JoshC.

Tbf their relationship with goons is significantly better now. Just look at Coaster's TR from PBE's trip there and all the perks they got.. Plus they gave Tobi (the guy who did the Klugheim CGI models) front row on the first ride of Taron on preview night. Admittedly they've effectively bought him off to not publish his Rookburgh one but oh well. But yeah, the relationship between Phantasialand and their locals makes Towers and Ropers look like a newly wed couple on their honeymoon...

What a wonderful mess of track. Also from Dex.. Wuze Wall looking mighty fine, bar the weird brown segments at the top. Believed to be there as part of the sounds barrier. Hopefully they're to be better incorporated, though admittedly it's a minor detail for now..

#BetterThanHelix #IntaminBetterThanMack

This thread is fast becoming the Linnanmaki thread... But with damn good reason.

Genuinely think this has the potential to be in the same league as Taron and/or Helix (delete as appropriate depending on your views on both rides). The launches won't be much faster than Helix, but I see them being much more intense. And the layout just looks like a ton of fun. So it's a bloody solid winner of a ride. It's a shame this ride isn't attracting the same hype as Helix, Taron, Icon and even Asterix21 is. I guess that's down to location, but still...

Nemesis is the best invert I've done. Although I've only done 3. Black Mamba is great but the second half is noticeably weaker than the first. Inferno is good but not as good as Nemesis. Simple.

An interesting note from John Wardley about his involvement in Wicker Man... http://www.john-wardley.co.uk/wickerman.html Nothing that hasn't really been reported before, but his tone of voice is certainly interesting..

It's less about planning permission and more that it would take longer than 4 months to bring it back to anywhere near an operational standard. Thorpe were drunk, and posted a stupid tweet. Nothing else behind it.

I agree about the triple launch section potentially killing the momentum. However, with the airtime moments included in that as well, that should at least offer something more interesting to it.

For those unaware, Star Ball is an end of season staff party. Pretty poor of anyone to post anything on an official social media account whilst likely inebriated... Not sure if it's just a joke or if you're genuinely unaware, but Project Zero was totally unrelated to Thorpe - it was a pair of Escape Rooms which opened in Ashford..

Nice concept - not as 'brick'y as I was expecting, which is a good thing. Equally, I hope they have a balance to make it 'feel' like Legoland, else it may feel out of place.

^It's an extension of the park, behind their SLC. Construction photo from PabloA on Coasterforce...

Walibi Belgium took a trip to Switzerland and took some drugs with Intamin... Coming in 2021. Note that, sadly, the new Intamin at Asterix will be 51m tall, so this will only be the highest coaster in the Benelux. Burn. Again, another mental-looking coaster from Intamin; that final third looks insane. Anddddd, just as a reminder of what's coming up in Walibi Belgium over the next few years: 2019: Popcorn Revenge - 3D shooting erratic dark ride 2019: Junior coaster 2020: Splash battle and Gerstlauer sky fly / sky roller 2021: Intamin coaster and re-introduction of their kiddie cred, along with a retheme of the Vampire / Werewolf area Damn Walibi, damn.

What's better than a coaster with one launch? A coaster with two launches. And what's better than a coaster with two launches? A coaster with four launches. And what's worse than a coaster with four launches but still bloody good? A coaster with one proper launch and one of those weird triple semi-shuttle launch things (but it's fine because this thing looks bloody awesome)... Intamin bringing their A+ game with this. And with it being Parc Asterix, expect some tasty theming too. Only bad news is this is still 2 and a half years a way from opening...

As you say, it's a listed structure, so it will never happen. This was a hoax by someone on Twitter and hasn't even been thought of by the park, Lett alone any plans being dreamed up.

This is what happens when you stick a dark ride in the middle of the park and don't have a large enough budget for exterior theming. It's no surprise really, as it's exactly what they did with Ninjago.

Though it hasn't been officially confirmed anywhere, it is strongly rumoured that the Fly trains will have 10 rows, and there will be 4 trains. That would put it at a higher capacity than Taron. How that would translate to throughput is of course a different matter, but I don't think it will be as much as a worry as it first seems!

Go on then.

Genuinely thought we had a Vekoma thread somewhere, but clearly not.. But it's fine, we need one... During this week's IAAPA, Vekoma are revealing 4 new generations of some of their coasters. Flying coaster is one of them (see Phantasialand), another one is the upgraded version of their SLC... Called the Suspended Thrill Coaster (STC), the new off-the-shelf model features two inversions and a significantly different layout. The last "new" SLC is set to open in China sometime over the next year or so I believe. After that, the STC takes over as the only off-the-shelf suspended model Vekoma will sell. Given that Mayan (SLC at Energylandia built a couple of years back) is generally considered not-horrendous by most, and the good quality attractions Vekoma have been building lately, it's fair to assume this should provide a much smoother ride experience, as well as a fun, cheaper, option for many parks.

Not strictly Phantasialand-related, but it'll do... Vekoma have updated their website to show promotional art of their new-gen flyer. More details will follow during this week's IAAPA. Personally feel like those trains are a bit, well, ugly. Hope there's easy customisable theming options..

But what do number of interactions actually count for? Sure, it increases outreach, but that's pretty pointless when what they're posting is effectively gibberish. And it hardly increases outreach in the first place when it's probably the same people interacting. It's the sort of stuff that small-scale pages do, not pre-established large companies too. This doesn't even take into account that the type of people who enjoy this, like young teens, aren't exactly in their abundance on Twitter, preferring things like Snapchat (which, ironically, is severely under-utilised by Thorpe). It shows a complete lack of understanding of who they're trying to target, as well as how and why. It also doesn't help when they post things which could be interpreted as hints to investments which aren't going to happen (see today's tweet). No Thorpe, that's not interacting with fans and being funny and clever, it alienates a large majority of people who don't about pointless teases, and sets expectations too high for the minority. Very definition of shooting yourself in the foot.

Alternatively, go for an interview there, and they let you roam around the park unescorted for free afterwards. Didn't feel wholly comfortable with that proposition...

Anyone else feel like Thorpe's Twitter is the cringiest thing to happen in 2018, and just generally not how a theme park should do social media? Or am I just out of touch with what's "cool" these days...

As a project, this must be costing MILLIONS - this won't be cheap. Crazy really that they're considering this, just to potentially help ease of traffic congestion. I question how much it'll improve people's travel to the park, and how much of Europa's thinking is just 'this draws even more attention to us and creates something unique'. But it's still a quirky thing to see, and I'm sure people will love it, so I've got nothing against it.

Dia de Muertos is the, predominantly Mexican, celebration for 'Day of the Dead'. It's a 3 day festival taking place 31st October to 2nd November for people to celebrate life and death, and reflect back on loved ones who have passed away. It's slowly creeping its way into western culture, mostly because people think it's Halloween related and an excuse to dress up vibrantly with skulls. But it's not, and if anything, shows how people don't understand the point of it. Why on earth Thorpe it would be a good idea to make reference to it, I have no idea. Most people don't know of it, don't care for it, and it has no relation to anything at Thorpe. And given how few interactions it got, it shows. Fun fact - the backwards cave section in Chiapas at Phantasialand is based off of Dia de Muertos. Hence the disco ball, flashing lights and singing skulls.