JoshC.

It's a fact - this ride takes up more floor space than Duel or Hex. Granted, this ride's building also includes a shop, but measured by square meter, this ride is larger than Hex or Duel. Regardless, my point still stands: you don't loads of space to create a good dark ride if you're clever enough. I just don't get the argument. The shipping container hotel is a temporary solution to a long-term problem the park have. Your standard visitor probably won't even take note of it; they'll probably see the shark feature and catch a glimpse of the containers. Once they're in the park, they won't notice it. It doesn't affect their day in any way, shape or form. People who use the hotel are likely aware of it and if they're using it, content enough with the idea. The inside is relatively nice as well - certainly looks nicer than some places I've stayed in. If people complain about the shipping containers and their look, people should also complain about the marquee sitting in park next to Swarm. It stands out, has no use to your every day guest, and everyone will see it. It has more visual impact than the shipping containers, and for less gain. Yet that receives next to no stick compared to the hotel because it's not made out of shipping containers. Also, just as a quick question, what do you mean by "premium theme park"? Other than the entrance price, it's difficult to call Thorpe a premium park in any way in my opinion, and that doesn't really relate to the hotel? Bit confused. So far, I don't see anyone praising Thorpe for what they've done? I don't even see indifference? All I see are people expressing their disappointment so far, or people waiting for the final product before making full judgement? Think you're jumping the gun a bit. At the moment it's a big red box and it looks awful, yes. To be honest, I do think that when it's finished, it will still look awful, mostly because it will be adjoined to a much larger, much better looking part of the building. I've always felt that. But still it's best to wait until the final product - it's possible that it may 'work'. Unlikely, but possible.

Terror of the Towers marketing... DID YOU KNOW IT HAS A NEW ROUTE?! On a serious note, hopefully they continue to post little things like this to advertise the other attractions too.

I don't get how any of these examples support your claim that the this part of the ride is going to be an eyesore? -The likes of Colossus, Inferno's volcano and Rumba Rapids are things that the park do want to sort out (ie they do care), but budget is more the likely the bigger problem. -Cattlepens come to logistics more than anything else, and whilst they could be more creative, one has to question whether anything more creative will add to the experience enough for it to be worthwhile. Many many parks have cattlepen / highly compact queue lines with bits of theming to distract you. Thorpe isn't much different. -ABL is a bit plonked down, yes, but there's been a clear attempt to make it feel like its own area and give it its own feel. I don't get your point here? -The shipping container hotel argument - that loads of people bring up - just annoys me. You hardly see the containers unless you're looking out for them, and you only see them on the entrance bridge going into the park (when most people are focused with what's ahead of them). They're a temporary solution, and most people don't see them. So I don't see how the points you've raised supper the idea that this part of the building will be an eyesore? Yes, other parts of the park aren't perfect, but that doesn't necessarily mean that this will be terrible. You don't necessarily need tons of space to create a great dark ride. Just because other, high quality, dark rides are huge, it doesn't mean all are. Things like Hex and The Haunted House are/were fun dark rides that are well-received, and they're both smaller than this. Also, a general question (not aimed at anyone) - why are we always making comparisons to some of the best dark rides in the world? Do people seriously think Thorpe can be aiming for that standard? Why can't we just wait and see what this is come next year and see how good it is in its own right? Just feels like people are already setting this up to be a fall.. Nah - Spiderman's floor space is almost three times the floor space of this. Agree with you about mentioning this is only a small part of the building, and the remaining part of the building is seemingly on two floors, and very little space is taken up by the shop. This is still going to be the biggest dark ride in the UK. --- It's a shame that they couldn't really fit the ride elsewhere. Many dark rides usually are tucked away behind other things, or at the edge of the park, so parks only have to theme part of the building (Duel being the best example I can think of). Looking at the plans, it does seem like this could be the final product. Of course, the plans don't always show the finished results exactly; some finer details can be added that aren't included on the plans. To be fair on the park, we still know next to nothing about the ride, so it is of course possible that this could be part of the ride's theme / story in some way. Unlikely, but possible. Don't forget that the rest of the building looks much better themed and styled too, so one can only hope that attention is drawn away from the lesser eye-pleasing sections of the building. Also, one thing which I think is worth chucking out into the mix again - the plans indicate that the ride will have on ride photos. There's certainly a few types of ride this would eliminate in my opinion, and an immersive tunnel would be one of them.

Nothing in the plans. A reminder for everyone how the building should look roughly... (James' picture that CoasterDude posted is from a north-west view of the site). The plans also indicated that this part of the building will have some (more?) trees to help try and hide this part of the building.

Looks exactly like how the plans said it would. Don't forget that the rest of the building and themed structures looked a lot more visually interesting than this part of the building.

I imagine Smiler incident has had a knock on effect towards the park's popularity. I expect Merlin predicted that, plus they had a low investment year, so I don't think slightly lower figures should be ringing alarm bells to anyone to be honest.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see how anyone can seriously think Samurai is returning to Chessington? It just seems like people are putting 2 and 2 together and getting 5. If Samurai returns to Chessington, I'll eat my hat.

I agree that Rattlesnake's prolonged downtime after the Smiler incident is a bit odd considering everything else that was closed following the incident has now reopened. However, I feel like it's very difficult to criticise the closure when Merlin have handled the situation perfectly in my opinion, and they're not going to be keeping a ride closed longer than necessary. I also think it's difficult to have an opinion of when the closed rides should reopen, since this is an incident that we've never seen Merlin handle before, and have no clue how something like this is dealt with behind the scenes.

Why do you think they need to step marketing up? They've got leaflets on park and a teaser website for the ride. Do they really need any more at the moment, when the ride isn't going to open for (at least) another 7 months? At the moment, not many parks have big time marketing for their major attractions set to open next year. Swarm had some huge marketing campaigns going on this time in 2011, and yet you see that final product as a let down, so it goes to show the marketing preceding a ride's opening doesn't make a good ride in the long run! I personally think that would spoil the effect of any sort of immersive tunnel. The whole point is you're meant to be immersed in a surrounding - having a huge car to your side would really make that difficult and would certainly ruin anything on the screen to your side in my opinion.

Fuji-Q has some ridiculously awesome-looking scare attractions; would really love to experience them one day. Certainly a place Thorpe should strive to compete against in the global market if they're serious about making their Halloween event top quality. Saw is crying out to have an escape room treatment really, but would require some minor modifications for it to work. Would be a pretty amazing thing to do if they could pull it off, but I'd be surprised if it's happened this year. Most staff won't know that much about the building schedule of WC16, so I wouldn't believe that even. There won't be a maze in the building either - they would have to finish the rest of the building, construct the walls and ceiling, make the ground safe to be accessed by the public, stop the construction of the ride to create, build and operate an entire maze for a month, then de-construct it to be able to continue work of the dark ride. Way way way too much effort and logistical trouble for one maze. I'd be surprised if a maze goes near where the Island Beats stage is. There's not a lot of room there. Sure, they put Dead End by that walkway a few years ago, but there's not a lot of room there, so any form of official attraction would be very short. That space could hold a small scare zone, but that's about it. tl;dr - don't believe everything you hear from "someone"

Worth pointing out again that Rattlesnake is still down because of the Smiler incident. So at least that has a decent reason for its closure.

Only old maze I really miss is Se7en. I really enjoyed the concept of the maze and there were some great scenes with great effects in there. The blank areas between scenes were very meh, but it was overall a good maze in my opinion. -Curse was always underwhelming to me; nice to look at, but never more than people shout 'Arrrrr, me mateys'. Shame I didn't do it in its last season, as apparently it was good -Asylum was very meh, and liked giving me a headache. -Hellgate was a bit meh too. Some of the others I miss in some ways - I'd have liked to try Passing a couple more times / see it develop over a couple of seasons. Could have been a really nice attraction. Experiment 10 was great too, but needed some of its issues sorted out, and unfortunately MBV just doesn't match up to it. So I 'miss' them in the sense of I'd like to have seen them have more time to possible develop. I wish I'd done Freakshow 3D too. Sounded like a nice and clever concept (and then it would have given me a full house on Fright Night attractions). Shame it's all be painted over and the like. But then again, I'm not complaining with what we've got. Cabin is a brilliant maze with a fantastic idea. MBV inherits some of Ex10's issues and some new ones, but at least uses small spaces and good theming well. Saw Alive is a solid conga line style maze. Blair Witch was great last season, and showed that Thorpe can utilise suspense in their attractions. Studio 13 had a fantastic premise and is to the date the most immersed I've felt in a scare attraction. So, very happy with what we've got at the moment!

I saw this and expected to see "something other than graw" as a member now. But close enough ey..

Unfortunately I don't have a photo of this, but the Tetley Tea character that recently appeared on a themed bench by the Teacups, then disappeared following some damage, has returned! Hopefully it can stick around longer this time!

I don't recall any kitchen scenes from Studio 13 / Asylum / Freezer? Sure the guy wasn't just pulling your leg? IAC was closed today too though, for the record.

Truckers had had Fastrack for a couple of seasons now (since 2012 I think?).

I'm with SCB on this one - effects-based rides are different to rides with effects.

*Insert a suitably sarcastic comment to celebrate*

Yeah, definitely my main issues were with the park were clearly older parts of the park. I could at least appreciate the quality and effort in some of the newer rides I didn't like (Mystery area, Talocan, etc), and Taron already looks fab, so it's great there's a positive outlook. If Temple and Hollywood get replaced, I'm not even sure my wildest dreams could come up with sort of quality attraction they could do in that space...

Lazy retheme of Peeking Heights it is then.

Hotel tickets include Summer Nights.

Agree with Benin that whilst they may not give the exact theme (then again, why would they want to?), they give the generic feel and theme. This marketing campaign is a bit odd though, since the boards around the construction site and the website have very different tones and feel to them. Of course the website will give a better indication to the ride's feel, but it just feels...odd, almost like there was a change in idea or something.

Never too early to advertise for Halloween events in my opinion. Didn't the Scarefest hearse appear at like the beginning of August last season? Just a shame they decided to put it on the Market Square compass, which is arguably the coolest thing Chessington have added in the past couple of years.

I'd be Lez Cougan, since we are all Lez Cougan. Alternatively, I'd be Gustave Hooghmoed. [Yes, I'm really that much of a geek]

Looks like it's lights out for everyone then.