Baconjack
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Posts posted by Baconjack
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5 hours ago, themagician said:
It has indeed @rappa but for as long as I’ve been going to the parks, I don’t ever remember getting queue wait times like this, even in the peak of summer. Or is my memory deceiving me?
DC Rivals had a 4.5 hour queue during the Easter holidays last year. It did only have one train operating, but can you remember in any GC parks history, where a ride has got that sort of wait?
As pointed out by other people waiting more than 2 hours for tower of terror was normal 10 years ago. Same goes for Superman before Rivals got built
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7 hours ago, STRAWS said:
talking about Movie World losing its magic look at this
Credit Thats so mid
This is absolutely ridiculous in my opinion. I know it school holidays and it will be busy, but this isn't even safe with how many people they have let in imagine they had to do an evacuation. Also 3-hour ques for the rides Village may be pocketing the money now but Movie worlds reputation is going to plummet. they need to limit the numbers. Dreamworld is so much more fun to be at not just because of the ques but the staff are so much better to.
To be fair if scooby and green lantern was open the crowds would be much more dispersed. Everyone likes to rag on dreamworld for having a low ride count but at the moment down the road isn’t offering exactly a lot either, you have a major that’s going to be down until 2025 and another one that they struggle to keep open and isn’t open currently either. A giant line for doomsday is quite sad to look at really but that’s a consequence of poor planning.
Would be just another summer school holidays day at movie world if both were open otherwise which is not good by any standard either. You can say “Oh village’s reputation will slide” and that’s a fair argument for locals but at the end of the day most visitors are interstate and will go to movie world anyway, or go to dreamworld as well. That’s why village can get away with this kind of stuff even if it means ripping people off, because they’re usually only visiting once a year at most.
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2 hours ago, themagician said:
According to the Energex website, power has been restored for WWW, so I wonder if the park will reopen today?
Gold Coaster is no longer listed as down on the website so potentially given both share the same grid
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18 minutes ago, themagician said:
Didn’t they just spend millions on refurbishing it?
Yeah in 10 years or so when it will most likely need it again hence why I said
1 hour ago, Baconjack said:Dreamworld should be realistically throwing money at Giant Drop if they need to in 10 years
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Just to set some boundaries on which land is allocated to the main park (as per the recent zoning changes to the park), this would most likely rule out big brother & blue lagoon as they have been rezoned for mixed use.
All said there's still 3 key spots around the park for development:
- Rocky hollow spot
- Trolls village/thunderbolt/flowrider spot
- Wipeout/chill out zone spot
And there's also a few rides reaching end of life in the next 10 years (gold coaster, gingys gliders, potentially claw & giant drop) and a ride in need of change (motocoaster)
With all this considered here's what I would say for each spot (in no particular order except for the last bit)
Family ride on the rocky hollow spot - a water coaster that's more flume than coaster (think journey to atlantis) would be really nice here as any water rides in the future need to be differentiated enough from thunder river to avoid comparisons (but that goes without saying)
Major coaster in the trolls village/thunderbolt/flowrider combined plot of land. Call it thunderbolt 2 if you want it to, would love to see a small scale dive coaster on that site (think dr diabolical's cliffhanger or iron menace), Australian first, crowd pleaser, within dreamworld's budget (as of late) and ultra reliable. Ticks just about every box and worth the price tag
Gold coaster inevitably removed and used for WWW. I'd say it's probably got 10 years max left in it. The land it sits on is prime real estate for WWW expansion, could easily fit a lazy river in there as that's the only gap really left in that lineup. All said though you could easily put the dive coaster in this spot & put the lazy river in the thunderbolt plot if you wanted to properly flesh out WWW (as was planned several years ago)
Flat on the wipeout spot - i like the idea of the nebulaz. Would love a screaming swing in australia but is not happening in that spot because of clearance issues re: claw and tailspin
Motocoaster renovation to integrate it into rivertown - we'll probably see this sooner rather than later I think they just need to see how such a project fits into the budget.
For later down the track - Giant Drop is approaching 30 years old and Claw is nearly 20 years old. Dreamworld should be realistically throwing money at Giant Drop if they need to in 10 years as it is their one prestige attraction. If that necessitates removing the old ride system and building another one on the same tower - then so be it (they've already done the numbers for a falcon's fury conversion so it's possible). Realistically Claw has about 10 years left in it, I think this is a straightforward like-for-like replacement with a new generation gyro swing (such as Goliath at adventure world). Further gingy's gliders will need to be replaced by then, so use the opportunity while it's gone to rip out the tower station and expand dreamland.
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1 hour ago, New display name said:
Cam someone explain to me, what @Baconjackis saying.
Will explain again:
Sky voyager - delayed multiple times and opened nine months after expected timeline
Steel taipan - delayed and opened a year after expected timeline (You could blame Covid for this one but no one was for New Atlantis)
Giant Drop renovation - delayed a few times (from memory was meant to be completed end of 2022 could be wrong though)
Years is a bit of a stretch from me but the point still stands regardless. If we’re taking the piss out of village for failing to stick to timelines (rightfully so) then it’s only fair to point out this is standard practice for parks on the coast even if we finally got some rides open on time for once.
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3 hours ago, Levram__ said:
Village projects aren’t cursed, they just need to learn to stop prematurely putting a date on things… DW’s approach over the past few projects is the perfect example of managing the opening of a new attraction. Benefits with both the consumer expectation and assists with the operational transition.
"Past few"
Yeah sure two of their biggest post-2016 additions have been delivered years after their original opening timeline. This isn't even discounting stuff like giant drop's renovation which was pushed back consistently as well. Bit of a recency bias showing here.
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2 hours ago, Rivals said:
i still can’t believe they were going with a 60m tall funtime star flyer and we ended up with what we got.
Can’t they not build at that height?
I was under the impression that sea world has to build things within a stricter limit (whatever council mandates for the spit)
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Haven’t visited but it and Japan are the first countries on my list when I’ve got enough money to travel.
Something I would mention is that if you want to visit Everland I’d advise travelling later on in the year as their major coaster (t express) is allegedly going to be down until April/May
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8 hours ago, themagician said:
Unfortunately that seems to be the case. I’m sure they’ll tweak it more, but @Ogre just posted a video of staff riding it and this is the puddle at the front of the queue area
You’d think maybe a drain in that section of the queue which collects water and recycles it on the water jets would reduce water costs & eliminate this problem entirely?
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7 hours ago, Tricoart said:
According to auscoasters on Instagram, however, a circular concrete base has been poured in what’s described as ‘a rectangular plot’, which they’re theorising to possibly be for a new flat of some description (they predictably mention the possibility of a Screamin’ Swing, due to the rectangular shape of the plot).
After their last ride they built for them came within a bees dick of killing people I highly doubt Village would buy anything from S&S again
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And a tiny one at that. The process of commissioning the ride would probably take longer than the construction itself
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1 hour ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:
I think the colour scheme works well during the day, and boosts the lighting package at night. testing has shown they have kebab shop sequences, but i'm hoping that it's just for testing and we'll have it toned down for usual operations.
Why even lol if you’re going to turn the lights on surely it’s not that difficult to jump on a computer and change the setting to make it light blue or something. These rides have programmable led’s, Luna park’s one is set to be all one colour to fit the vibe correctly. They really should be setting stuff like this up now with a few weeks until opening
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10 hours ago, Michelangelo said:
WB also have DC Kids which could include Teen Titans Go! Or DC Superhero Girls.
Ssshhh people hate the existence of Dc at mw
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1 hour ago, TBoy said:
I think the problem with that is that licensing rights go through the BBC, not the ABC IIRC, so it wouldn't be the same bundle that Dreamworld got for things like Bananas/Play School etc.
That’s correct but you’d figure given it’s a local brand and very in at the moment you’d be more than keen to get them on board. Dreamworld has spent plenty of money for licenses before look at Dreamworks and Nickelodeon before that. Plus with bluey you could have integrated that with the existing ABC kids land or developed something totally new.
Instead dreamworld renewed its deal with the wiggles rather than going after bluey. Not a bad choice at all and better than nothing but it doesnt take a genius to figure out that bluey would have been a far better ip to drive gate numbers. Though they could certainly add it in the future given there’s the tower station sitting behind that area which can be cleared for an expansion down the track
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30 minutes ago, themagician said:
If it was up to me, I would complete a staged refurbishment of the whole land (except for Marvin as it's new and they gave RoadRunner some love a couple years ago). I would keep at least one of the driving attractions and despite being the oldest, I'd probably keep Speedy because the Drive School is such good real estate. They could create a whole new Looney Tunes indoor land and be inspired by what was done at Warner Bros World, Abu Dhabi.
Giving road runner “love” is putting it very lightly they bought new trains, ripped out a third of the rockwork and replaced the cool old sign with a boring 2d one straight from their sign printing machine.
Apart from doing that (which nerfs the ride and doesn’t improve it) adding Marvin & driving school and getting rid of the hut what else have they done to that land? It’s been 15 years (and even longer for most of it given how much of the land was built in the 90s) I would flatten that section bar road runner & Marvin and start again from scratch.
Bring back the looney tunes village name, get rid of junior driving school and put an air conditioned dark ride back in that building, put speedy Gonzales out of his misery & the other rides in that left section that are quickly approaching 30 years old, then start over again-
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Now imagine if dreamworld decided to sign a nice little exclusivity deal to put bluey in that new freshly relocated ABC kids section they have instead of the wiggles
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11 minutes ago, Ashley Jeffery said:
I doubt kids are walking around pointing out the roofs. It's a kids area and still the best themed one in Australia. Remember this isn't Disney and the key demographic they are targeting is kids.
“It’s a kids area” is not a valid excuse to explain away abject laziness because there’s no longer licensing standards that the park is bound to. People will walk past that ocean parade section to get to serpent slayer & tiger island it’s not just kids. Neither is the “not Disney” excuse our parks in the 90’s did what Disney could for half the price.
I suppose Nickelodeon Land doesn’t exist either and you’ve conveniently forgotten that
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59 minutes ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:
With such a massive hole in their lineup with the losses of so many of their big attractions, perhaps retro throwbacks to old rides in Dreamworld might not be the image you want in the public's mind?
Of course, then you have the big issue - obviously you have to NOT produce thunder river merchandise, but then it's absence leaves a hole in the product lineup... what to do.....?
Two of the three rides I mentioned have already been replaced (indirectly but that’s beside the point)
Thunderbolt - gold coaster (if punters on Facebook think that despite them running next to each other for a couple of years then that is what goes)
Tower - Taipan
Wipeout - chairs, yeah you get the point on that one.
Obviously you’d avoid thunder river (or anything in gold rush country for that matter) with a 10 foot pole but that goes without saying. It’s a good opportunity to make some extra cash though you’re not spending much to make shirts. Though the case is strong especially when the current batch of investments are complete and there’s not so much of a gap in the lineup anymore. If dreamworld is happy to change their logo back to the 80s one then I think they’d be happy to make some thunderbolt shirts.
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1 hour ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:
I don't think it's fair to suggest that current management are like pre-2016 management at all - for starters the big implication there (which you probably didn't intend) is that current management is perhaps being unsafe, taking shortcuts or risking peoples lives - when I know for a fact Dreamworld has a current emphasis on making safety the very first and primary consideration above all others (which is why I think we do sometimes see things like pool fences etc. that maybe weren't entirely necessary).
I know what you're getting at from a themeing perspective though. I agree with you that the chinese rooftops should have been taken down, but as they stand currently, it doesn't look terrible. Yes, Dreamland has given them freedom to leave some things 'as they are' with some small changes to signage, but rather than being lazy, i think that's a clever way to tackle the problem on a budget. They have, and continue to plus the area as time goes on, so while things like the chinese themed roof is unlikely to change, I don't think we can call a final opinion on the land until its... well... final.
Yeah I certainly didn’t imply the safety part. Anyone would have done what current management are doing, I mean the operations of old management really speaks for itself - I’m not looking at it from a day-to-day operations point of view but rather from a presentation and capex allocation point of view. Even old management would sprinkle in some minimal theming - look at tail spin & hot wheels as examples. How are they any different to let’s say giant drop & taipan. It’s inoffensive sure but is still quite boring, this is a theme park, not taronga zoo. It’s almost the polar opposite of what’s on offer at the spit (although general upkeep is a different story entirely)
Also the budget argument is a perfectly valid point - dreamworld are spending most of the cash on Rivertown- but give me a cohesive land over an extra flat or 2 any day of the week. New rides can be added later on in a stage 2 - but you need a good foundation first before adding new stuff (and not the other way around) which is what this refresh should have been but unfortunately misses the mark in that regard slightly..
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It was terrible when it was new so can't imagine it later on in its life. As said previously it was the little brother to aqualoop and it showed. No back mats made it uncomfortable to ride as you felt every single transition between the slide pieces at high speed.
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On 24/11/2023 at 7:49 AM, themagician said:
I had already expected a Dreamworld redevelopment, but I think Dreamland has turned out to be a nice project, and has allowed the kids area to become more complete. The theming and immersion isn’t quite to the level of Dreamworks, but I still think it’s turned out well. And having seen the overall layout of Rivertown, that’s made me even more excited for its opening.
Current management did what the pre-2016 management would have done - remove logos, repaint buildings & rides while making minimal changes and called it a day. When there is no IP and by extension no standards to follow they can do whatever they want. Hence why there are ancient chinese facades in ocean parade & fantasy buildings in kenny & belinda's dreamland.
Some parts of the land are done better than others, I think the splash zone and the dodgems are done quite well but I think that the park could have little more ambitious in removing traces of dreamworks from that corner of the park to make something totally new as opposed to a debrand.
All said its very clear to me they are spending the bulk of capex on rivertown and I think this will turn out much better because they're flattening abc kids world and starting from scratch, so just a case of wait and see. I am certainly optimistic for that if anything.
On 27/11/2023 at 6:31 PM, djmcbell said:This genuinely interests me far more than the Wizard of Oz are at MW.
Wizard of Oz I feel gets unfairly denigrated because one of its key coasters can be ridden in Victoria.
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8 hours ago, New display name said:
Did you not ride TOT before DW slowed it down?
To be fair it didn't go at the speed advertised for most of its life. Only footage i've ever seen it reaching the top is very early on in its career.
Speaking of tower, why doesn't dreamworld make merch for its past attractions like other parks around the world do? I didn't see any on the website, though I haven't visited in 5 years so things could have changed since then.
I bought some vintage thunderbolt and wipeout hats off marketplace the other week and they look quite good. You'd think those three rides would be great candidates for retro shirts (which is in at the moment)
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9 hours ago, STRAWS said:
White Water World has removed the wedgie from the website. it's been closed for 2 years now.
They have done a silent removal and sign for it in park has been scraped Aswell I believe.
What are your guy's thoughts?
Boxing Day 2023 Parks CLOSED
in Theme Park Discussion
Posted · Edited by Baconjack
If that’s true then what is the point of making the effort to re open it then if it’s all going to get demo’d in a few months?
Reckon we might see vintage cars closed until Rivertown opens