Marc

Dont think you can read to much into that, a marketing department are there to try and make more money for the place!

I'm not sure if they've changed the wheels or somthing recently but my last 2 rides have actually been quite smooth.. Was quite surprised tbh!

Maybe people actually enjoy storm surge? To be fair it's the perfect ride thrill wise for the new target Thorpe seem to be aiming at

I must agree with Ste, as much as I dislike the ride Saw is quite well themed when compared to the other coasters on park, the interactive bit inside / station are very well done IMO.

Sorry I meant the Octopus Gardens rides it replaced are ones you would expect to see in a town centre

Just something what I've noticed more and more recently on not just these forums but various forums about the UK's parks is the slating of Merlin and it got me thinking are they really that bad? I know people don't like things such as paid fastrack but these are things which have been around way before Merlin got involved with Thorpe / Alton / Cwoa, and what business sense would it be for them to come in and but that what must be fairly high revenue stream? I think Merlin have actually done a pretty good job with "The big 3" of our parks since they took over.. At Towers we've had: Mutiny Bay - Much better than what was previously there, well themed and good area IMO Thirteen - Whilst possibly marketed wrongly, its a pretty fun ride which id say generally is well received Nemesis Sub-Terra - It wasnt great at opening, but they listened to feedback and its a decent little attraction now The Smiler - Its problems are well documented but its what the park needed and the public seem pretty happy with it - Along with that X Sector had its re-ferb too. Thorpe: Saw - The Ride - Possibly the parks most successful attraction, it has its critics (including me) but again its a ride the public seem to love Saw - Alive - Was more of a bolt on but it continued the Saw theme going into another year, it offered a different experience to what the park had on offer for a couple of years, its themeing is actually pretty good too. Storm Surge - Ok... its far from great, it looks bad, but is it an improvement on the rides you would see in Staines town centre? Probably.. The Swarm - Pretty much what all enthusiasts wanted from Theming to Marketing the entire thing is pretty well executed X - Since ive followed the parks I think X:\ No way out was always getting a retheme in that closed season, it finally did, Loud music, Lights and a lower hight restriction to start appealing to a wider family market, its not amazing but its a a vast improvement. Along with that thorpe have seen investments in areas which matter with the park looking and running much better than it did pre Merlin. Chessington: ( I dont really know a great deal here!) The Hotel - Pretty decent investment, its a nice hotel inside and out and is pretty popular Wild Asia - Replacing the tired beno land area, a vast improvement Africa Retheme - Area looks so much better now than it did previously Zufari - Its opened up a previously unused area, fits quite well into the target of the park Whilst this year hasn't been CWOA's finest Merlin do seem to be spending money in the right areas in replacing theming across the park which needed doing (not by fault of their own) Along with this, the annual pass is pretty good value for money when you compare it to other annual schemes, whilst its alot more expensive than back when I started visiting (I think a Tussauds annual pass was £70 then!) you do get an awful lot for your money now. The parks all also seem to have a pretty good future planned for them too, with continued investment in them all, I do genuinely feel Merlin get the blame for a lot more than is really down to them, IMO the parks are in a MUCH better position than they were pre merlin.

Yes you can, last time at Stealth Diner and Amity Kebabs

AP tickets are only valid along with an in date annual pass as far as I know.

By the looks of it some automated system. It also has one above fastrack so they can count the amount of fastrack guests in the queue. I guess its some sort of trial at the moment

http://thorpeparkmania.co.uk/news/07-08-2013/Summer-Nights-Return Just what we all wanted

They are placed looking straight down on the queue lines so I guess they will be able to do some sort of count of people entering.

They have setup some cameras in the Stealth queue line, it looks like they count the people entering the normal queue / fastrack queue and then theres one to count at the exit also. I'm guessing this could be to do with trying to get more reliable queue times?

Although they haven't confirmed Thorpe is the park yet have they? It seems the most likely candidate though, all very exciting!

On my last trip all effects were working (including the church sound effect which has recently been fixed) Only one not on was the 2nd water skim, I guess this messes up the fire / new on ride pics?

Rita does seem to be up and down alot more this year! (An awful lot) Saying that I think Nemesis and Air are the only ones not to be down alot this year.

Stealth's open Alton Towers ......

Saturday seemed the busiest by far, which was good to see, Colossus had a 5 min queue when we rode and Stealth opened with a 5/10 min queue also. They had more food units open across the park with Amity Kebabs open to so was nice to see the event a bit busier.

To be fair they did give out wristbands when you entered the park. As for list of rides, again like my last visit the Queue boards list of rides made it clear enough which ones were open / closed, id be very surprised unless there was a problem the event you visited was the only one they didnt update the boards.

Does this thing still need dummies to test in the mornings in the middle of summer??

The whole park was open till 10pm for all of August in 2006, every day it was dead after 6/7 to be fair.

Its included in your admission.

I expect we will see Zodiac, Quantum, Vortex, Depth Charge and maybe Rush open? I expect if bigger rides were due to be open it would be marketed more than a small note on the site.

I'm not saying its a good thing, the point I was trying to make was at least thorpe's hours were cut when the park was closed so people wont have arranged things, in towers case people will have booked hotes / time off work for dates of an event which are now not happening on them dates / reduced hours which I think is a bigger part of the problem here really.

I dont see why either of them are an excuse tbh At-least thorpe did that before the season started and didn't change the opening times half way though the season when people had planned things around the times. I know they can do this and its all in the T&C's but its poor, no wonder Thorpe is getting better guest satisfaction scores this year than towers.

When it opened late they were able to add a message at the top of the site which scrolled through, They certainly need one this year with Oblivion being down for 2 weeks, Thirteen had a few days and Smiler every couple of weeks!