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Yeah I'm so so against this. The one thing I always banged on about is how once you pony up your hard earned cash to get in the gate, the parks really were a magical getaway where class was removed. Low income families could escape being the 'have nots' for a day, and didn't have to stand there as the rich people passed them in the 3 hours queue. This is a sad time on that front. It's been a few years now (cough cough) since I was at Disneyland however it was around the time they rolled out the new app based fastpass (admittedly it was $30 a day) and it really was a fantastically set up thing. But it didn't make you 'plan your fkn magical day' before you even got there. That's once thing I really hate that they've done with the parks over the years, spontaneity is one thing that makes a theme park visit fun. But it's Disney and there is no parallel, so we will all piss and moan about it, and then as soon as Scomo opens the damn gate we'll rush out it and back on a plane to give them all our money.

Do we think there's room for a 'Hurray For Hollywood' style event themed to Halloween that could run leading up to Halloween? It could operate similar to Disney's Magic Kingdom event where there's no mazes or anything, but a big Halloween party. Take the regular parade, have it at night and feature 'zombified' characters or something similar with additional fire dancers, scare performers and have trick-or-treat stations. It could be a more adult parallel to spooky nights with drinks and cocktails, and then run the rides at night. It would have significantly less overhead and I feel wouldn't be a huge financial strain.

They could’ve even done the old trick of having it under maintenance until they can announce a new attraction

It must be hard trying to find angles to make a much shorter circuit seem like it's an upgrade. New carriages is one way I guess. I've said for years that they should close the station at Billabong Cafe and Rocky Hollow and have it not stop at Main Station for 10mins like they currently do. With how short it is they'll almost need to leave Billabong station in to try and trick people into thinking the ride has a bit of length to it.

The one pictured is the DW ToT. Intamin's modern day version of the ride is this one at Ferrari World. The loading is faster with the switch track and also the cars have greater capacity with both forward and backward seats. BUT when you compare the ride to the new Coaster coming to DW, this new version of ToT really doesn't have anything that the new Coaster does + another one trick pony is not what DW needs. I wish they could have come up with an affordable and effective way to salvage ToT, sadly 2019 is one for the DW history books.

Than Arkham, I assume? Yeah look, different for everybody I guess. For me, Buzz is just too short. It's Surfrider with a bit more track and an inversion. It's a one-trick pony. Reminds me of Marcel Vos' half corkscrew coasters. Storm is way better themed, but just not that exciting. I know an SLC is an SLC, but honestly they're a staple across the world, so clearly popular enough, and with the Kumbak train I think we have one of the better ones. The VR adds to it too. Now, i'm not Push, and i'm not going to sit here and claim its the best on the coast - I agree its near the bottom of the list - it may even BE at the bottom - all i'm saying is I don't think its a clear cut "easily" at the bottom as was made out.

https://www.goldcoastbulletin.com.au/business/dreamworld-ceo-greg-yong-says-cashedup-company-is-planning-new-major-attractions-for-park/news-story/2d6991d18ea55af33584d6a14a64422d Here's where the images came from. So yeah unfortunately I haven't found a live CCTV feed - though that would be greatly appreciated should we have access to one. If the link fails to load the above article, use this: https://www.news-mail.com.au/news/dreamworld-shopping-for-next-ride/4244246/ Should you fail to see ALL CCTV images posted in the earlier post, a simple Google search of "Steel Taipan CCTV" should do the trick

I think I saw from somewhere that the clue for the Trick or Treating station at BuzzSaw reffered BuzzSaw as something that sounds like a bee and that it can saw a tree down or something. Maybe BuzzSaw will be rethemed to something like that. It would also kind of make sense to retheme the ride with that subject if the new coaster is called “Steel Taipan”.

We visited Alton in 2010. Th13teen was a fun ride, quite enjoyed it. Air (Galatica) broke down as it did, but we waited. Really enjoyed that sense of flying. Spinball Whizzer was fun, agreed on the movement of the structure, it was doing that in 2010! Oblivion - remember getting up the top, thinking the view was amazing and then "oh sh*t, why am I doing this" on the reverse chain at the top of the drop. Exhilarating as you plunge into the darkness, but all that energy gained is wasted with the shortness. A real one trick pony. Ran out of time for anything else, never got to ride Nemesis. 😩

I don't want 2 MW's theme parks on the Gold Coast. It must be pulling someone if it's been running for years now. That ship sailed when WWW was canned as a park. WWW is nothing more than Blue Lagoon on steroids now. It's obvious it’s currently not Gold Rush. DW don’t have a plan so what do you want DW to say? Do not do this. Do not spend all of DW's money on a one trick pony while the rest of the park sucks. LOL, who's in the "I'm to cool crowd"

Isn't there a tax depreciation trick by leaving things SBNO?

I think this is the one time that you can say Dreamworld isn't really at fault for that ride being a pile of crap that now needs to go. Whilst we can argue they should have invested in a proper coaster and not some cheap one trick plonk it down and go model, they seem to have gotten fairly screwed by a terrible design and manufacturer. It seems about as well designed as the Giant Inverted Boomerangs really. About the only thing you can fault the park on is their usual cheap ways to save a park style of trying to run it with a single operator and sacrificing capacity to do so.

Yeah, you are missing things. Those two rides are leaving as they were not popular. Flow Rider was an upcharge attraction and not meeting expectation. Also being in the wrong place most likely didn't help its cause. BRC (wave to wags) seemed to be losing interest within the last 18 months. It also seemed maybe the ride was seriously outdated (as we know) and was going to cost too much to revamp. Hence why it been removed also. As for the comment about "Duplicating", It appears they are looking at what the attractions provide given how popular they are. So if we look at Vintage cars VS BRC they both a are driving attractions. But Vintage has a much higher output per hour over BRC. Think of all the set theming may be and the maintenance required to keep this attraction going. If it is not super popular then why keep investing in it. Especially if it is run down. They are also looking at the future when it comes to duplicating. You don't want a park full of a bunch of Shockwaves. So I think this is what they are trying to look at and achieve long term. Avoid trying to have the same pony tricks as much as possible. It was also interesting to here they know what is popular within the park, But most importantly they also know what is not popular.

Probably needed to be replaced and Village did their old trick of just removing it, not seeing any value in it.

The trick is to do it during the day so people don't notice 😊

So I just got back from a visit to Abu Dhabi. Unfortunately I only had time to visit Ferrari World. Here's a quick trip report. The park itself is quite small but well thought out. The theming is very impressive throughout. Some of the things that the park did well: - Lockers/Storage of loose items was FREE for every ride. If you got a locker you got a wristband to wear whilst riding - Whilst on Formula Rossa you were provided with glasses to wear due to the speed, this was a great idea! - For those who wear glasses you were provided with "goggles" to wear on all rides so you didn't have to take your glasses off, which is another great idea! - To cater for those who wear traditional headdress they also provided special hoods to wear over your headdress, which I thought was a great way to accommodate the local cultural dress. - Food was acutally quite cheap. A slice and drink cost about $14AUD and the pizza was surprisingly good. OK some negative things: - I understand that Ferrari is a premium brand but merchandise prices here were ridiculous. I bought a fridge maget as I was given a 20AED voucher but it still cost me over $10AUD. T-shirts started at about $80AUD, the most expensive item I found was a leather jacket for about $1900AUD! - The opportunity to drive a Ferrari is available and costs about $300AUD, which is reasonable IMO, but it is on the streets around Yas Island, so you are limited to about 60km/h. There's the F1 racetrack nearby which would be so much better if they could use that so you could actually drive a Ferrari how you should drive a Ferrari, FAST! - Unfortuantely I don't think that this is a full day park yet, unless it was busy. It only took me about 2.5 hours to ride EVERYTHING once. Yes it was somewhat quiet the day I went (The only ride with a queue was Formula Rosa at 40 minutes, yay for free fast passes!). That being said they are constructing more rides at present (Including Mission Ferrari, their new coaster which looks amazing (I got a sneak peak inside the show building where they are building the dark portion of the ride, no photos unfortunately as they were moving a crane through the door and opened and closed it pretty quickly)) So the 4 roller coasters: Formula Rossa Is fast of course but was so much better than being a one trick pony. The long low helixes were great and the hills provided some ok airtime. I'd much prefer to ride this than the one trick ponies like Kingda Ka and TTD Flying Aces This was quite good. Lots of speed and airtime over the hills although it was already getting a bit rough and bumpy unfortunately. Themeing for the ride queue was amazing except for a small section of the Silver/Gold queue which is just a staircase. Turbo Track This was really dissapointing. Slow and a bit meh IMO. You can either go forwards or backwards, but not both. Doesn't feel particularly fast or thrilling either. What worried me most however was watching the spire from the queue, that thing wobbles a LOT in the breeze. I think they would have been better using the space in the middle for a really tall drop tower. Fiorano GT Challenge So much opportunity that has gone to waste. They duelling coasters have no real "near miss" opportunities which was dissapointing and there is a lack of banking on some turns, which make the ride quite bumpy. I went on everything on offer and found that most of the attractions were well themed and thoughtout. The Viaggio in Italia was great so hopefully Dreamworlds new ride is of a similar quality. Overall the park was great to visit. It was expensive but worth the day out. (I've submitted some pages to be added and removed from the Ferrari World page here on Parkz as some rides are missing and or closed)

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/sales-delivery/non-delivery-of-products-services#failure-to-supply-a-product-or-service Suggests that they shouldn't be taking the money. Gyms are in the same boat right now. Our kids swim school tried this trick over Christmas "we'll take your money, and give you make up lessons for the lessons that aren't operating over Christmas". One of the mum's researched, rang them up, next week we all got forms to apply for the hold to be made.

I really think that Dreamworld kinda has to go back to the drawing board as a park, there are signs that perhaps this is what they're already doing behind the scenes. Put simply, they're not going to be able to be anywhere close to rivaling Movie World in terms of thrills for quite some time and will have to focus on something different to get people through the gates for the time being. It does seem like something they're doing, which gives me hope. (Keep in mind a lot of this is my own opinion on what makes rides fun/thrilling, so of course there's going to be subjectivity here.) It's not just now because of DC Rivals that Dreamworld are behind on thrills, their lineup was inferior long before this. The only rides that stood above MW equivalents are the Claw and the Giant drop. Now don't get me wrong, I absolutely love these rides, but if I was given the choice between those two and MW's best thrill rides in Superman/Arkham, I'd have picked MW every time, maybe even just for Superman alone. Although I will admit that I'm probably more scared on Buzzsaw than any other coaster in the country, it doesn't deliver on the fun side of things even when compared to something like Green Lantern. TOT is just not that good, maybe if the park was empty and I could get lots of repeat rides I'd have a good time with it, but whenever I've ridden it has been a long wait for a slow launch to put me halfway up a tower with a bit of floater air that I could get over and over again on the claw at the other side of the park which rarely has that long of a queue. Wipeout looks way more intimidating off ride than it feels on ride. There's not any real forces involved with it, it just lurches you backwards and forwards and sideways a bit, and sometimes you flip upside down. I could go on and on for every other ride but I'll save you the trauma. Now that DC Rivals is here it has pretty much cemented my position on this, and with dreamworld as they are at the moment they're not going to be able to compete in the thrills market. I really want dreamworld to be successful, and I'm happy to be quite patient with them. But they're not going to be able to survive as a legitimate rival to MW forever unless they step up their thrill ride game some time in the future. I totally get that the right thing for them to do now is go back to their roots as a park and get that all fixed before they can build anything massive. Also, for the love of God, if they didn't spend the last decade building one trick pony cheap ride installments they'd probably have been able to build something incredible. I think once dreamworld starts to enter the rides market again they should really actually think about what they're building instead of seemingly picking any random pre built rides and placing them wherever there's empty space. It's like they're playing RCT career mode, and just picking whatever cheap flat rides will only just get them to reach the scenario goals, instead of actually being imaginative and building something truly unique to dreamworld.

What do you mean? I've already mentioned that - at least after the first ride, i'm usually looking anywhere but where they're making me look, to try and see how things are done, or look behind the magic. Its just the person I am - I want to know how the magician does the trick.

It’s normally the kiss of death for a trip report if you post it at time when bigger news is happening, so after waiting it out, it’s time for the next instalment from Japan. Parue Espana – Shima Spain Village https://www.parkz.com.au/parks/JP/Shima/Parque_Espana_-_Shima_Spain_Village/ (over 200 pics published in the Parkz gallery) This place is in a bit of a pain in the butt location at the bottom of a peninsular on Ise bay about 90km South of Nagoya as the crow flies. However it’s over a 2 hour train ride because its so mountainous. I got to the town of Ugata (the station used to reach the park) the night before after my day at Nagashima Spaland. I did this by getting a bus from Nagashima to Kuwana, then using a Kintetsu limited express train to Ugata. The train is a bit pricey because you have to purchase both the base point to point ticket, plus an additional surcharge ticket to cover the fact its limited express. A word of warning. If rain is forecast, you’re probably better off rescheduling if you can. Neither Pyrenees nor Gran Montserrat run in any sort of rain or spitting, so you’ll end up doing a lot of waiting around if the weather isn’t good. In hindsight, if I was planning on doing this again, I probably would have based myself in Nagoya and daytripped rather than trying to work in a loop through destinations / parks and had a spare day. Would have meant the option to shift things around, plus return to Nagashima for re-rides (A subject for a future trip report) The park is quite good, and if you are going here, there’s really no need to visit Lagunasia. The main reason for Parque Espana is of course to ride Pyrenees, a superb B&M inverted coaster. There was a brief break in the rain earlier in the morning so it was testing when I arrived. However it started raining again so no dice. The day started on Iron Bull , an indoor coaster with some over the top restraints and a couple of lift hills. Moderate drops and helices abound. At the midpoint you come to a stop in a boiler room themed environment where there are a few special effects and flashing lights. Kiddy Montserrat was my 600th coaster since still no Pyrneees. I did like the Gaudi theming. The park did seem to make an effort to stay on point. The section it was in was probably the emptiest feeling. Batalla Del Alcazar Adelante was nearby. Like that magic powder ride at Lagunaisa, its a revolving dark ride, except the vehicles always stay facing towards the middle, where there is a big diorama in the middle of the ride where you shoot killer centipedes. What set this apart was the way the vehicles could slide back and forth on the spot, bringing you closer to the middle of the turntable. There was also an Alice in Wonderland walkthrough where you were given a magic wand to interact with some rudimentary effects. Credit to the girl running it for reading out a full english instruction card for me! Illumination Ride Nutcracker was also up this end of the park. The classical ballet soundtrack gives this ride illusions of grandeur, in reality its a detuned version of its a small world, with 2D sets and lots of fairy lights. Had a chicken katsu curry here for lunch: With no signs of the rain abating, I made my way down to the lower section of the park. The place is quite impressively themed, and carries that mid 90s vibe when theme parks seemed to be at their peak. One hidden gem everyone bangs on about is the Escalator ride. Flashing lights meets spanish pop music. It was ok, and yes probably unexpected for most guests. Down the bottom is slow boat ride called Feliz Cruise. It used to lead into a full on dark ride, but they chopped it short and now it's just outside. As well as big sets it had some funny dioramas too. There was a ship you could have a wander around in. There was a low key funhouse called Choquy's Mystery House. Not much in terms of physical obstacles, but plenty of optical illusions. One i thought was cool was a false hallway that actually turned out to be a prisim type shape pointed towards you when you got a bit closer. The main attraction at the lower end of the park turned out to be Don Quixotes Magical Flight A peter pan rip off, and probably of similar length, with some good production values. I decided to hoof back up the hill, where you pass through a Spanish Village. If i had been smarter i probably would have gone downhill through the village and come back up via the escalator. One of the buildings had a trick art exhibition. Back at the top of the park and still no sign of Pyrenees opening, so I delved further into the park. Grabbed some Pizza in the main street. Japanese style with Teriyaki chicken, seaweed flakes and mayo, This section was an entire indoor kids area. More Gaudi stuff I saw there was a 360 cinema, and here I got a proper dose of Japanese eccentricity, being treated to the most surreal kids 3d movie i have ever seen. I had no idea what was going on. It was a couple of kids wandering around in a spooky forest with seemingly random wierd stuff going on. It was all in Japanese of course, so even more baffling. I thought perhaps that would be the end of it, but a couple of weeks ago, I found who produced the film, and there's an english dub! https://www.thejuice.com/#https://www.thejuice.com/portfolio/hansel_gretel/ The linking seems to be wierd, but its the 45th movie in the portfolio: Skip to about the 4 min mark to see how im not lying about the wierdness. Hmmm, what else to do in the park. I was gonna wait till the very end to make sure i got on Pyrneees. At one point it seemed like the rain had stopped and they had commenced testing, but nope they got a few laps in before halting again. Arrrrgh. I had a good look around the Spanish museum in the park. The highlight was a cinema showing 80s stock footage from Spain that had evidently been produced just prior to park opening and never updated since. I did a re-ride on Don Quixotes Magical flight.... (Photo not good enough for database, but at one point you went under the sea) I also took a wander through the Fairytale village they had. I had been keeping a keen eye on the rain radar all day, and it looked like the last of the rain bands had passed over the area, and right on cue Pyrenees commenced testing, so I parked myself at the entrance...If i was gonna get a ride, i wanted to snare the front. After around 45 mins of testing, and with about 90 mins of park opening time to go, Pyrenees opened, to some high fives with a couple of locals and the attendant who had seen this funny foreigner waiting out to ride this thing. In the end I got 3 laps (front row, a back row, and then another near the back) until i had to leave, would have happily done more, but beggars cant be choosers, and i was thankful to have not missed it, the memories of missing both Eejanaika and Ultra Twister still there. As for the ride? It's mental, and lives up to the hype of being one of the best inverted coasters. Steel first drop, a loop that whips you around, a good zero g, another tall, but tight loop with plenty of force. The ride then really shines when it takes a downhill left turn at full speed into a trench and does a cobra roll with plenty of kick. From there it does a forceful helix, almost like a horizontal loop. The latter part of the course is a bit more drawn out, but still fast, doing a corkscrew along the way. For good measure theres actually a bunny hop right at the end that gives a good bit of air....enough to elicit a few screams on the train anyway. So there you have it, i came, i saw, i conquered. Last but not least i got a single lap on Gran Montserrat. Again, would have liked to ride more, but i had also been closed all day, and with the time till i had to get my bus it was either another go on this or a 3rd go on Pyrenees. Normally mine trains are slow and crap, this one isn't. It was built by mack, and just blitzes through the course at high speed, with heaps of helices. The only other that comes close is Mine Train Ulven at Bakken. I skipped the flume that runs through it due to the cold wet weather. As the sun set rapidly i got a night ride on Pyrenees before heading to the exit. So yes, definitley try to get here. Its worth the trip. Pyrenees is one of the best coasters in Japan, and the rest of the park is good quality (Abeit a little stained, though in better nick than Lagunasia) In normal circumstances, i think you'd be done here in 4 to 5 hours if its quiet, though with my bad luck with the weather i stuck around all day and spent a bit of time sitting around.

Because he's talking out of his ass Ive not ridden TTD but apart from Xcellerator I've not found anyone who doesn't rate superman as the most powerful launch. And Superman is certainly most solid attraction of any of the accelerator coasters given its more than just a one trick pony. Xcellerator is of course a whole different beast. There is nothing like that launch except maybe dodonpa

Both of these parks are small stops you can make when sightseeing around Tokyo. Both accessible via multiple rail lines. Tokyo Dome City https://www.parkz.com.au/parks/JP/Bunkyo_City/Tokyo_Dome_City/ Home to the famous Thunder Dolphin, a hypercoaster in the middle of a city. As far as the layout goes, the drops are impressive, but it is let down by a lack of airtime, and the ops are a bit sluggish, though they were running two trains at least. The weather was cold, so they have hot air blowers in the station aimed at the wheels to keep everything running warm. Basically you head up the cable lift, a decent first drop (I was 2nd row) , overbanked turn, then a bit of a speed hill on top the building where you get a tiny bit of air, then a good overbank and drop through a hole in the building, yet another overbank through the ferris wheel, another longer, more drawn out speed hill. Next you curve up onto the roof of the building and do a bit of a trick track....essentially a straight bit of track with a few banked kinks in it (up here they could have easily done some bunny hops to spice it up) . Finally there is a curved drop off the building into a set of brakes, so the train is still carrying heaps of speed at the end. It's absolutely worth a ride, but at the same time its B&M levels of hypercoaster excitement. I would have done the ferris wheel but the light was dissapearing fast so I wouldn't have been able to photograph much. Panic Coaster Back Daaan was a great suprise. I thought it was just a Gerstlauer family boomerang clone indoors, but it's not, its very unique. Imagine something like Firechaser Express where the station is a dead end with a switch track. But what makes this one different is there is no 2nd switch track partway through the layout to reverse the train (Like in firechaser where the factory explosion scene is) Instead the track feeds back into the switch track at the station, so you arrive back in the station facing backwards. So the ride starts off with projection onto the walls and floor of the station with a cartoony bomb bouncing around. It detonates and you are launched into a layout like this in darkness. When you get back into the station, more projection and another cartoon bomb, before you are launched out backwards into the course a 2nd time, but this time all colourful orbs light up the ride area and mirrors on the wall make it feel like a kaleidoscope. The backward launch of course means you are reversing into the station at the end, so everything is reset for the next group of riders. I was out of energy so i didn't go looking too hard to find the Dive shooting dark ride, I did a lap around and had a look at the dark ride area before calling it a night. Hanayashiki https://www.parkz.com.au/parks/JP/Taito_City/Hanayashiki_Amusement_Park/' This park is another small easy to visit one, and the reason to go is because it's the oldest park in Japan and hosts the oldest coaster in Japan. It's right in the heart of Asakusa, next to Senso Ji Shrine and Hozomon Gate and Nakamise Shopping Street, so you'll probably end up near it anyhow. It's also in walking distance of Skytree. Kicking myself I walked right past this without realising it was a small madhouse/haunted swing ride. The park really does feel like it was decorated by the old lady in the fibro house at the end of your street. It feels a bit like LPM, what with the coaster doing a lap around the park, and the abundance of Zamperla flats. Roller Coaster was fun, fairly brisk, it only does one lap around the park though, so not that long.

Even if it's bigger, i think if they were to put a hyper in, it would just scream copycat. they need something that really says 'i'm different to whats down the road' without being a one-trick pony. A really nice woodie or hybrid would suit this perfectly.

In terms of thrill ride offerings, until Rivals opens, Dreamworld has Movie World totally licked. There's just so many different flat rides, some of them iconic legends (Wipeout) that to say Movie World's lineup of thrill ride attractions comes close is hyperbole. It's not a poor offering by any stretch of the imagination, and even when Rivals opens, it won't be poor, it'll be at best out of date. Talking specifically about roller-coasters though, Movie World's had Dreamworld licked for years. Sidewinder is a second hand, out of date 90's coaster with the smallest inversions on any major coaster in the world, Buzzsaw is a one trick pony, Tower of Terror, one trick pony, and the rest are either universally panned as awful, they're closed or a kid's coaster. Movie World has a world class launch coaster, world class wild mouse coaster (until they stripped it and said nothing since about it), an interesting albeit gimmicky El Loco coaster, a stock standard inverted coaster but with a unique helix and world class VR setup and a kids coaster. TLDR, almost every major coaster Movie World has brings something world class or unique to the table. Dreamworld's coasters are just not up to the national standard anymore, let alone the international standard.

Yeah, that seems like too much work for so little payoff. If we were talking Shanghai Pirates or Haunted Mansion, then by all means. Outside of that, why use an expensive trick for something that can be done cheaper, and without jarring guests eyes when 3D real life all of a sudden becomes a 2D dome screen.