Marc

Open dates for 2019 are out, nice to see less closed days and a couple extra fright nights!

Whilst it obviously don’t appeal to all they’ve had more engagement on twitter than any of the other merlin parks since they closed for the season - so I can see why it don’t appeal to all but it’s also not necessary a bad thing..

Aha I remember when they reduced fright nights till 9pm! For me: Saw Alive - solid maze, well themed and still draws the crowds. Living Nightmare - it’s not going to go anywhere, to be fair to it it’s probably the best themed maze Thorpe have had, it needs some serious work on its ending though. Platform 15 - this is again a good attraction when the actors are on form, but like living nightmare it needs work on its ending which has always been inconsistent at best. Blair Witch - This year Blair witch wasnt bad IMO, they got it much more “forestry” than it was in the past and that worked well, merge this with Dead Creek, and it’s back to a decent length too. New: Big Top - this is probably one of the parks best mazes they’ve had - would really like to see this return. New concept - preferably not an IP, an original concept maze (inside) be that on the beach or over behind swarm in a Marquee New maze in IAC - with some work they could make a pretty decent jungle themed attraction, no need for the hoods but it would take some work to certain parts to work as a fright night attraction.

Thorpe have launched details of their 2019 season pass which looks to be replacing the TP annual pass. £55 for the season with normal summer weekend / Fright Nights exclusions, they are also selling a parking pass for £21 which is decent value too but has the same exclusion dates. https://www.thorpepark.com/tickets-passes/annual-passes

Glad I’m not the only one who noticed this ! I don’t think it’s either but I’m sure someone will work it out!

For all the bad things said about this years event, there were positives to be had, Big Top Showtime was great - yes the maze was much better but I don’t see the show as a replacement for the maze, but the show on its own worked well, and was very effective, they were also good whilst they were roaming the park. Amity high again, very good, really would like to see something like this return. Audio was also better this year, it was good that areas got individual tracks back, I’d like to see more next year, this year the flats all kept their normal music where as in the past all rides had their own FN tracks, would be good to hear this again. As for new things, I’d like to see at least 2 new (proper indoor) original concept mazes - one of them maybe the big top or 2 completely new ideas. Would like to see more park wide theming.

Lets be realistic... Would be nice to see parts of the park tidied up, queue lines repainted, paths jet washed and maybe even a colossus repaint? Conformation on Loggers leap would be good either way. Would like to see work on audio too, work at Stealth is good but parts of the queue are still dead, colosus queue is awfully quiet too which would be nice to be addressed!

Fastrack on here is always considered as an “issue” though - in reality If the park weren’t forced to close the pretty much all their coasters for the evening the would of been fine for the most part (busy sure but that’s expected on a day like today).

Fastrack / Capacity / Mazes / Lack of Milk wasn’t the problem tonight - the problem was having to close all their coasters in temperatures which a few years ago would have been fine.

I think the problem Alton probably have is if the pods were of a too high spec they would potentially compete with the more expensive huts in EV - which they will want to avoid. I think people will want to stay in the pods, they aren’t not luxury sure but they will certainly do a young couple / family for a night, the same ones who would have usually spent their £70 on a hotel down the road not wanting to pay the higher hotel prices at the park.

You’ll always get better value for money at an off-site hotel, that’s pretty much the case for any sort of entertainment value - whilst I agree they are not the best rooms in the world - it’s a good alternative to the more expensive rooms available which I’m sure many will take advantage of.

Towers pods are on site - Premier Inn's are opening in Cardiff City Center surrounded with competition, thats a fairly significant difference. Didnt people think the Thorpe Shark was a terrible idea and destined to fail?

Will be really interesting to see how this works for them - I can see it being pretty popular if it’s priced right - it’s also another attraction helping capacity which is always a good thing!

I think they are going the right way here - as accesso is more and more pushed hopefully more and more people can use mobile ticketing, self service machines like at the eye would help too.

With Fright Nights well underway the 31st is fast approaching - the park have started some very early marketing for 2019. A sign has gone up over the exit and a page has been setup at https://www.thorpepark.com/2019 to sign up to be the first to hear more information on 2019. So what would you like to (realistically) see for 2019? I’m not expecting any new attractions for next season and that’s probably a good thing - the park can really focus on what it has and going from there. For me id like to see: Clarity on Loggers Leap future - if it’s returning or not I think this really needs to be decided / communicated. General tidy up - it’s fairly obvious, but there’s bits of the park which need a good tidy up, some queue lines are looking tired and need repairing / painting, buildings particularly around Angry Birds land could do with a lick of paint too. Fixing up of theming - the park over the last few years have come on leaps and bounds in this department, Infernos has its waterfalls back, the mist is working more times than it isn’t after years of nothing, Tidal Waves sign, water tower work to a degree, the effects around The Swarm are mostly working and Saw finally saw its blades fixed, and seeing this continue would be great. Colossus could really do with seeing it’s pit cleaned out and if possible a solution to the issues it’s had with its fountain since it opened - it really looks great when it’s working, more work over at tidal to get both the Sign and Water tower fully working would be great too. Audio - again, recent times we’ve seen a lot of good progress with audio, I know some replacement tracks are controversial but I’d say the park is sounding much better now than it did 3 years ago. I’d like to see more here, Stealth and Tidal Wave have seen a lot of work on their sound systems and both sound great, would like to see this continue, Colossus / Lost City has dead speakers which would be good to hear working again, the Bridge Speakers have had better days too and could do with replacing. Wouldn’t mind The Swarm having a new IMAscore track too (hinted in the entrance track). From there would like to see general volumes abit louder, particularly at the entrance. Events - whilst the year of the walking dead / Love Island Lates have been fairly controversial on these parts I think events over the year is a great thing - even if the theme isn’t for you (Love island isn’t my thing but I loved the 10pm closes!) and more of this next year would be great. Fright Nights - obviously this is a hot subject at the moment, I hope next year we see more investment in Friht Nights, it would be great to see the big top return, along with at least one more all new indoor maze, personally am not against IP’s for mazes if it’s the right IP and is done well, but generally prefer original themes - the ideas they can come up with are usually just as good. It’s also important to learn and evolve the good parts from this year too, The Big Top show time, whilst not anywhere near as good as the Big Top maze does a great job in the dome, the roaming actors this year in Amity and the clowns are also the best I can remember. That’s my lot for what I’d like to see in 2019 - what would you like to see?

I’ll say no more... (And I know it don’t excuse for problems now!)

First hints for next year - sounds like we will see events over the season similar to what we did this year. Fingers crossed for more late night summers!

The Swarm was testing most of today - fingers crossed for opening tomorrow

Much like towers do during fireworks, the park have bought in additional food units to help with the peak crowds over half term

Whilst imo it’s still not the best attraction - it’s a lot better now with some part of it not being hooded. The annoying audio constantly saying to not remove your hood has also gone now thankfully. Big improvement on what it was.

More changes on the ride - the Zombies in the cages on the last block brake run now fall towards the train when the trains stopped, in the exit there’s a new cage with barrels which move and bang against the cage. In the queue line the barrels behind the fence seemed to be trying to do something but didn’t seem to be working tonight. Nice to to see the continued improvements! I do wish the smoke machines could be re-adjusted to fire at the train as they did when it first opened!

https://www.merlinentertainments.biz/investor-relations Merlin’s summer update is well worth a listen - some interesting points about struggles staffing the parks in the south east with hints they may look at the pay structure.

Thats not quite true - Tidal Wave finally has music back in its queue line and station, Stelath has had it’s plaza speakers which were removed put back into place and the rest repaired.

There’s a lot of focus on WWTP which is a shame as a lot of the park wide audio is quite good - as has been mentioned the Colossus track is probably my favourite - especially in the station (video below) although I did notice sometimes the normal track plays - I don’t agree with there should be one / two tracks park wide - even with speakers not working during normal season we have themed audio for the areas and it works so I think it’s good this year we’ve seen the areas go back to having their own Individual Fright Nights tracks. Goung back to WWTP I do see what it’s trying to do though it is subtle - back in 2006/7 maybe we had a fright night themed WWTP which had Halloween songs between the standard Big Bob voice overs which worked but was pretty cheesey. Agree with comments on the lighting - would be nice to see the LED lights set to just one colour in the areas which they are used. For all the bad points regarding the mazes this year one good thing to come out of this year IMO are the roaming actors, the guys over at Amity do a great job of generally being pretty freaky, always interacting too which is nice to see. The Big Top clowns also I feel would have a lot more praise if they weren’t a “replacement” for one of the best mazes the park has had, on their own the show does a pretty good job of scaring anyone in the dome and causing general havoc in there whilst when there roaming park wide they do a good job - it’s just a shame it’s at the expense of The Big Top. There was also a Zombie Flash mob there on Saturday - saw some videos which looked good hoping it returns next weekend! Overall for me id say the biggest problem with Fright Nights this year is the lack of a stand out attraction - we’ve always had one (The Asylum, Cabin, Big Top) where even if you had bad run throughs on the other mazes - these are almost certain to deliver, this year im not certain what the headline attraction would be.

I think WWTP is overall quite good - there’s one bit where the “wwtp radio” jingle has been edited and sounds slightly odd but that’s the only real bit I’d say don’t sound good personally. Song choices are down to opinion, as has been said the songs on there now have a meaning to the vocals, I can also see an argument for a more Halloweeny choice of songs (although could argue this would be too cheesey) but overall I think it’s a nice idea - it’s nice for the individual areas of the park to have their own themes again instead of the same loop playing across the whole park as we’ve had for 4 or 5 years now.