JoshC.
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Posts posted by JoshC.
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My concern with the use of the Black Mirror spot is that it's not overly large.
One of the key positives about Survival Games and Stitches is that they do have good lengths to them, which help justify the upcharge.
All mazes which have gone in the BML spot have utilised the space well, but have never been particularly long. As such, I hope we get a more "special" / "gimmick" maze in that location.
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As Stealth has 3 trains, the park rotate which one of them goes under annual maintenance. This means at any given time, one train is always in the maintenance area, deconstructed, having its parts checked, cleaned, inspected, serviced, replaced and whatever else is required. This takes the pressure off having to do it all over winter (when such things would normally happen).
The maintenance area has room for all three trains to be stored. It will be up to the engineers on the day which train(s) they want to being in there after park close.
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58 minutes ago, Cal said:
Glad they’ve got a 4th. Hopefully this will relieve a bit of pressure on queues, hoping they can get that right this year.
I'm less hopeful.
Perhaps I've been naive with Thorpe's logic. Or possibly just stupid. But I've realised what their thinking is with maze tickets.
The park are offering a Fearsome Four bundle, which costs £34 for the early slot (3-7pm), or £38 for the late slot (5-9pm). One shot maze tickets remain at £8 for the early slot (choosing a 1 hour time slot of either 3-4pm, 4-5pm or 5-6pm) or £10 for the later slot (choosing a 1 hour time slot of either 6-7pm, 7-8pm or 8-9pm).
So that means the Fearsome Four early slot bundle is effectively more expensive than buying four early one shot maze tickets. I clarified this with Thorpe (via their Facebook Passholder group), and they said it is correct because "Based on giving a four hour window, it would be 3 Afternoon slots and 1 evening, hence the price".
So, that means if you (say) book a One Shot for 3-4pm, the park aren't saying you can choose any time between 3-4pm to visit that maze, they are saying that you should be dedicating the whole 3-4pm slot for that one maze (in both queueing for and experiencing it). That is how they are organising it, and that is how their numbers work.
But this is not clear at all, in my opinion. At the very least, I have only just realised this from Thorpe directly saying this, despite the fact it has always been like this since they introduced the ticketing procedure: "Since introducing ticketing it has always been hourly timeslots for one shots, and then an hour per maze in a package, so this has not changed."
So herein lies in the issue. People think they can rock up at any time in their time slot for a maze. So if, say, more than half the people for the 3-4pm slot rock up after half 3 (which is a natural reaction as people will think "Everyone will go at 3pm"), then it spills into the 4-5pm slot. Same thing happens for the 4-5pm slot, and that further spills into the 5-6pm slot. Rinse and repeat, and then you've got a horrible overflow of people in the later slots.
Bluntly put, too, there have been too many instants I've seen - and experienced - where the queue line for mazes exceeds 1 hour since the paid-for tickets were introduced. Reasons for that will be varied and complicated, and in some cases, unavoidable. But it's been a consistent issue, and one I don't think they will have put any real effort into solving (although please prove me wrong Thorpe).
I don't want to come across as harsh or dismissive. But simply put, it does not seem like Thorpe know or understand how they are advertising or selling the timed ticket system of their mazes, and how the public view and use them. Operationally, the park have shown themselves to be incapable of running the mazes in a way which matches the timed ticket system, and I don't think this will change this year.
I fully expect that whatever the new maze is will be to a good quality. Stitches will return and be a hit again. Survival Games will remain well-received thanks to its split up technique (but be less impactful due to focuses being elsewhere). And Trailers will again be fine, but show both its age, and how it was the first maze to be built under this new, budget-heavy, Fright Nights direction.
Again, perhaps I've been naive / stupid and this has been glaringly obvious to everyone else. But if this is how Thorpe have operated, and continue to operate, the paid-for / timed-ticket mazes, it will have the same issues it has every year.
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The issue with the train crash sequence (and why it was removed for the 2018 season) was that it just didn't work. Completely temperamental, had a mind of its own, and they just couldn't get it right.
As cool as it was, it was also another effect that made it a "one and done" type ride. And, given its temperamental nature, when it didn't work, anyone who was expecting was more disappointed.
I maintain my original standpoint with this version of Ghost Train: the concept is the best they could have done with what they had to work with. There's issues (transition to crypt, the shop exit, etc), but given the hand they were dealt, it's not bad.
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Temple is no great loss right now as it has like 10 balls throughout the whole attraction anyway.
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1 hour ago, ThemedEntertainFan said:
- why does the backways of a train station lead to a crypt and
The idea is that the crypt is next to a train station. Perhaps could be communicated clearer, but I guess it's not too farfetched an idea.
1 hour ago, ThemedEntertainFan said:- the crypt still feels like the tube tunnels. It should really be rethemed into a tube tunnel, maybe they dug through plague pits or something.
This is something I felt a bit on my most recent ride. Maybe not so much the crypt feeling like tube tunnels. But the transition from train station to crypt is very clunky, and that certainly feels like just a random tunnel (maybe that's what you were more getting at earlier)
1 hour ago, ThemedEntertainFan said:Also, does anybody know if the TV screens still work or do they simply stay black?
My memory is hazy on this, but I think that Angelis Mortis is meant to appear on the TV screens at the end of ride. Although I might be confusing that with the fake shop scene; I cannot remember.
1 hour ago, ThemedEntertainFan said:EDIT: Also does anybody know what the delay patterns are?
The delay patterns are effectively just listing off the station stops or just generally being creepy / causing chaos, depending on what point of the story the delay occurs.
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9 hours ago, Cal said:
I imagine this is the highest throughput ride on park too.
Possibly, but the way they've butchered capacity on it, maybe not.
1 hour ago, Benin said:Though that it has an exact reopening date on it is suspect.
Tbf they've done this a few times with rides, giving an exact date for reopening. Rarely has it been right. Tomb Blaster had about 3 reopening dates advertised before it opened this season, and even then they opened it on a date not advertised.
Regardless of the cause, it's a massive hit against the park to have their main water ride (and in practicality, pretty much their only water ride) closed for summer. Highlights the need for another one.
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4 hours ago, Inferno said:
Only 2 years late, but here's my write up of Brave it Alone in Studio 13 in 2014.
Thanks for posting this! Was a great read (and also great to re-read everyone else's experiences!)
I wonder what the logic behind the switch in style was between 2013 and 2014 (and then to 2015 and 2016)? It very much seems like 2013 they were given free reign, and 2014 they stuck to a much more rigid set up. But they then went to a more fluid style in 2015.
I liked 2013 and 2014 for very different reasons. As you say, 2014 version wasn't that scary, but the experience itself felt a lot more psychological, which I guess makes sense since it was more rigid / scripted. 2013 was a lot more chaotic and left you wondering what would happen next, but also had the psychological aspect.
Very much agree that it was the right call to have a pre-selected maze each evening as opposed to them all, given it was a niche product.
I would genuinely love for Thorpe to do an alone experience again. So much potential. I will talk about this until the day I die, but Walibi Holland are the perfect model for how to do an alone experience within a normal theme park setting. Yes, it'll be an expensive upcharge, yes it will have a low throughput. But it won't appeal to everyone and that's fine. Create an experience which can be done again and again in a custom space and it will work.
I know that towards the end of Face it Alone, there were several bumps in the proverbial road with its running. AMC were, to my understanding, against the idea of having extreme Face it Alone experiences in their mazes. The manager responsible for its organisation left. The actors were expressing concerns about some guest behaviours (I heard stories of some guests basically asking/expecting/demanding certain things be done to them in Face it Alone). Just seemed like a storm perfect for it stop.
But again, I'd love to see it brought back. The park clearly have the budget, resources and creative talent to take the gamble on it. It's just whether they actually want to.
I should try and share my 2015 and 2016 experiences at some point... -
Water feature has been off over the weekend and I believe the last couple of days too. The fact that it's everything, including on the concrete, makes it look rather displeasing. Although I imagine with a damp cloth and some cleaning spray it would look okay...
1 hour ago, Benin said:Maybe that's why they removed the viewing platform plans?
If you look at the middle lake area on ride, you see just how shallow it is; I've seen some people joke it's more akin to a swamp. The furthermost point of the land infill, which is/was meant to be removed, is still present too. A bit flooded, but present. If you're feeling brave enough, you could probably walk across it.
I'm hoping they just had a timing issue and couldn't fully sort out the land and water for opening and are either letting nature take its course to sort it, or will do so over close season. But for now, it's another displeasing on the eye feature, and another "Well at least there's no look out on that area" moment.
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I guess the flipside of the Crows argument is if you have the entrance the other end, you've got chaos with Stitches and a scare zone entrance bottled together.
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16 minutes ago, Coaster_Contrarian said:
For what was paid per head, it definitely was not worth it. And they only ran the ERT for 40 minutes and not the hour we were sold. Ended up with only two rides on the ERT.
If the organisers didn't know, then I think they've, and by extension the members, have been a bit ripped off.
For clarity, I'm not talking about worth, but rather what they're offering. I wonder if they are saying "You can pay £X for 1 hour, 1 train, or £Y for 1 hour, 2 trains", or just "1 hour ERT". I agree 2 rides in an ERT is a pretty rubbish return; I'd be unhappy.
Also, I've seen this 40 minute thing thrown about a bit. Am I right in thinking the ride's queue line was open for 40 minutes, and then shut, but the ride ran for the full hour? If so, that shows how misbalanced the numbers are in my opinion: an ERT shouldn't have a 20 minute queue! Perhaps times have changed. But yeah, not a great look.
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8 hours ago, planenut said:
When it comes to throughput I cannot see TP being bothered as they have a limited capacity, and any people in the park have already paid, they don't have to worry.
I'm a little confused what you mean here? Every park has a limited capacity and all people in the park have paid? But they still have to offer guests value for money, or they won't return / be disgruntled.
Thorpe have made an effort to improve throughputs across the park. Stealth is a prime example of this.
8 hours ago, Cal said:Another topic, the park must surely be aware that the break run is seriously impacting throughputs at the moment. No matter how hard they work in the station, I don't think its possible to get higher than around 800. If the train got into the station quicker I imagine they'd easily be hitting 1000+. Do we think this will be sorted in closed season or it'll be left how it is?
I'm not sure how much it's affecting throughput, but the park will no doubt be aware of it. No doubt the park have a list of things they'll want to work on, hopefully alongside Mack, to help get things running smoothly.
My bigger concern regarding throughput is whether they can keep up the high standard they've set in the station. The park have been sensible and aren't running it on more staff (I believe they're running it on 1 op and 4 hosts, and that is the bare minimum it would need). But they're working their socks, and clearly have a good team. Can they keep that going all season? What about in future seasons? All well and good running it like that now, but if they can't do it when you've got the extra queues, etc, it's a problem.
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One train on ERT is not ideal. Wonder if organisers are aware they're getting 1 train ops or not. It also begs a question: If they need to start train maintenance that early they can't run 2 trains for an ERT session, how will they cope during Fright Nights?
I went today and got 4 rides by 2pm, which included a closure due to a guest action, as well as weather delays because of heavy rain / threat of electrical storm.
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9 hours ago, Parm Pap said:
BOMMMMMMMMMM, dodododo BOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM, dodododo, BOMMMMMMMMMMM, dodododo, BOMMMMMMMMMMMM, dodododo
oh are we over, the worst of it, the worst of it, maybe things are up, but we shall see, yes we shall see
dun dun dun, dundun dun dun, dundun dun dun, dundun dun dun, doo doo doo doooooo doooooooooooooo
More insight than an endoscopy. Thanks as always Parmesan.
- Martin Doyle and ImLucifer
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3 hours ago, ML27 said:
I don’t want to jinx it but I think we could be over the hill with the various issues.
Don't mean to be pedantic, but if they're having to open the ride 2 hours late daily, I think we're still very much in the middle of the issue(s)!
3 hours ago, ML27 said:I say various, I mean really it was just the lift hill with issues. The valley incident could have been prevented with having water dummies and procedures in place for testing. Which I’m sure they now have.
Here's the thing, realistically, no ride should have the test daily with water dummies. It certainly shouldn't be part of the morning routine. Filling a train with water dummies, emptying them, etc is a time-consuming thing too (not 2 hours worth, but still time-consuming).
Hopefully whatever Thorpe and/or Mack are doing, means they can resolve that problem so they don't have to test with dummies daily.
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Back on 2 trains today, after operating on 1 yesterday.
It did open 2 hours late today though.
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9 hours ago, MattyMoo said:
It's crazy that there's been only 8 days of public operation (one could argue it's more like 7 and a half with the downtime on the Saturday).
Still more than Top Thrill 2 though! 😉
(Thanks @Mark9 for keeping score)
- Matt 236 and Martin Doyle
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9 hours ago, Parm Pap said:
now we're cooked.
You know it's serious when Parm Pap doesn't make a non-sensical post....
9 hours ago, Benin said:Was the ride area cursed by Logger's Leap and it's biggest fan?
I think the curse was done by the Rocky Express fan personally.
6 hours ago, Glitch said:Why would they even allow for potential roll backs in the design phase? Wouldn’t they have models to say there is an X% chance that the ride valleys in these conditions, why would they not change the dimensions of the ride until they had something which would give a close to 100% guarantee of always making it around the track…
Obviously they'll have models, but I'd be surprised if those systems have a way of determining a probability for a rollback / stall / valley. And even if they did, I'm fairly certain they would never approve anything where the chance for stalling was higher than a fraction of a percentage.
Plenty of rides have stalled in places; it's something which happens. It's not a common occurrence - and certainly not a 'teething problem' - but it can happen. Other Thorpe coasters have stalled during empty-train tests: Colossus on its final turnaround, Saw on its overbanked turn (and the bottom of the first drop), Stealth atop its top hat. There's plenty more examples around the world. It happens.
The slower running of the stall seems to have occurred after the first prolonged closure, with the lift hill seemingly being slowed down slightly. That might be having some knock on effects.
I see plenty of people saying they didn't test it enough, etc. That's bull. They've tested it plenty, but there's clearly been other factors which have happened too.
I guess Thorpe are nearing a point of damaging limitations. Do they reopen asap, and keep papering over the proverbial cracks until closed season? Do they have an extended period of closure to fix the issues with Mack? Something else? Who knows.
As has been said here, other rides have had difficult first seasons which are later forgotten about. I'm sure Hyperia will be the same. But for now, it's a difficult wave to ride.
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Yes I know, Hyperia has barely just opened, but it's only natural sooner or later to ask the question "What comes next?"
If we were to rewind 20 years ago, Tussauds had a clear investment cycle strategy for Thorpe, with a major investment coming every 3 years. That carried on into the Merlin era, before being tweaked to every 4 years.
Obviously, we all know the story from here. Swarm didn't give an instant increase in visitor numbers, so the powers that be at Merlin deemed to some form of failure (despite the several flaws in that logic). Thorpe tried something different with DBGT and that, frankly, flopped. 2020 was at one point pencilled in to have a major investment, but that was cut when Merlin decided to pull tens of millions of pounds of investment from their Resort Theme Parks.
But obviously things have changed in the last few years. Merlin have been taken over. We have a new CEO, and new board members. And with that, there seems to be more investment coming into the theme parks again, slowly but surely. And a fresher wave of optimism has come.
So, more to the point of the topic. When do you think we'll see the next major investment at Thorpe? Arguably any new attraction could be classed as major, after years of very little new things, but of course I'm talking of a something along the lines of a new coaster or similar. Could a 3-4 year cycle be back? Could it depend on Hyperia's success? Or even the rest of Merlin's success?
And even more importantly, what would you like to see? Blue sky or realistically, this is the place to share your thoughts.
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For me, I think one thing is clear: Thorpe should stick with coasters. There's no harm in them becoming a roller coaster park at this point. It's what the public want. They're not going to compete on the international stage in terms of immersive experiences, nor would they with Universal if that comes to the UK. That's not to say they should stick car park coasters here, there and everywhere, but for major attractions, they should stick to coasters.
Part of me thinks an intertwined family coaster / log flume would be perfect. A 1.2m family coaster would be a perfect addition, although of course it doesn't have to be tame (RMCs tend to have 1.2m height restrictions for example). And I think the park need a solid, new water ride, and a log flume hits the spot. A more modern one with restraints will no doubt appease the Merlin H&S folk too.
Yeah, that suggestion goes against my 'stick to coasters' idea somewhat, but it does also solve a glaring gap in the park's line up.
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We're just over 3 months to Fright Nights 2024 and we don't have a thread? We're slipping guys...
Nothing is confirmed for the event, so for now, everything is speculation / what you want to see...
My Predictions
- The return of the 3 mazes Trailers, Survival Games and Stitches
- Return of Lucifer's Lair and Amity High (in some incarnation)
- Something new in Death's Doors' location
- Mysterious new attraction
The glaring omission here is The Crows. I would love to see them return in some way, and I think the scare zone works well. But the simple issue is for now: Hyperia. The area is being used for Hyperia's extra queue. Do the park expect that by Fright Nights, their busiest time of the year, they wouldn't need that extra queue? If that space is used for a FN attraction, where would they sensibly contain people? It just seems like a massive headache.
Obviously it's difficult: maybe by October they wouldn't need it. But they'll need to make that decision, at latest, by August really. So they've got time to see how it goes. But if they're regularly needing that area over the next month or so, I reckon they have to pull it this year.
As for something new, this is a tricky one. I'm behind the park charging for mazes; I think we've seen improvements in the quality of mazes (at the very least, the budgets have increased). But a 4th upcharge maze stretches things a bit; can the park appropriately staff 4 upcharge mazes worth £10 a pop, as well as scare zones and shows? Might be tight. That's not to say they won't do that though.
However, I'd rather the park try something different. Obviously we saw them do that a couple of years ago with the audio experience which flopped massively. But something that isn't a standard, upcharge maze is worth a shot. Maybe a proper alone experience? Or a more intimate show (like the Exorcism show at FEAR)? Or, maybe be wild, and do a smaller, but high-throughput / constant conga-line, free maze? Give people a taste for the mazes without them having to pay. I don't know, I'm just throwing ideas out here, but I think it's time for something different.
Sparkle Project
in General Discussion
Posted
Yeah, I think this is the main thing.
The park said they were going to do an announcement about the group after Hyperia's opening day, but then the issues started with Hyperia and it took a backseat.
The group was primarily focused on sharing updates that the wider audience wouldn't be interested in with those who would be. It works during the winter. It worked during Hyperia's construction. But now, there's nothing to share really.
The group also was a way to get feedback from Passholders, which was also a mixed bag. I imagine the issue is that now the park post operational updates (ie when Victory Plaza opened) or asking for speculation (eg about Fright Nights), and these invariably lead to complaints. I imagine it gets tiresome to hear the same complaints a lot, especially when they didn't plan for it to be like that...even if those complaints are fair. People also became a bit rude at times. When the people running the group were literally running it at any and all hours, it probably was a bit much
The group has served its purpose for now. They're not deleting it, it just won't be active any more. It's a shame as there's a loss of direct contact to the marketing team, who are actually in a position to action certain issues that guest services can't, but it's time to stop it. Would be good to see it return each winter though