JoshC.

So S&S have noticed that Mack design half of their rides whilst seemingly drunk and / or high as a kite, so decided to have a crack at it themselves. The results aren't good - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyJi4uenl18tUI2ytqkzWfA/videos Interestingly, one of the rides seem to fit pretty nicely at Drayton, seemingly being based at the park: There's been a few wild rumours over the past few months of Drayton investing in an S&S coaster for 2018, and an inverted coaster and a launched coaster are two obvious things which could add to the ride line up. Hope it's not the above though, since it just seems awful...

Park opening hours have received a tweak... -10:30am openings are now 10am. -4:30pm closes are now 4pm. Dark Forest, Cloud Cuckoo Land and Hex are advertised to open at 10:30am every day.

I'm sure you are well aware that there are many members here who find out many things relating to parks, and can post these things, but can't give any 'proof'. And some members who almost constantly give correct and accurate information don't always need proof.

The Danes are getting a piece of the virtual action... http://www.looopings.nl/weblog/6986/Virtual-reality-bij-achtbaan-in-Kopenhagen.html Dæmonen, the B&M floorless at Tivoli Gardens, is getting the VR treatment, with a Chinese theme - letting people get chased by loads of things from Chinese mythology. The VR is being supplied by VR Coaster (which did Europa's VR stuff). It's optional, and will cost about £2.90 to try.

Not content with adding a new attraction, painting Goliath a new colour, and refreshing the colour of two other coasters, Walibi Holland have also announced they're replacing some track of their wooden coaster, Robin Hood. Where's Walibi's cash cow come from the past couple of years?!

It's a shame all the stuff is so RARE, I only like my merch well done

Of all the criticisms that could be thrown at Fright Nights, I don't think a lack of uniqueness is one of them. Outdoor attractions are rather uncommon, especially in a more set attraction format (most outdoor scare attractions are scare zones). Cabin's free-flow, choose-a-door style was original, and still remains rather unique. Of the top of my head, I can't think of many specific scare events that offer, albeit mini, escape rooms either. And they've never been afraid to try something different or unique in recent years either - Experiment 10 and The Passing being prime examples. In some ways, we are spoilt for choice a bit, and with Towers pushing the boundaries a lot more lately, it does under-value the uniqueness of Thorpe's mazes somewhat - especially since everyone visiting Thorpe will know of Towers. One could argue that Thorpe's biggest downfall at the moment is their inability to be able to produce a quality, 'standard' maze. And that's not the park's fault either - they don't have a huge space they could use to create a standard, conga-line maze with rich theming, lots of special effects and so forth. Compare this to all other major scare events in the country, who all have large spaces which can be used / converted into scare attractions.

Walibi in 2016: "Our 2017 attraction won't use VR" Walibi in 2017: "Our 2017 attraction will use VR" http://www.looopings.nl/weblog/6903/Nieuwe-virtual-reality-attractie-in-Walibi-Nog-heftiger-dan-The-Clinic.html As of yet, this new thing doesn't have a name, but it's been revealed it will be a spin off of their headline Halloween attraction last year, 'The Clinic'. The Clinic strapped people to a stretcher and then simulated a person's death, post-mortem, funeral, cremation and afterlife and was really well received. A "more horrifying" version of that does sound interesting...

If these rides do come to Thorpe, I don't see the Fright Nights thing being an issue personally. Platform 15's queue took up very little space in the area since it mostly used Loggers queue, and Blair's could easily spread around a bit more if they wanted. I'd also be very surprised if they stayed open after 3pm anyway. Rocky closed at 3pm, so it would make sense to close those too tbh.

Depth Charge photos stopped being sold around 2011/2 I believe.

At least this should put to bed some rumours that the sky ride wasn't going to open this year..

The two sides of theme park enthusiasts, as illustrated by The Simpsons...

It sounds like you visited during July/August time, when both Stealth and Ghost Train were closed for extended periods of time for separate - and very uncommon - circumstances. This is not the norm and both of them are scheduled to be open, bar unforeseen maintenance, for all of 2017 as far as Thorpe have said.

Are you suggesting that painting coasters makes them smoother?

Project 'Brain Trip', the rumoured to be abandoned 2017 thrilling dark ride attraction, is still in fact happening, with an open date of 14th April. Assuming nothing had changed, it's still going in the old 4D cinema which is near Lost Gravity. Marketing started today, with this 'teaser' on the park's Facebook: A construction picture is also on the park's Snapchat, @walisnaps. I'll link the Looopings article, which has more details and the pictures of construction: http://www.looopings.nl/weblog/6849/Walibi-Holland-geeft-eerste-hints-over-nieuwe-attractie.html I believe Walibi Holland's director has also mentioned it won't feature virtual reality / has expressed a dislike for VR stuff. But with the project name and being located near Lost Gravity, it'll be interesting what the theme will be.

Ha that's awesome. A bit un-Toverland in some ways but I'm sure they'll make it work. The 100m ride thing is intersting - drop tower anyone?

https://www.thorpepark.com/2017

Is 'Derren Brown's Ghost Train: Rise of the Demon', at 47 characters long including spaces, the current longest official name of any theme park attraction in the world? Not trying to make a joke, being serious after the thought sprung into my mind...

I guess the way I'm seeing it is that it's not "more" cuts, in the sense that less money is being pumped into running the attractions. I would assume that Hex and Driving School require more staff, and are more costly to run, than Toadstool and Ice Age? So in comparison to 2016, there aren't any 'cuts'. Obviously we can make the argument that the 'cuts' are still there because rides are closed, but I just don't see them as any 'more'. Saw Alive is a weird one, since it still opens, though I did forget about that. IAC feels a bit of a non-point since it just doesn't open over FN; it's not 'closed' and a fair few theme parks do choose not to open some attractions over their Halloween events for various reasons (be that the space is used by FN attractions, operational demands, or whatever). Do agree that a lot of Merlin's recent investments, especially the smaller scale stuff, do seem to be more short-term focused though.

I guess if we were to be pedantic, we're not seeing "more cuts to the line up", just a different reduced offering - two attractions are (re)opening, and two attractions are not running instead. So it's the same level of offering as 2016. What other IPs have closed soon after opening? I wouldn't count CATCF as a 10 year stint (which was the rumour contracted length) is a reasonable time frame in my opinion, and I can't think of any others?

Not the worst line up they could have produced to be fair. Good to see them just opening rides for the event again to be honest!

Colour me surprised they haven't milked the return of Hex and Driving School with 'BACK FOR 2017' or 'REFURBISHED FOR 2017' slogans plastered over them. Not that I'm complaining! The loss of Toadstool is actually reasonably major though given how few rides there are for the market it targets.

Really Old Train Design?

+1 for the Magic Valley soundtrack being fab. I've heard the 'IMAScore music sounds very similar' point raised a few times, but it doesn't really bother me. All of their stuff works with the attractions they've been designed for, and with little knowledge of audio tech, I (and I guess the majority of people) don't really pick up on all the niggles that some do.

If Towers Fireworks is a definite, could I perhaps even be daring enough to suggest the possibility of replacing the Towers weekender altogether? Drayton is meant to maybe get a big-ish thing in 2018, so might be worth missing it this year. And there's loads of other places that could be done!