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Mer
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Posts posted by Mer
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Thanks again to Ryan and Paige for this great meet
I was lucky to be able to go in the end, and I'm glad I could as it was a much-needed break for me 
I've done a l'il trip report: https://forum.maniahub.com/blogs/entry/848-towers-meet-2017/
We need the photos and videos of Battle Galleons on here
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On 30/05/2017 at 6:04 PM, Stuntman707 said:
I will have scraped together enough money to go, don't want to miss this meet.
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From the Wikipedia article on Tomb Blaster, which mentions why they changed the lasers (assuming it's correct):
QuoteIn August 2015, Tomb Blaster closed for a nine-month refurbishment carried out by Merlin Magic Making, the design & creative division of Merlin Entertainments. Amidst health & safety concerns about a lack of maintenance over the years, all the sets were retreated for fire retardancy and a new fire exit installed in the station. Several sets were also retouched with fluorescent paint in an attempt to give an ultraviolet makeover. The 2002 laser gun system was removed and replaced with new equipment, after the original laser company had liquidated. All lighting and audio equipment in the ride was removed, to be replaced by LED ultraviolet units and different sound stores.
The ride re-opened during the annual pass preview weekend of 2016 to highly negative reviews.[4] General response from guests as well as fans of the ride criticized the "unprofessional" nature of the new ultra violet lighting and audio alterations, citing missing sound effects, many animations still broken, missing pieces of the sets and excessive light spillage that revealed the areas intended to be covered by darkness.[5]Love that last paragraph
I didn't follow any updates on it during the refurb so didn't realise H&S was worked on too. Good to know that the "4 minute rule" shouldn't apply anymore if there's a fire
Having ridden this atrocity again yesterday, I've realised that different targets score different points, depending on what colour they turn when you hit them. The ones that turn a white/yellow colour score 100, either the blue or red score 50, and the other scores either 50 or 25 (can't remember exactly). So this is why it's so hard to get a decent score now; only some of the targets that 100, you don't know which targets score 100 UNTIL you hit them, plus a lot of them need to be fired at several times before they register. Some of them yesterday did seem to be more responsive though, which was good. But I shouldn't be having to say that - it should be all or at least the majority that work with the first shot, not half of them!
Another thing I don't get is that they still have the old targets (with the single green dot) as well as the new ones - do the old ones still work or...? They need to get the queue line TVs back and make a new video which explains how it works with the different colours/number of points. Or at least put signs up/add it to the ride board at the front. I've also heard families/children on the ride, or coming off the ride, saying they were confused, or that the older targets were easier...
The effects were out of sync and the rattling dog cage thing doesn't go off until the train has passed! You don't stop in the snake pit for that long at all. The mummies at the end were completely broken, not moving or anything. The boulder was, of course, broken too. The Anubis scene was stupidly quiet, I'm not even sure any audio was playing
The UV is terrible and ruins the whole feel of the attraction. It doesn't even make sense considering you're supposed to be in a, erm, tomb.
The audio around the ride in general was hit and miss, with it suddenly cutting in at one point between scenes. Reminds me of how they messed up the Bubbleworks audio when it changed to Imperial Leather
The station audio is a bit of a mess too. It has one TV which still shows the old video, but it's not that loud and the audio from it cuts out when the station announcements play. However I'm glad they have the old announcements back and no longer use that awful "It's dangerous out there!" thing.
And am I the only one who's noticed the lack of smell effects since this "refurb?"
Ugh, I just find the whole ride frustrating and no fun at all now!
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Yeah hopefully the waterfalls will come back! It's probably because some people tend to move out their seat to avoid getting wet...which begs the question why they've even gone on a water ride in the first place
Actually, that's just reminded me of a Facebook group/page a few years ago about people who go on water rides and are surprised when the seats are wet -
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Me and Stuntman were there from about 1pm today, and I'm glad to say that things were running really well (aka, how they should be running their park)
The queue times were really good for a Saturday (and on a bank holiday weekend) - all rides were around 60 mins or less throughout the day, with the odd 70-90, but not for long. In fact there were quite a few times during the day that some of the main coasters had between 20-30 minute queues - enough time to get a cheeky front row ride on Stealth 
All the 2 train coasters had both trains running, don't know how many Saw and X had but their queues were similar to the other coasters give or take, so presumably full capacity.
The queue times were being updated very regularly which was great. Reliability was very good, Swarm and Stealth had a few shutdowns but they didn't last too long (and it was those which temporarily pushed the other coaster queues up). Only saw DBGT close once
And my bae is back on two swings
DBGT is definitely a vast improvement on last year, and now feels like it's what it was originally meant to be. And we finally got to do I'm A Celeb Waited until it had no queue right before closing time and witnessed this shocking sight as a result:
We didn't have a photo opportunity though - have they got rid of it this year, or was it maybe because it was the end of the day? -
Popped onto the pier for a bit when down in Brighton yesterday (didn't ride anything though)!
Booster is still down, took some pics and a video of engineers doing stuff, for all you geeks
No idea if it normally has this much maintenance so it could be nothing (unless it's rusting away like the Super Booster ) 
Popped the video on YouTube as unlisted because videos uploaded straight into forum posts don't seem to play if you're on a smartphone.
Turbo was repainted in 2013 to a tacky yellow and blue colour. It looks and sounds as rough and awful as ever. Good old Pinfari
Also they have a new soft play area in the dome part (which actually looks quite fun and made me wish I was a kid again ) and a new spinny kiddie drop tower thing called i220.
(Can't help but feel that Timber Tug Boat would've fitted in better on this pier than Thorpe...)
Probably would've tried out Air Race if I wasn't stuffed after a lovely three-course Italian Looks like you get some awesome hang time!
Oh and the pier is technically now Brighton Palace Pier, as was revealed last July
http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/14592161.Victory_as_new_owners_agree_to_put_back____Palace____to_pier_name/
Quite a detailed article which mentions the new owner and changes they want to make to the pier whilst keeping the tradition and heritage!
I remember it being called Palace Pier, I think it's nice they're referring back to its original nameLooks like the sign should be changing this year!
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Is the usual game of Empire happening this year?
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I think it's normal for them to advertise for jobs throughout the season, and other parks do it too. They'll mainly be recruiting for the summer holidays I imagine, then again for Fright Nights etc
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On 29/03/2017 at 7:29 PM, Stuntman707 said:
I also have a recording of the pretty chilled music they were playing around Thorpe at the end of the day. It's like slow tempo Chillstep. Apologies about the voice recordings at the end.
The audio link doesn't work (it goes to a page with a play button but it doesn't work)
Which is a shame as the sudden rant from Peaj at the end is hilarious
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Yep, me and Stuntman will be attending everything (we did confirm a while ago
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I've collected quite a few over the past year or so!
Also managed to get hold of some random Dungeons pins from Berlin, Edinburgh and Hamburg, despite never visiting...
Some of them in the photos are just plain ol' badges but meh And yes, the DLP ones are still in their packaging - I just haven't got round to putting them on my lanyard yet! Oh and the Merlin one saying "You're A Star" was from my call centre days
The new Towers ones for this year look nice - that Nemesis one last year was a bit crappy tbh I need to get some Chessie ones too, didn't get round to buying them last year Anyone know if they're the same this year (some of them last year were glow in the dark!)/if they've added any more? -
On 25/03/2017 at 2:38 PM, Coaster said:
How is capacity on the coasters today?
Ermmm well...put it this way. Saturday was the first time I've made a complaint at guest services
Inferno started on 1 train, then when it became apparent that there were a LOT more guests than they budgeted for, they added the second. Swarm was also on 2. So that was the good side of things...
No idea about Saw but it had a 75 minute queue at one point (and I think it stayed pretty long for most of the day)...Colossus was on one train which meant even fast track had a 45 minute queue...Stealth was on one BUT we weren't expecting it to be open so maybe I'll let them off, even if it was one of the longest, worst queueing experiences of my life
But that was mainly due to me feeling sick!
On 25/03/2017 at 4:17 PM, Jack said:At the start of the day X was on 4 trains and the queue moved surprisingly quickly but when I rode it later on it seemed that a train had been taken off as there were moments where there wasn't even a train in the station.
X was weird - we went on it at about 10:30, no queue outside and pretty empty inside, but there was quite a gap between each train...when we got back outside, there was an external queue and they announced that it was 60 minutes!
Oh and Rush still only had one swing working
I know people will harp on about how the park was busier than they anticipated, but that is no excuse. Why wasn't the second train ready on Colossus? Why was X not running at full capacity? As for Stealth, I'm really hoping they only opened on one train so they could hurry up and get it open, and not because the other one isn't ready!
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It does look ridiculous, even more so in person! It's quite sad to see what was a nice little area of the park being destroyed. Sure, people will argue that things don't last forever and theme parks have to change sometimes...but this is just a mess.
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They do look nice, but...Creams ftw
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On 15/02/2017 at 8:01 PM, mrmonkey said:
I'm getting Europa withdrawals bad! So want to get back this year.
Argh same! And I really must write my trip report from the meet last year. Better late than never!
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On 11/03/2017 at 9:02 PM, Mattgwise said:
Something clearly wrong with Rameses Revenge in this video clip from today :/
Wow...what a mess! It's embarrassing that they even opened it in that state. The riders look confused as well!
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I'm just happy that they've finally improved the speakers in the Vampire station!
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On 15/01/2017 at 10:17 PM, Wumbamillio said:
The elephant is (shockingly!) the same. Its been butchered over many years, it was built to smaller scale and was meant to appear bigger from a distance, which is why it now looks tiny when closer to the track. The trunk also seems to have been shortened and the whole thing painted solid grey so doesnt look as nice or lifelike. And its movement probably has never been properly refurbished in 30 years, last it got turned on it moved pretty badly.
Goes to show how standards dropped! You'd never think the exisitng elephant could look so good!
The water used to be dyed a teal colour, and yes its always been a closed water system.Cant believe how much better the elephant looks there! Do you know when it was moved to the other side of the track and why? Just seems a bit pointless to move something like that
Unless it was so it could get guests wet (it looks too far away to do that originally).
Fright Nights 2017
in The Past
Posted
I've only been once (2013) and am bloody determined to go this year, hopefully on preview night as it will be cheaper and quieter!
My question is...do they still have a maze that is out in a cornfield? I know they change the mazes every so often but I'm hoping they still use it! That was flippin' creepy wondering around a pitch black, silent field 
Oh and to stay on topic...Thorpe, woo, etc.