JoshC.

You have some Bantille lyrics in your signature.

^Would actually love to hear that played in the area during Fright Nights! They probably won't change anything. If they go for park-wide theming, I guess we could see some small bits adding to the area. Given that Fright Nights is aimed towards the older audience, there's no need to do anything to ABL really, as the majority of people going for Fright Nights will be less interested in it. Roaming actors will probably be told to not focus on younger children I expect.

According to Screamscape, it's the state of New Jersey that have put the restriction on (though they themselves find it hard to believe!) - http://www.screamscape.com/html/six_flags_great_adventure.htm They mention about how the control systems for both rides are linked, so essentially the rides cannot operate at the same time. I've definitely read this somewhere else, though where I cannot find. Certainly doesn't surprise me; though I do hope the two can run simultaneously in the future.

Looks like a new maze is definitely on the cards: http://www.prweek.com/article/1307467/thorpe-park-hires-prettygreen-fright-night-sessions (Loving that MBV photo as well ) Here's the company Thorpe are working with - http://www.itsprettygreen.com/ . They seem pretty good; looking forward to seeing how they go about with the PR!

I don't have any jokes unfortunately. I guess you could say I'm a pun wit wonder.

Helix cost just over £21m, but I guess the difficult landscape could add to the cost. According to Wikipedia, Blue Fire cost between £5.5m-£6.5m without "decorations", which I guess means theming. Alpina Blitz at Nigloland only cost £5.5m as well. So they certainly seem quite affordable, and at say £6m, it's not unreasonable to say that one of the smaller parks here could splash out and get a smaller one. I do wonder if the lack of Mack is because the parks are waiting for more to be made, to see how good the quality is - I don't think Mack have done many major coasters for example.

Stealth won't be able to get the additional supports to get one, because of the council restrictions. Thank goodness as well in my opinion - Detonator is a great drop tower. Plus I wouldn't want to see the park's icon coaster have to deal with troubling throughput to accommodate for a drop tower.

Yeah, Jessabelle's released has been continuously put back - with it currently having a limited release in November now. I'd be surprised if that was turned into an attraction to be honest, but if it was, it'd make for a create chance for to have a maze which uses atmosphere more than actors jumping out at you. Still holding onto a sliver of hope for a Hostel-themed attraction, however 'out there' that sounds, but TCM seems like a likely choice.

Disappointing.

I'm still with The Resistance. I dunno how well we'll do; spent most of the pre-season training fighting off swarming alien races and convincing people they're Lez Cougan...

I doesn't look like it's going for the accuracy of the likes of RCT, with more the 'it's meant to be preposterous, let's have some fun with it'. Given that, I think it looks okay to be honest.

^Yep, it is that model! Great theme for an indoor spinning coaster and should be a nice little addition to the park. Definitely high up on the list of US parks I want to visit one day for sure!

^I dunno if it's that simple; from what I've seen, the public can't normally access the underneath of top hat sections of launch coasters (could well be wrong there, just what I've seen from pictures). So it just seems to be a more general thing of not letting people underneath the ride section. From what I've seen, the station and queue line are quite enclosed on Zumanjaro(?), so I guess that minimises risks of getting hit by loose items and whatnot.

Zombies are in Cabin in the Woods, so it could be reference to that. I don't think there's a Lionsgate-distributed film that's main focus in zombies though and is particularly popular (someone correct me if I'm wrong though!). I've noticed that on this link - http://www.thorpebreaks.co.uk/fright-nights.html , they say: Since it says 'some', that probably means there'll be more. Not groundbreaking news, but it does confirm that there'll probably be at least one new IP this season, meaning that there should be an Asylum replacement of some kind. Well, hopefully at least!

If you want something to facepalm at today - http://www.gazettelive.co.uk/whats-on/family-kids-news/watch-lightwater-valley-flamingo-land-7594234 There is no 'best' coaster - it's all so personal. You cannot come up with some sort of systematic formula for deciding how good a ride is. Indeed, things like this annoy me all the more, as it can lead to Maths getting a bad image in the public...

Verbolten (Let's see how quickly we can reach Farup from here!)

(which JoshC. dislikes)

No more progress yet unfortunately; too much work going on unfortunately. Hopefully some more progress will come sooner or later though.

Summer Nights is meant to be minimal queues though, not no queues. Yeah, it's nicer to have with no queues, but it's not like the event is any different to what it's being advertised if there's short queues.

Favourite coaster manufacturer is a difficult one. B&M do make some quality, but at the same time, they can be very formulaic with their rides. Then again, that could just be down to the parks who order their rides. Then there's Intamin; despite all their flaws, they are very innovative, and do contribute to the industry. Perhaps too innovative though, but heyho. But then you get the 'smaller' ones, like Mack and even Gerstlauer, who are improving their ride selections, and being involved in bigger and more exciting projects. So really difficult to choose. In terms of rides I've ridden, I've always favoured B&M rides, so I'll have to go for them. As for flat rides, I'll have to go for Fabbri. Just because they've got a great selection of rides and seem to be quite reliable.

Given that the plans valued the project at £2.3 million, yet we got everything that was including in the plans, it's a bit weird (unless there was some sorta crossover whereby the plans were changed before submitted, but the value of the project wasn't?). To be honest, for under £1m, I think the cinema experience alone is worth it. Shame though; double the budget could have seen some very nice things!

http://www.altontowersguide.com/gallery/behind-the-scenes/the-smiler/ Behind the Scenes / Lift Hill walk of Smiler!

Whoops, just deleted that post after realising that You're Next has been taken off this season's adverts, which would mean it's not returning. :S I agree with you that TCM Would be a good choice though!

Unfortunately, I won't be making this meet. Really, really want to, but it's just not feasible. I hope it's a great success and that this is the first of many 'more exotic' trips to come!

You see, the trouble is, I don't think if you simply spruce up the park, it'll make people want to visit. It definitely will make people who are already there want to visit again, but it won't necessarily entice people to want to go there in the first place. They'd need more. In the case of Thorpe, they've had such large amounts of investments (the last time there was nothing new was 1997; before a fair few members on here were born!), so people could well 'expect' something new, otherwise they won't feel the need to go there. Whether that new thing is a new ride, a new show, some gimmicky event, whatever, they'll need to get something new to entice people in. Simply sprucing up areas won't be enough (unless it's a large retheme). It will have to be a slow process - adding new things and sprucing things up until such a time they've given people enough reason to want to return that they can afford to just take a year to not add anything new. And I just don't think that year will come for another 2-3 years.. The care of rides is certainly one of the highlighted problems with Merlin's parks. Of course, they can't take all the blame, but still, it's something which really needs to be addressed. We don't want to see more cases like Loggers tunnel, Dragon Falls theming, RMT, etc.