JoshC.

Don't get why people are getting so worked up about this to be honest. This is clearly just a retheme of the current ride system (maybe with some minor amendments); hence the "factory doors closing" and "under new management". The 'bye bye Bubbleworks' is more just a hint that it'll be no longer Bubbleworks by name or nature. There'll no doubt be an IP; Hotel Translyvania or Gruffalo are where I'm placing my money. Nice to see it getting some work as it is needed. Let's hope they invest a suitable amount of money into it. But at the moment, colour me uninterested.

Presumably things like the dolls, clapping monkey and such are there for the Victorian vibe. I imagine the Victorian stuff is there to juxtapose the modern day underground stuff, and thus create a 'Woah' effect on people riding. Unfortunately it seems to have been lost a little.

I don't see why anything would need to be pushed back significantly, a few weeks at most. This isn't an ideal situation and could well attract unwanted publicity, but won't affect future developments. Although I'd still be incredibly surprised if the hotel opens completed at Christmas 2017, but that's a separate matter.

Worth mentioning now that Plopsa have removed all reference to Heidi on their website. A new permit will take a few weeks to sort out, so I imagine Heidi will reappear then. Long term I don't think the park have anything to worry about, but this has attracted a lot of attention in the Belgian media. Though with their big new ride not opening any time soon and some negative press going their way, it might not the best summer for the park...

The confusion could come earlier - people will no doubt not get the link between entering a Victorian warehouse with a hanging Victorian train, to the modern day story you explain. There are subtle things to hint to what will happen, but they're perhaps too subtle for some.

Wow! That was my first reaction after getting off Derren Brown's Ghost Train. So, it suffices to say I did enjoy it and, for me, it was worth the wait. However, I think this might be a bit of a Marmite attraction, and given some of the reviews on here, that does seem to be the case. Anyway, a review of sorts... Why I enjoyed DBGT: -Fab pre show featuring Derren was fab. -A good, long, continuous story. I enjoy rides that have a story, and give you a reason for why you're there and what you're doing. Ghost Train does this well, with an interesting story which just works for me. It lent itself for some scares, some laughs and a sense of believability. -Mostly great VR quality. I'm still dubious as to how big a thing virtual reality should be in theme parks, but Ghost Train utilises VR well. It's of a high quality, fits within the story - albeit loosely - and the fact it mixes in with the surroundings so well gives a sense of realism to it. And I can only see it improving over time as technology improves. -Actually questioning what I saw. One big push for Ghost Train has been about questioning your perception, and not being able to tell what is real and what is not. After riding and talking to other people, I genuinely was left questioning what I saw. Though this was on some of the smaller details from the VR film, it was still a great touch that left me going "No, it was definitely this I saw...at least, I think it was?". A great thing to keep you thinking after the ride, and adds a real sense of re-rideability to it all! -Hanging Victorian train in the warehouse is awesome in real life. And, in general, the theming inside is fantastic; it's very easy to forget you're at a theme park and not in a train! -It works. This sounds a stupid thing to say, but here me out. My biggest concern with this was that the attraction might feel disjointed, that there was too much going on, and it just wouldn't flow and wouldn't really work. But when I went through, it all flowed and just worked for me, which is fab. Now, anyone reading this review might be thinking this is the best thing since sliced bread, or I've come down with a case of new-ride fever. So I do want to bring this review down to earth a bit, especially for anyone who is reading but has yet to ride. My review of course reflects my opinions, but as I said earlier, I feel this might be a bit of a Marmite ride and not to everyone's tastes, particularly in the enthusiast community. Here's why... -A lot of VR. It takes up about half of the experience, which is certainly more than I expected. And this could be a problem for some; in particular, those who enjoy 'real' theming and those who enjoy being able to share their experiences with others in real time. Like I say, it was more than I expected, but it wasn't too much for me, since it all felt necessary. But for others, it might be too long, or just not want they want from a theme park attraction. -Second VR film isn't as good as the first. Whilst I still enjoyed the second VR section, it is the weakest part of the attraction, and the graphics aren't quite as good as in the first section. Hopefully this is something that can be addressed over time though. -A jump in story between pre show and main show. The pre show does nothing to set up the story of the attraction; it is much more akin to the introduction of a Derren Brown show than a theme park ride. That's not to say there's nothing to explain the story before hand, but it's just very subtle. So when the story in the main show starts, some may be a little lost / confused as to why what is happening, is happening. It's something that you need to go along with, much like with Derren's shows. But given in a theme park environment people seem to lose all common sense / reasonable thought, it might be lost on some people, and leave them too confused to focus on the attraction. -The story and ride hardware. Simply put, I'm not sure everyone will like the story and / or ride system. There's nothing wrong with this, as everyone has different tastes and the like, but some people, especially enthusiasts, may just dislike the ride because of what it is and it just not being what they want. The final verdict: DBGT won't be everyone's cup of tea. It's a shame this is the case, as the first major dark ride in the UK for forever needed to be an instant classic for there to be more crop up in my opinion. Hopefully, though, enthusiasts can appreciate how good an attraction this is for Thorpe, that it filled a space in their line up, and used up dead space on park. Everyone around me seemed to scream and laugh through the attraction, and leave with a smile on their face, which is great. And most importantly for me, I enjoyed it and can't wait to try it again.

Surprised no one mentioned this, but this happened yesterday... Source: TST FB Apparently the ride was closed for a couple of days prior as well. Oops.

Almost 3 weeks later and Heidi still isn't open. Why you ask... As of 2 days ago, the park no longer has a valid environmental permit. The park remains open, but by the park's director's own admission, they are open against the law. As such, the park could face a large fine or even closure, at least until they get a valid permit. And with some lawyers encouraging locals to make complaints about Plopsaland, things are looking a bit worrying for the park at the moment. From what I can tell, Heidi is now ready to open, but they don't want to risk it in case it agitates locals. Plopsaland are also looking into taking legal action against the company they hired to look after all their environmental issues. Sources: http://www.looopings.nl/weblog/5770/Plopsaland-open-zonder-vergunning-Ik-heb-slapeloze-nachten.html http://www.looopings.nl/weblog/5780/Plopsaland-durft-nieuwe-houten-achtbaan-niet-te-openen.html

Don't see why people would, or indeed should, be annoyed. This event is happening after the opening of the ride, is free to enter and is more than what we were expecting at the beginning of the season.

I was under the impression that Thorpe were planning on revealing Platform 15 at ScareCON (in late May), but decided against it because of Ghost Train and wanting to keep the focus on that? So it wasn't necessarily the marketing campaign that was delayed, just the reveal to (scare) geeks. Not that I can recall, especially for a specific maze. Probably the only major campaign for FN that happened before August was back in 2005, when they bought Freakshow 3D back in summer, and pushed the fact they were getting 2 new mazes, so this was people's last chance to have a go!

https://www.thorpepark.com/events/fright-nights/ Platform 15 teaser! The FN push is coming early this season! There's also posters on park advertising P15, and VIP experiences, including Face it Alone, BTS of mazes and a new Zombie Academy thing.

Lost Gravity is very different to the two Eurofighters I've done. Lost Gravity wasn't particularly intense, just fast and fun, with some nice pops of airtime. The Eurofighters I've done focus more on intensity, and of course the signature drop. The restraints also create a completely different feel to the ride as well. So really they're pretty incomparable, but if you had to point a gun to my head and ask which coaster I preferred (ignored theming), it would go in this order: Saw, Lost Gravity; Typhoon.

Walibi Holland was the only new-for-me park of the trip, and there were two obvious draws for visiting: the new Mack coaster Lost Gravity, and Goliath, the Intamin mega coaster. We seemed to get lucky with our visit, as the park was very quiet, and we didn't queue over 15 minutes for anything if memory serves me correctly. Overall impressions of the park are quite mixed for me; there's some great attractions around the park (and of higher quality to Walibi Belgium's offerings), but there's still a fair amount of trash about that makes it difficult to praise the overall park too much. Anyways... Xpress: Platform 13 Located by the main entrance to the park, but before the 'containment gates' into the main bulk of the park, this opened up at least 15 minutes before the park opened. And my god, this was a massive gem, probably the biggest surprise of the whole trip. The coaster itself is almost a clone of Rock n Roller Coaster (I haven't done RnRC myself, but that'll not doubt give some indication to the quality of the coaster to those who have done it). But the reason for this standing out so much was because of the atmosphere in the queue line. Themed around a mystery train disappearance, the queue line feels exactly like an abandoned train station, and features plenty of scares, a creepy atmosphere, surprises and excellently themed sets along the way. Dare I say, the queue line is a better scare attraction than many scare mazes that the UK theme parks produce at Halloween! An unassuming entrance Lost Gravity With surprise opening out of the way, we headed over the Lost Gravity, which opened shortly after the 10am opening. Words cannot really describe this ride. Whoever designed this must have been high on a cocktail of drugs, but they've managed to create a ride which chucks together loads of random, somewhat incoherent, ideas, and makes it work for a fun ride. The queue is weird and features a couple of wtf moments, the theming is odd, the effects make no sense (including the huge flamethrower effect which makes even the staff jump as there's no rhythm to it going off). The ride itself - first drop is fab, airtime hills are fab. The top hat thing is weird. The second half of the ride is really slow and killed by the MCBR, but at the same time, is still alright. I definitely think the outer-left seat is going to give the best ride experience. All in all, this attraction makes no sense at all, but is still a fun little thing. It's nothing *special*, but definitely a great concept, and hopefully more parks invest in Mack BigDippers in the future... The top hat looks very square from this perspective... Escalator theming the queue because...reasons? Goliath The main thing I remember about Goliath is how painfully obvious this was a ride from the Six Flags era. No theming, awful-looking queue, no audio in the surrounding around, unimaginative name, awkward location. That's not to say it was a bad ride, but I guess because I always look for a more overall experience than *just* a coaster, the lack of overall experience will stand out to me. The coaster is pretty fun, offering nice moments of airtime and intensity, and has a decent-ish layout on the whole. We had a ride on it in the hail, which was both painful and awesome in equal measure. We ended up riding this a few times during the day, so I guess that shows how loved it was by the group as a whole, but it's just a shame there wasn't more to go with it! From here, the park goes a bit downhill. Robin Hood, the park's Vekoma woodie, is alright, and has a bit more airtime than it's sister Werewolf, and is good in its own right, but failed to leave much of a lasting impression on me. Speed of Sound, a Vekoma Boomerang, is one of the better Boomerangs I've done in fairness, but the transition between the cobra roll and vertical loop is rather unpleasant. The soundtrack is annoyingly catchy though. Coaster-wise, we also did kiddie coaster Drako, which wasn't terrible. El Condor The final coaster we did at the park was El Condor, a Vekoma SLC. I heard bad things about it, so wasn't exactly looking forward to it. But dear oh dear, this was dreadful. The OTSR actually squished my ears due to the lack of room they provided. The ride was rough, rattly and in general just uncomfortable and awful. And this was in the front row too! Honestly, I cannot think of a worst (notably) coaster I've done. One can only hope this is on the chopping block for the park (hopefully for their 2019 coaster...) This is not BaronC. approved. Outside of the coasters, there's little of note really. Merlin's Magic Castle was a largely forgettable Vekoma madhouse, though did feature a nice bit of misdirection in the main ride show. Their rapids and log flume were fun and featured some quirky signs (though are clearly nothing to write home about as I've forgotten their names, and I'm too lazy to look them up...). And aside from a couple of smaller rides, there's not really much else on park. I'm probably selling the park a little short here, but time constraints, laziness and a general mediocre reaction to the park isn't really encouraging me to go much further. It's evident that the park's recent investments have been very good for the park though, which is only a positive sign. The lack of indoor rides was something that really stood out to me (especially given the pouring rain!), but hopefully next season's 'thrilling dark ride' will help with that. One final point - the park's direction. Walibi have made is obvious that they want Walibi Holland to be a thrill park, focusing on teenagers and young adults. They pretty much said as much when they closed down their 4D cinema for next year's apparent new attraction. And, much like Thorpe at the beginning of the decade, they've tailored their marketing and general park atmosphere to that market. From "#HardGaan" ('#GoFast') plastered all across the park and live DJs playing music across the park (with many songs featuring plenty of swears), they know what they think this market wants. Oh, and there's this charming t-shirt, which many staff wear, and is also on sale... Subtly, not Walibi Holland's strong point. I'm by no means a prude or anything, but this whole style seems very theme park unfriendly. And it's nowhere near as clever, subtle or humorous as some of the stuff Thorpe did during their fathead phase (the 2011 fireworks event 'Thorpe Park BLOWS IT UP / BLOW S#!T UP' advertising was something which I genuinely found amusing and clever, and still brings a smile to my face thinking about it). Part of me hopes it works for them, as I think turning Walibi Holland into a thrill-focused park would be great, as they have plenty of opportunities (much more so than Belgium and Rhone-Alpes) and a firm foundation already. But at the same time, we've seen plenty of parks try this strategy, before realising alienating families is never a good thing. So who knows. Anyways, enough rambling. Platform 13, Lost Gravity and Goliath were all fab coasters in their own right, but everything else is a bit drab. Hopefully we can see more fabness in the future. Next time - Germany, and Phantasialand of awesome-ness...

In fairness, power faults are usually external problems and when they happen it's difficult for parks to do much.

If you're with @J.S217, ask him what his Top 10 favourite coasters are every 10 minutes. By the end of the queue, you can guarantee it'll be a completely different list to what it was at the start. If not, just find all the 4.5s in the queue.

An indoor flume ride isn't a dark ride in my books. If it is, then that would mean an indoor coaster is one too, which I think is absurd.

Early rumours suggested SW8 would open in 2017, and this did fit in with the original 4 year investment cycle Merlin seem to like. However, it seems that plans have changed, for a variety of reasons.

This past week, I hit up a few European parks in search of some new creds, and to go back to some places I enjoyed last year. Just thought I'd throw in a few thoughts from my visits... Plopsaland de Panne Went here last year, and had a lot of fun. With Heidi originally planned to open July 1st, we decided to return for some wooden coaster goodness. Alas, it wasn't meant to be as Heidi Spiti is too loud at the moment, and sound barriers are still being constructed. Looks like a fab little coaster, and I'm sure when it opens - and is fully themed - it will be a great addition to the park! Also new since my last visit was the gigantic castle housing a restaurant a teacups: For what it houses, it's pretty insane. The level of detail and the sheer scale of this is completely unnecessary for a restaurant and teacups. Hopefully this is a good sign of things to come in the future from the park, but one can't help but wonder if the investment would have been better placed elsewhere in the park. I had hoped to try out a few more attractions we missed out on last due to closures (namely their starflyer, Disko and The Bat; their random suspended coasters). Unfortunately, both the starflyer and Bat were closed, despite being listed as open on the park's website. A bit disappointing, but nothing major. Their disko was open though and has a nice, lengthy cycle, and is nicely themed. The true highlight of Plopsaland though is Anubis: This Gerstlauer rolling launch had a lot to live up to after I ranked it so well last time. Fortunately it still delivered. The exit from the launch is a bit rougher than I remember, but otherwise this is a solid coaster, with a very punchy launch, pops of airtime and a nice bit of intensity blended it a brilliant 'older family' coaster. Actually, I don't have much else to add (for longer review, see my trip last year: http://forum.maniahub.com/blogs/entry/693-belgerand-day-1-plopsaland-de-panne/ Walibi Belgium Walibi Belgium was a weird one last year. We visited on a very busy day (thanks school trips!) and arrived over an hour late to the park (thanks Brussels traffic!). We managed to get most things done, but it was all a bit of a rush. It wasn't a park I was dying to go back to, but it fit in nicely in the trip as a last day, was a chance to get the Boomerang cred I missed out, and also do their weird-looking new coaster, Pulsar. Speaking of Pulsar, that's where I'll start. For those who don't know, it's a shuttle coaster featuring 3 launches (2 backwards, 1 forwards) gradually increasing to 62mph and a small airtime hill. On, and one Tidal Wave sized splash. It's one of those coasters where all sensible thought said it'd be naff, but I just felt like it could be great fun. And you know what? It's fun. The launches are both fun and a little bit punchy (and great with lap bars), the airtime is alright, and the splash gets you wet. How wet does depend on where you sit - the back leaves you rather soaked, the sides wet and the inside sprayed. Front row was blocked off due to loads of water spilling into those seats during the ride - hopefully that's an issue Mack can correct soon! Geeky techy specs were about too The turntable system for loading (meaning the coaster has 2 cars) is really clever, and it means that one car is ready to go before the other has even finished. No doubt this is thanks to Mack's brilliant engineering and clever way of locking and checking restraints. This meant the queue was really quick moving and it must get a really good throughput (I believe they're aiming for 800ish and I can see them reaching that easily!). The turntable was the cause of a couple of breakdowns during the day, but I imagine these issues will be ironed out with time. The combination of the ride experience, theming, slight story and music means that Walibi are onto a real winner with this attraction. It feels different enough to their other shuttle coasters, and is a great family attraction. Hopefully we see more of these pop up across the world! Another cred for the list was Cobra, a Vekoma boomerang: It was rough, awkwardly intense and just not a fun ride. So glad I didn't waste 20 minutes of my life queueing for it last year. I won't really bore you with the rest of my trip. The park was very quiet (longest we queued for anything was about 10 minutes for Psyke Underground), so we managed to get everything done, and some rerides of some stuff. My opinions haven't changed much from last year (see here - http://forum.maniahub.com/blogs/entry/699-belgerand-day-3-walibi-beglium/ ). Would like to add that I still enjoyed Werewolf, despite now having done other woodies, though naturally not as much as my first ride. Something I'd just like to throw out there was the atmosphere of the park. With generic chart music everywhere (except Pulsar pretty much), a few rowdy guests who seemingly would never follow instructions (people standing up on their extremely rapid rapids rather dangerously) and the like, the atmosphere felt a bit dull and meh. A bit of a shame, especially since last year's visit was overall much nicer despite the large crowds. I feel as though I've properly 'done' Walibi Belgium now. With Pulsar, Psyke and Werewolf, they've got 3 coasters I enjoy, and the likes of drop tower Dalton Terror and madhouse La Palais du Genie are fun rides, but there's just not enough to entice me back any time soon. Not a bad thing of course, it's a nice enough park, just nothing all that special. Next time, a new-for-me park: Walibi Holland, featuring Lost Gravity and Goliath...

This was rumoured to be the case a few weeks ago - it wasn't just a case of dodgy translation I believe. But like pluk says, they have simply split into a rides division and a non-rides divisions. They have cited that they've had poorer sales than predicted in China recently, hence why the rumour they would stop dealing with rides was somewhat believable.

Inversions were considered on suspended coasters, prior to the opening of the first one (The Bat at Kings Island in 1981): For the reasons stated above, the idea never took off and inversions on suspended coasters were never really considered.

Looks like a solid 4.5/10

Isn't that the same video they posted on their Facebook in late April / early May? Why have they uploaded it to their YouTube now?

I don't think anyone's getting stroppy about it? It's more just that this is a thing where keeping the secret is part of the fun and, dare I say, the overall experience. By laying out every minute detail online, regardless of the location, spoils that fun for no real reason in my eyes. Before anyone else goes with the 'it helps for people who are unsure on riding' thing, I don't see the point in that. If you're of that nervous a disposition you shouldn't be riding it. And if the vague description has got you scared - then good, that's the point!

I believe that the actual ride section of Hex is in a custom made building separate to the Towers themselves? But the transition is done so well and the building is hidden enough that you don't actually notice it. In any case, I can't see this being a demolition and replacement of Hex. When the time comes to completely get rid of Hex, I'd be surprised if they replaced it with anything to be honest.

The trouble with soundtracks for Merlin rides is that each ride seems to just have one or two pieces of audio in them (queue line / ride area and station). That in itself is not enough to warrant a CD in my opinion. So if they were to sell any soundtrack, they'd have to do a whole park (or area, at a push) CD. But given the various different people / companies behind all the different pieces of audio, I imagine that'd be difficult to sort out. It wouldn't go a miss having any Merlin park sell some of their ride music, but I can't see it happening any time soon, more for logistical reasons.