Coaster

Now this is a hilarious publicity stunt, especially considering that Studio 13 is one of the tamest mazes there is: http://www.independent.ie/world-news/and-finally/panic-room-for-fright-nights-guests-30666460.html

Of course I can see the problem. I hugely disagree with handing out free fastrack tickets, I would prefer to see them sort out the problems but years and years of past visits has told me that they are never going to change the way they operate the Fastrack system - they would rather be poor if it means more money in their pockets. But at the time I was with three very disappointed people, as well as myself and we had all just wasted a huge chunk of our day so the only way to make up for it was to use the passes to at least allow us to reduce the queue time on one of our attractions. No it's does not. Fastrack tickets are just bits of paper that don't cost the park anything to give out (besides printing money obviously). If they really cared about customer experience they would improve what is being complained about rather than just handing out free Fastrack tickets to shut people up.

Sunday 12th September 2014 Time in park: 11:30am - 10pm RIDES CLOSED: Samurai, Rumba Rapids, Flying Fish, Stealth (for a lot of the evening), Logger's Leap (evening only). The day got off to a bad start when we arrived and were greeted with this queue for the annual pass fee: (It was actually a quite a lot longer than this, but I couldn't fit it all in the photo). Despite the queue being this long, and taking over an hour, they only had four out of eight windows open. Bear in mind that we are only having to queue here because of the park's greediness anyway, so I find it infuriating to be made to wait in a queue when, as an annual passholder, you should be able to walk straight in. I'm not sure why Thorpe choose to hinder their passholders like this, given that they are usually the park's most loyal guests. This was especially annoying for us as two of us had premium passes, one a clubcard day ticket and only one a Thorpe park annual pass, so four of us were having to queue for one person. Annual Passholders should not be delayed this much in entering the park, it is unacceptable and absoloutely poor. The first half of the day in the park was okay. Nothing really went wrong (aside from three rides being closed), so we just went on most of the coasters before having lunch. The second half of the day was where most of the problems started. Firstly, after going on Studio 13 and Cabin in The Woods we headed over to Saw Alive, which was closed! Therefore we did a few rides and joined the queue for My Bloody Valentine, which was signposted as being "up to 60 minutes." This was confirmed by a member of staff. The queue was nowhere near halfway through the fencing, so should not have taken longer than 60 minutes. It was moving at a fairly good speed until about 30 minutes in, when the Fastrack queue started to fill up. At this point the main queue was forgotten about in favour of those who have given the park yet more money, and the Fastrack queue (which was pretty much full) was run off completely before we even moved. I think they were probably doing a ratio of about 5:1 groups (5 fastrack, 1 normal queue) as we were not moving at all. Further to this, every time anyone arrived in the Fastrack queue they were put through immediately, which led to yet more hold ups. The queue, which should have taken an hour at the most took 110 minutes. 110 minutes stood out in the pouring rain in freezing temperatures, without any kind of apology from the staff. In fact the batcher asked us three times how many of us there were, as everytime he went to batch us he did Fastrack instead! Needless to say he got a rather abrupt reply the third time he asked us. Unfortunately Thorpe have shown that they don't care about anything but money. This Fastrack situation is diabolical, and I can't remember the number of times they have said "we'll sort it out", yet the same problem keeps occurring over and over again! My friends were disgusted, one of which doesn't visit Thorpe very often! Stealth was long since closed by the time we came out of MBV, which is inexcusable, especially when we would have probably still have got a ride on it if the queue for MBV had only taken the advertised 60 minutes! We were told that the ride would reopen again but it didn't, much to our further disgust. We went to guest services to complain about MBV, and were given a priority pass which we used on the same maze. Then we went and waited in the queue for Saw Alive which was very short, but nobody was being let in. After waiting for about 15/20 minutes with no communication about what was going on we left and went in CITW again and then BWP to end the evening. Overall I was not impressed at all with this experience and at any other park I would be absoloutely appalled. Sadly, at Thorpe I have just come to expect it. Very poor show, and one of the reasons why Thorpe is nowhere near the best park in the UK. RIDECOUNT: Nemesis Inferno x6 X x4 Colossus x2 The Swarm x1 Saw: The Ride x1 Slammer x1 Detonator x1 Loggers Leap x1 MAZE COUNT: My Bloody Valentine x2 Cabin in The Woods x2 Studio 13 x2 The Blair Witch Project x1

Are they going to open it?!

Ah, in that case it could still have a more interesting layout.

Is this not the official layout then?

The theming looks great, but the layout looks dull - not much better than Oblivion really.

So basically Hellgate then. Well, Hellgate with it's theming removed anyway.

It has just occured to me (and someone please correct me if I'm wrong) that Cabin in the Woods seemingly uses less than half of the space previously occupied by Hellgate. I say this because the actual exit of the maze is less than halfway across the side of the building, and the maze never seems to extend past that at all. Could this mean that a lot of Hellgate is still there?

Might as well sue Thorpe for building Tidal Wave, Oakwood for building Drenched as well and be a millionaire!

Well no I was joking as I can see that, just like re-riding, it was ultimately my choice (even though I could argue that I wouldn't have got the bug if the queue had only taken the advertised 60 minutes). Are you really suggesting that a stomach bug that lasts for 2/3 days max is not much worse than being seriously injured, I.e. breaking your neck? I think the latter would be much worse.

Yes but there is a difference between getting seriously injured from falling off a ladder and being ill. I have had a very bad stomach bug these past two days partly as a result of standing in the freezing cold for 110 minutes for My Bloody Valentine at Thorpe, perhaps I should sue for that!

Does anyone know why the queueline of Studio 13 is playing My Bloody Valentine music? It sounds good outside MBV but doesn't suit Studio 13 at all, they would have been much better off keeping the old music, or at least using something else as having the same music on both mazes is just dull.

I was sort of agreeing as knew it was sarcasm.

^ You, as it was you that chose to stay on. That's how it should work anyway. To be honest, I can't see a park getting sued because someone was ill.

No it's not its completely unacceptable (as they don't actually do anything about the problem) but we had wasted 110 minutes stood out in the pouring rain so we accepted it. I will however be emailing the park to suggest a way of preventing this (put the prices of fastrack up and don't sell as many).

Fright Nights is turning into a bit of a farce this year. Broken effects in most mazes - in CITW the tunnel isn't spinning, but also the wolf head uses to breathe air at you last year. Saw Alive the carousel trap isn't working... Then there's the queues... We waited 110 minutes for My Bloody Valentine when it was advertised as "up to 60 mins..." Needless to say we complained and went on again with a priority pass. The most infuriating thing was that the queue actually moved at an acceptable speed until the Fastrack queue started to build. Then they were doing the worst batchig I have ever seen - I'm sure at I've point they didn't batch any of our queue for about 20 minutes as they were running off the whole Faatrack queue first (which was full due to overselling!). They have been running the park and event for long enough not to know how many fastracks should be sold. Sheer greed. Most mazes closed several times throughout the night as well which is just poor. Mazes should not be leaking! Surely the designers know that in October it's likely to rain a lot!

I actually can't believe what some of the actors are saying this year! In My Bloody Valentine, when you go through the claustrophobia tunnel (the inflatable one, not the crawling one) the actor shouted "Get in the fanny!" We were laughing so much! Then in Cabin in the Woods one of the actors was just on a scooter going past us like "Beep beep!" And then in the last run of the day in Studio 13 one of the actors said "Come and play with my doll! Put your hand up her skirt!" It was more like comedy nights this evening to be honest, it was absoloutely hilarious and had us in fits of laughter! I still can't believe that the actors are allowed to say things like that though! I will post a more detailed post tomorrow on the event, as there was one incident which was not acceptable at all, (long story short 110 minute queue on MBV advertised as "up to 60 minutes" due to Fastrack overselling.

There is no sense in making people walk all the way around an empty queue just because some people might be sick/whatever after re-riding. H&S gone mad.

That's not annoying, it's absoloutely diabolical! How many years have they been running this park? And they STILL can't get it right. Money, money, money!

WHAT?! That's worse than Oakwood! Do they not realise that's wrong? I'd like to see anyone who sees Thorpe through rose tinted glasses try to defend THAT! They said on this site that they weren't going to oversell this year! Lying to loyal fans. Before I send an angry Tweet to them, do you mean 8 normal queue to 2 fastracks? As that would still be too many!

Not if it was a wooden one!

Well it doesn't sound like a very good day today judging by Twitter and Facebook pages (and the new queue times page). Overselling Fastrack (causing a 90 minute queue on MBV and some people with Fastrack's to be kept waiting an hour), four rides closed all day, The Swarm broken down earlier, Stealth broken down now and nothing being done about queueline smokers! I'm sorry, but Thorpe have been operating a park for YEARS. Anyone who knew anything about running a park would no the limit of Fastracks that can be sold by now! They said they would improve the issue this year, clearly not as they have put new Fastrack banners around the park to sell more, and are clearly not limiting them enough (if at all)! I am starting to get tired of Thorpe now. The preview evening proved that they can run the park fantastically when they want to (I.e. when there are celebrities there), so this sort of performance is frankly p!ss poor! If the park is like this tomorrow then I will not be happy. £49.99 or a £10 annual pass fee for this?! What a joke!

Well then it's up to the rider to know when their limit is.

Is The Swarm closed along with Samurai and Rumba Rapids or is the queue times site just playing up?