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Dreamworld have updated the printable park map on their website. Adding the grids and adding the list of attraction with height requirements and small description is good to see and should be very helpful for guests.4 points
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Liseberg https://www.parkz.com.au/attraction/liseberg This is the last remaining park I had to write up from my Scandinavian trip. Liseberg is a bucket list park for me, and it sure lives up to its reputation. It’s located in the nice city of Gothenburg. You can get there in about 3 hours from either Stockholm or Copenhagen. I was in the city early enough to take a stroll around the CBD and just walk a couple of km to the park (Though multiple tram lines go to the park too). (The spherical building is part of a museum next door) Even had time to do a lap around the outside of the park to gaze longingly at Balder, which was closed for my visit for track replacement. Was ready at the entrance for opening time, and had the app on my phone to take advantage of the virtual queueing system. Was quite a fairly day though. I was there from 10am till 11pm and did plenty of rides, waits often ranged from 20-60 mins. I’ll talk a bit about the park itself at the end of the report, but here are the rides. Helix Much Like other Macks such as DC Rivals, it’s an excellent, well rounded ride that combines lots of cool things. 7 inverisions, 3 really good airtime hills, a couple of launches, and it’s hillside location means you make some quite large drops and dives. And overall it’s well paced. In some ways though it represents the end of an era. If you’ve ridden a newer RMC, Intamin or Vekoma you’ll know how these days coasters are a bit more funky and dynamic, owing to advances in engineering. On the other hand Helix is very ‘traditional” (Like a good B&M), it’s all conventional elements done well, but I think now the coaster world has evolved, and something like Taiga is the way things are done now. Starts off with a drop out of the station, corkscrew and a bit of a drawn out turn. Theres a decent launch straight into a corkscrew, then it really picks up with a dive down the hill, airtime, another dive, a zero g roll, another airtime hill, and helix, all woven amongst other rides. That in itself would be a decent layout, but a 2nd launch sends you into an inverted top hat, another big dive, airtime hill. At this point the ride peters out a bit, with series of uphill S turns, and concludes with a heartline roll, but it’s nowhere near as agressive as the one on Steel Taipan. The queue is a sight to behold. The design brief was clearly “Make queuing an architectural experience”. EDM in the queue line pumps up the atmosphere a bit. Uppswinget S&S Screamin Swing. This is a ride that seems quite common overseas, but never quite made it to Australia. A shame because they are excellent. You get the huge swings of something like a Gyro Swing, but less nauseating, just great moments of airtime over and over. The position perched over the edge of a hill made it even better. AtmosFear A gyro drop without the gyro, and it was at a weird point in time where intamin was using their superman/surfrider type seats on drop rides. The queue line had a cool theme, sort of like a power station or nuclear reactor. What set this one apart was the addition of VR. This one didn’t seem to slow things down too much, I guess because it's only moving up and down, so less difficult to sync the ride movement. Once you are seated they just go around and offer a headset during the checking. Of course I gave it a go. Spoiler: it is like you are in an underground scientific research lab, and are being lifted up past this huge particle accelerator, as you reach the top, a wormhole forms and the machine begins to break apart, bits get sucked in, aliens come out and they try to attach to your face, but right as you are about to get eaten you drop. A bit of a freaky experience. As you are being lifted up you are so preoccupied with the footage that you forget how high you are, and it’s not until you start feeling the breeze at the top of the tower and the sun on your forehead that you realise “oh geez, im 100m in the air wearing effectively a blindfold” AeroSpin TailSpin crossed with Trident sums this one up. Seemed quite easy to get a continuous spin going, and again the hilltop location made for some great views. Lisebergbanan This one is excellent, so I did a few rides. It’s a terrain coaster by Schwarzkopf, and for such an old ride it runs very smooth. And operation are excellent too, with several trains pumping guests through. Loved the attention to detail in the queue and station, it was actually themed like a train station, right down to the daggy 50s terrazzo floors. The ride maintains a great pace from start to finish, with quite a spread out layout that you really cant get a full picture of from any one vantage point. The best part is where you complete 3 large circular drops in a row, like a enormous tilted helix, where you would keep lapping around uppswinget. Eventually the track peels away with more curves and helixes through the trees, concluding with a speedy finale parallel to the main park walkway. Onboard you got some glimpses of the custom family boomerang they are building too. Valkyria I love dive coasters and this is a particularly good one. One of the reasons they are great is they are so re-ridable, they aren’t’ too forceful, and the drop is fun. Couple this with a single rider line and I think this ended up being my most ridden attraction. The only drawback of the single rider queue is you virtually always end up seated on the right as you are the last in the row, so I did use standby once to get a left hand ride. The theming is fantastic, with the station even having a projection of a shadow of a valkyrie flying around, and a custom soundtrack that was dramatic viking music. From the station you head up a 50m lift hill, around a turn, and perch on the edge of a drop. Shortly thereafter you are released, drop into a tunnel, emerge into an immelman, then make a hard overbanked turn with a great near miss with the lift structure. From there you do a bit of a figure 8, with a zero g roll and a heartline roll on the way. This part is over a creek running through the park, and you get a fair bit of hangtime, making for an interesting experience. FlumeRide Most flumes seem to follow a format of float along, lift, medium drop, float along, lift, big drop, the end. The one at Liseberg was somewhat unique, owing to the large hillside. A huge lift takes you right to the top of the hill. then there is a long floaty section that passes over and under a few other rides, including very closely to Lisebergbanan, so dont stand up! But the finale is great, because all the final drops come in quick succession. You do a drop, splash down and lose a bit of speed and then before you know it there's another big drop. Spokhotellet Gasten This can be low capacity, so i queued virtually for it. It was quite a long horror maze through an old hotel. The jump scares from the actors are what you’d expect, though this one has really well done and elaborate rooms, through various hotel scenes that totally are not inspired by TOT at Disneysea 😛 Mechanica Many years ago I did Bling at Blackpool and thought it was okay, and all these years on the ride experience is still just as meh. The arm moves in a big slow loop, and you are seated on flipping rows of seats that are arranged in a fan shape, much like a top scan. But because all the rotations are so steady you don't really flip much and it just ends up being a whole lot of being high in the air awkwardly sideways. Underlandet Underlandet was a fun kids dark ride where you go through the underground world of the Liseberg rabbits. Starts of with a faux lift ride into an “underground” loading station. Bright and colourful and quite well executed. There was a bit of narrative of the villain (Who resembled a magician crossed with Robbie Rotten crossed with Oddwald) sneaking around trying to steal carrots but getting hurt in the process. The ride actually goes up and downhill over a couple of levels too so its more substantial than you'd expect. Funniest part was a scene with various rabbit animatronics sitting on thunderbox toilets, with containers below labelled “compost:” Kaninslandbanan Overhead pedal car thing, that I mostly rode to get some decent overhead photos. Carried the theme of the kids zone of “Rabbits making crazy inventions to grow and process carrots”. I quite like how they had made the ride maintenance bay a feature and themed it like a wacky workshop. Lisebergshjulet One of those big air conditioned ferris wheels like the one at Southbank. Was ok but it was right on the edge of the park so it wasnt necessarily the best for park photos. Good views to the city center of Gothenburg though! Liseberg Gardens Didn’t know this existed till I visited. A whole corner of the park is just a nice botanic garden, much like at Alton or Tivoli, with pleasant trails winding down the hillside, and even an old windmill. Stampbanan Tiny kids coaster near identical to the baby shark one at Luna Park Sydney Rabalder A bigger family coaster the same as the Chicken themed one at Djurs Sommerland. The station had some crazy invention theming, including a dripping bucket on the way into the station. Kallerado One of the best rapids I have done. Really nice leafy setting, and plenty of Colorado theming too. The rapids were dynamic, with quite powerful rapids, plenty of fountains, and heaps of boats, to the point that on the open water sections sometimes boats would bump and overtake each other. Clearly popular with the locals too, it had a huge queue, but thankfully I had a virtual queue pass. Jukebox Octopus ride, but with a very creative theme, so just had to give it a go. (Plus octopii are fun for a spin and spew) Krilstallsalongen Quite a short mirror maze, with a few illusion rooms along the way. What i liked is that the front of the attraction was window, so you could stand outside and watch this happening: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/nQjlipMs4cc Skepp o Skoj I’ve done plenty of car rides, but never a boat ride. You pilot a little electric boat along a course, but it felt like the steering has huge lag, so you ended up just bumping off the walls on the way through. Tempus Finally got to ride one of these newfangled Zamperla Nebulaz. I reckon every park needs one, right level of intensity for a family ride, bit of speed, bit of tummy tickling airtime, but it’s so hypnotic to watch. The cycle seemed to be that they would load one half, run it for a bit, stop with you at the top and load the other half, run it a little more, then you’d get off and the cycle repeats. I quite liked the aesthetic of this whole area. Yes its just flat rides, but it was so classy. Come to think of it, it’s just like the grand exposition are at Sliver Dollar City. So there you have it, 20 different attractions in 13 hours. I wouldn’t have minded riding the Loke gyro swing, given how good its counterpart Tigeren was at Djurs Sommerland, and that was the only major thing I didn’t ride. The park is one of the best out there, everything is such high quality. Even generic rides had really quite ornate booths and signage. The dining options were great, The buildings were nice. Operations were good. The virtual queue system wasn’t oversubscribed so lines kept moving despite big crowds. They even had some themed areas, eg the Viking zone, the Port Zone, the 50s zone, Kaninlandet, Luna Park etc. I reckon this is something they could lean into a bit more.. Have a look at the attractions and give everything a themed zone. Right now it's half traditional amusment park, half theme park. In terms of what the park needs, well it has such a complete lineup already. Perhaps an immersive indoor coaster or a dark ride for older audiences would be good. There’s no shortage of flats or water rides.... Photos here https://www.parkz.com.au/search/photos/location/liseberg4 points
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Was once Australia's largest theme park - now look at it!! It looks like a regional park in Victoria, only with less theming3 points
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2 points
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I agree and have expressed the same here before, but would add that not all dark rides are created equal and, in the case of the major Gold Coast parks, a fairly high standard for theming and immersion would need to be met. Something on the level of a Disney/Universal attraction would be infeasible given investment costs, but I certainly see the Scooby Doo ride at Abu Dhabi or Van Helsing at Movie Park Germany as a realistic standard. Beyond that, Dreamworld needs a water ride. Anything approaching the level of Phantasialand's log flume would be outstanding, but even a Mack PowerSplash would fill that niche. Movie World needs a thrill coaster heavy on positives and inversions. I'd go with either of a Vekoma Blitz/STC, RMC Single-Rail or Mack Big Dipper. They also need a replacement or supplement to Stunt Driver, and more "experiences" akin to the studio tour/SFX show. Besides the dark ride as suggested, I actually feel Sea World's current offering is pretty strong and covers most bases, especially now the Atlantis precinct is up and running. Would the Vikings site be large enough for a dark ride? If not, a couple more flats/supporting attractions would do me just fine.2 points
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+ Dreamworld Flyer and the splash pad. I don’t really think it is necessarily a bad thing though. They really are transforming the park while fixing past managements poor decisions. Sure it’s a lesser ride count but atleast it will now be quality over quantity, and they’ve already stated they have more plans for the next 5 years or so. It’s really nice seeing our parks get so much care and investment as of lately.2 points
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Because they're probably renting it \ pay per use, and they've brought it in to fill a gap while so much is under refurb. Heck, Soarin' brings back the 'Over California' film for the DCA food and wine festival, and only runs it for a limited time so maybe it isn't a cost thing and just a 'do something different' thing. Even if you consider the entire queue plus ride experience takes 30 minutes, this just doubled the experience time as you can ride twice with two different experiences in your day.2 points
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Best seat on the coaster in my opinion. First drop definitely took me by surprise when you get yeeted over the top of the lift hill2 points
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MW - dark ride in the ltrr/jds building. having jds take up that building is a waste and all of mw's crap can be dumped elsewhere DW - big shoot the chutes in the old rocky hollow plot. high throughput family ride that's been missing from the park for ages SW - dark ride in the vikings/theatre plot. sorely missed, park needs a ride to keep guests cool on hot days. WNW - slide wheel or tantrum like slide next to kamikaze or behind black hole. slide wheels are pretty cool WWW - lazy river in thunderbolt or gold coaster plot. park's lineup isn't complete without it Adventure World - family thrill coaster in the old castle plot. perhaps an sfc 450 or a maurer spinning coaster. park has too few dry rides that are in between high thrill and kids only Gumbuya World - drop tower or top spin. park needs a big flat Luna Park Melbourne - eurofighter. park sorely needs a coaster Luna Park Sydney - impossible to fit, but a star flyer. imagine the view. Raging Waters - technically cheating, but dry rides.1 point
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Here’s what I would like - seaworld. The line up at seaworld is really good at the moment they do lack a coaster that inverts but I think they need a VR replacement first. They have room where corkscrew was and where VR sits. I would like to see VR get a tribute or a restoration. Keep the castle and everything and have it basically run the original course through the towers but have a dark ride bit inside the castle first so you come out of the station go around storm where there’s still trough then enter the castle and then loop back around and go up the lift through the towers and drop down. Either with new trough or restore what’s there. - movieworld. Needs a decent dark ride. Either replace JL or put it somewhere else. Not sure where but they would find a spot. MW doesn’t have a proper coaster that inverts either but I don’t think it really needs one. -wet’n’wild. Needs a speed slide like one of the 3 that was on the Mack 5 tower. Or something really unique in the spot left of kamikaze. -Dreamworld. Needs 2 things a good water ride and another ST level thrill coaster. But the rule is one each park so with people still not at ease about the rapids ride I wouldn’t go near a water ride for a while. So I would pick a RMC hybrid/topper track to rival DCR. They would then have: RMC - DCR . ST-SE . GC - GL. GD - BWSS . And that’s the big ones down Scooby beats MC and there’s not one thrill flat ride imo at DW that’s not better then DD. White water world - this park has a really good line up one of those racing half pipe slides that look like a kind cobra would be cool. Luna park Sydney - room is very limited. Off the top of my head I can’t really think of something that they fully need. I haven’t been there since the rework so it’s hard for me to judge what they need. Maybe just a few clean ups of some areas. luna park Melbourne - this one is the most unrealistic probably but if they shuffled a few things around they could actually fit a sky-rocket ll into the park. Someone else on these forums figured it out and it would work without removing any major attractions or buildings. But it seems like LPM is run more as a “look how amusement parks used to be” then a competing park. Which is totally fine it’s one of the best examples of a classic amusement park in the world. I do wish they kept the jet-star though. adventure park - a next gen vekoma like fonox would be dreamy. Gumbuya world - could also use a next gen vekoma preferably a launched one or maybe a intamin mega lite Fun fields - this one is tricky they have a great slide line up. I haven’t actually been here but I think a Larson drop tower would be a great fit. magic mountain NSW - home to Australia’s oldest steal roller coaster I believe. Maybe a mini gerstlaur euro fighter like adrenaline peak at oaks park in Oregon. green valley farm - another little slide would be fun Raging waters Sydney - a twister slide would be great. adventure world - intamin mega lite or a N-G vekoma suspended thrill coaster i think thats all the parks I can name off the top of my head.1 point
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1 point
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I remember Bounty's Revenge used to do that - test cycle right at like 9:58am or so so everyone lined up waiting for the gates to open was watching it. it was a nice shot flying over the top of the entrance gates1 point
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And attractions like Dreamworld Flyer will do exactly that. Second to Jungle Rush, the Dreamworld Flyer is the attraction is what I’m most excited for out of all the announcements they made. It’s going to transform the front of the park. And when they open the doors to the park they should just have it testing, so it adds energy as soon as you walk in. The jet stunt show they had in the fountain over the summer added so much energy to the front of the park it was fantastic to see. And while I’ll miss the fountain for the nostalgia of it, I’d much rather this attraction. I’m just hoping they blow us away with the presentation of it, so it blends in with its environment.1 point
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HAHA! I completely ignored the SE helix and figured you meant WOO. d'oh!1 point
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Perhaps the roof could be cantilevered so that it can open in the event of an emergency quickly allowing all the smoke to escape in one go (and they can install fire sensors in the eyes of the cars too) He is right that venues have fire systems that you can use haze with. I feel as though he might not be right about how hard it might be to do it for scooby - as given the level of investment they've made, I feel as though we'd have seen more smoke\haze in the room with the lighting upgrade if it were possible not that hard to do so. It is very apparent that there is some sort of obstruction preventing them from easily increasing the haze level in that room.1 point
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