lack of advertising for DOT. All the signs say Spongebob in the park maps, and even until you get up to where the line splits in half. As a worker at PKI for 2 years, and a huge fan of my home park, I have to say somebody may have missed an opportunity here. Anyway, bombard me with slams or whatever, DOT was a great thing back in the day, and I'm glad I got one more ride on it in it's short rerun at PKI.

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I think the clousure is such a huge disappointment because that ride is the closest anyone can come to actually riding in a stock car. Some of the old cast members of Phatom Theater appared outside of the Paramount Action Theater last October. In retrospect, it was a harsh omen of things to come.

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Actually Adventure Express is one of the most popular rides in the park, it was the first ride to have 10,000 riders or was it 100,000 I don't remember. Possibly even 1,000,000.

I was wondering when someone was going to correct that misconception. It's a toss up between AE and The Racers (depeding on whether you count The Racers as one or two rides). AE simply has a high capacity, so as soon as you enter the station, you're almost ready to board a train.

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I remember being disappointed in '93 when other Paramount Parks got the simulator (DOT) and PKI did not. Being a big fan of BTTF @ Universal, and considering that this was Paramount's initial push into theme parks, I expected an attraction of similar scope. So, on a business trip to Charlotte I made a special trip to Carowinds just to ride DOT. Boy was I glad that PKI got Top Gun!

I was really disappointed in DOT. It *could have* been a really cool attraction. I think what really hurt it was all the recycled footage from the film, which completely caused the rider to lose the "first person" perspective. That completely defeats the intent of an immersive simulator. You'd be driving along and have a reasonable facsimile of movement, then all of a sudden the camera would pan to the outside of the car (or even worse, shots of the crowds in the grandstand watching your car). Keep in mind...this was a car you were supposed to feel like you were riding in. I believe I rode it once the following year when PKI installed it, hoping that the attraction had been improved upon. (But, it was the same thing I had ridden at Carowinds the year before...)

Spongebob is ok...at least the film stays in the first person perspective, and is somewhat immersive. My only problem with Spongebob is that I've ridden it twice (last year and this year), and both times the 3-D seemed somewhat out of sync causing the film to be blurry in some parts.

"Jimmy Neutron's Nicktoon Blast" @ USF is also a Nick-themed simulator. It's a better "ride", but isn't in 3-D. I also heard that some of the Six Flags parks that had installed Spongebob this year added accompanying theater effects (in effect creating a "4D" attraction). Some other parks have done some cool things with Viacom's characters...

Joel

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Actually Adventure Express is one of the most popular rides in the park, it was the first ride to have 10,000 riders or was it 100,000 I don't remember.  Possibly even 1,000,000.

I was wondering when someone was going to correct that misconception. It's a toss up between AE and The Racers (depeding on whether you count The Racers as one or two rides). AE simply has a high capacity, so as soon as you enter the station, you're almost ready to board a train.

Won't we be able to conclude a lot about AE and its ridership due to it being down to only two-car operation? I thought I heard it was only running two cars I might be wrong. I personally love AE, almost better than Racer.

They should have definately advertised DoT. There were probably some people that were really sad when it was taken out and then to make a comeback after so many years....that would be pretty cool for them. Or maybe I'm just speaking for myself. I got excited when I first heard the news but I guess I'll be ok now. I like nostalgic experiences, even if they aren't real great.

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Actually people can drive a real stock car. It's called the Richard Petty Experience and travels across the country, but it is based in Las Vegas. They visit the Kentucky Speedway at least once a year.

but that is way to expensive and most cannot afford, so like he said, it is the closest most people could get to actually being in a stock car

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Dated? Flared jeans are dated, 80's rock is dated, heck, even all the coasters in PKI are dated. There are no recent state-of-the-art designs for coasters at PKI: Suspended, Arrow-looper, Arrow mine train, Wood terrain coaster, Junior coasters, Boomerang... Just because a ride is dated doesn't mean people don't want to ride it. Why do you think the Scrambler is still there? How about the carousel? I'd be interested to see how many people ride that. I'm not saying you should take any of these rides out, but just because a ride doesn't have great showings in capacity numbers doesn't mean it should immediately be taken out. PKI only did it in this instance because of the nature of Action Theater. They can change films and shows cheaply on the fly. That's why DOT was taken out. Hopefully they will just do a publicity stunt, and herald back the welcome return of this classic PKI ride later in the year, this time with some ADVERTISING.

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