TPJames

^It's been just me and my friend in the dark on saw during fright nights, felt really creepy as there was no one sitting behind us but didn't feel rough in the slightest. Then again, I don't find saw rough or jolty in general anyway except right before coming into the final break run. Colossus on the other hand, is one of the roughest and bumpiest rides I have been on excluding the front row seats.

It's a re-curring issue at all of the Merlin parks, they tend to update the queue times as they get longer however once they drop again, they don't bother to change the boards. In the last few hours, most of the queue times are 30-60minutes off the real queue length which can be really annoying especially when deciding what attraction to ride next in the last few hours on the park.It's potentially for several reasons: -To increase fastrack sales. -To stop people going to the attraction as the queue is too "long" which means the staff can relax and slow down on operations. -The ride operator simply can't be bothered to update the queuetime if it gets shorter. It doesn't bother me too much as I tend to look at queue length rather than the board and mainly judge from there however it certainly puts you off going to a ride like Swarm where you have to walk ages to get there and then risk the queue being longer than you think it is due to them not updating the boards. Of course at the end of the day though it's better as it being advertised as longer than it really is rather than shorter than it really is. Ideally, they could just bother to update the queue boards so there is an accurate representation of actual queue times across the park.

For me personally, shambhala is my favourite rollercoaster I have ever been on. It was pure heaven every time and even though I rode it 20 times, I still want to go back and ride it again. Obviously everyone has a different opinion, so shambhala may not live up to the way it has been rated in some people's opinion. It's similar to how I found nemesis at alton towers pretty meh after expecting it to be the best rollercoaster in the UK after the hype; I personally find nemesis inferno far superior. I don't think shambhala alone is enough to draw a guest to experience Portaventura, however I think the park as a whole is truly magical as it includes fantastic rides, shows and entertainment to provide an immersive, well themed and fun day out.

100pph through the main queue of a new attraction which is in a park which gains 15,000+ on a peak day? What an amazing choice of attraction

Vortex has re-opened today^

I think the throughput is quite slow as it's a poorly designed attraction designed not to cope with a park like Thorpe Park. A two hour queue on this maze in sheerly only a 30minute queue on a rollercoaster due to ridiculous throughputs. On both my visits, it wasn't scraping more than 200pph maximum throughout the trip, however when they decided to comprimise experience at the end of the day and give me the worst possible ever run, I can believe it was hitting 500pph under that circumstance. Honestly such a poor decision for thorpe to make when they are supposedly heading in the right direction through the theme park market.

It will all come down to what's its themed around. That will determine the life of the dark ride before it needs a retheme or refurbishment. If it's an IP, I can't see it lasting more than 10years depending on the choice of brand. If it's a good in-brand theme, I can see it lasting for 20-30years or so at the minimum.

Yesterday we were in the front row queue for Nemesis Inferno and three groups decided to board from the exit straight onto front row. The back row was closed off for disabled rides so it just really annoyed me that we could have been on in 3 rides quicker if it wasn't for VIP pass holders demanding or being offered to sit at the front and skip the whole of the front row queue. The fastrack queue was also in operation as queue times reached 80-120mins for nemesis inferno yesterday so it was unecessary for VIP pass holders to be boarding from the exit.

I read £3 for 3mins today? Maybe just my eyesight!

It was on really odd settings all day!!Only rode it once but it was much much slower than last year. Was still fun however I imagine the settings are slower to preserve the arm motor. The cycle started off by the main arm doing a revolution before the spinning kicked in, we did about 3 full revolutions at its "full speed" going backwards (much slower than last year) before whirlpooling at the top for about 60-90seconds!! We then went two revolutions forwards at "full speed" before they reversed the spinning again for two revolutions where you wouldn't flip due to the motors running opposite ways. The spinning was then reversed to fowards at a much slower rate for half a full revolution before stopping again. We were then held at the top for another 30secs before it took a long time to park. The settings were really long, but meant the queue was moving at a tedious rate. Didn't help there was only one staff member doing restraints and batching in the morning as well.

Could it be at all possible that they ordered spares of every part so when a part has ended its life span, it can be changed over without a fuss? If they had spares and re-ordered spares so that any broken parts could be changed over quickly, I'm sure both chessington and thorpe wouldn't be having so many closed rides at the beginning of this season.

Laughing with disappointment and disgust at the moment. I'm a celebrity experienced the most technical faults out of all the rides open today and suffered an imense amount of downtime. Not good considering it was claiming a "60minute" wait but in reality was 90-120 all day! --- Anyway, we arrived at the queue at 5:45pm expecting the queue to be significantly less. Well it turned out it was, but for all the wrong reasons. After entering, the maze "broke down" straight away. We had a 15minute wait extra but then they were back on track. The queue speed picked up immensely and appeared to be going three times as fast as on preview night. Little bit odd, isn't it? After the break down, we were at the front of what was earlier, a 90minute queue however we only waited 45mins after the breakdown. Time to go in! I was extremely excited for my second run, hoping that the comments had been taken on board. (It may be worth noting it was 45mins after closing time at this point) The first movie was the same as always and we were greeted by an extremely enthusiastic campmate. Great start, but it only went downhill from there. We were rushed straight in, were told we had to escape as quick as possible by unenthusiastic actors who would say "Go, hurry up, you're too slow to escape". We sprinted over the bridge and straight to the first trial. Once again another unenthusiastic actor, she sent us straight in and said we had only 15 seconds to grab the star or "else". My hole was completely empty and before I could take my hand out, she shoved me along straight into the next trial. No introduction to the chambers, straight in. We only answered one of three questions before being dragged out and pushed along the corridoors. On the plus side, I got covered in oats, although no one else in my group had anything dropped on them. We skipped the maze area and rushed straight past the medical checks. We didn't watch the second video and only had twenty seconds to "escape" the cyclone. I wasn't even allowed to touch the buttons, I was forced by the actor straight down the exit slide. --- Worst ever maze experience. We were only in there for about two minutes full of unenthusiastic actors trying to get us out so they could go home. I appreciate it was closing time, but why should experience be diminished just because we entered the queue later than others. I was also lied to by a group of staff chatting half way through the maze that this was the normal speed it was run at! However, all our group disagreed and clearly noticed it was being rushed! Honestly, I can't be bothered to go in again. They wasted my time and it was absolutely disgraceful, if I hadn't been in before, I would have had no clue whatsoever what the hell was going on and what I was trying to "escape" from. Thorpe need to buck up, this clearly was an awful addition with low throughput and in no way a simulation of the program. I can garuntee it will not be long before it gets shut down due to high running costs and unpopularity as it was 90mins with only 200people in the queue today.

I heard The Swarm had its first ever full day of downtime today? Can anyone clarify whether this is true?

90minutes ovbiously isn't a "high enough demand" to add extra cars of course.In actual fact, Saw has 8 cars on it's circuit, so running 4 is absolutely disgraceful. I'm unsure whether it can run all 8 at once, but I'm certain that it can run 7 cars on the track with one in the maintenance bay. If they had bothered to add more cars to the circuit, as with the other coasters on one train operation, then queue times would have nearly been halved. Unfortunately, the "demand" wasn't "high enough" which meant that they couldn't be bothered to spend the money to add more trains to the circuit.

Was letting about 10 people per 5minutes in last night. Was about 80people in the queue ahead and was advertised as a 40minute wait. I dread to think how long the waits are going to be in easter with fastrack in operation.I would hate for this to happen, but they may find a way to make it shorter in some way. Most of the time inside the maze was waiting to go into a bushtucker trial with an actor talking to the group. Considering it was taking 15-20mins to get through the whole maze, it may potentially be able to be cut down to a shorter time length to reduce queues. Doubt it was reaching more than 150pph last night as the lady by the entrance said we didn't have to stick to the timeslot as it wasn't running as "smoothly" in terms of operations as they thought it would have.

Having just experienced this tonight, I must say the theming throughout was absolutely amazing. However, I felt the maze to be of a slow pace and we spent around double the time chatting to camp mates opposed to Bushtucker trials(also didn't help my chamber was broken in the chamber of horrors...) The throughput is awful, they were only sending around 10 people in every 5mins resulting in a 40minute queue even with the timeslot. Luckily, as we were the only two in the line, we got half our wait cut off to fill up another group. I fear this attraction will end up like Saw Alive, it heavily relies on 10-15actors to run the experience and I imagine popularity will wear off sooner or later. With the current throughputs, I imagine it will gain lengthy queues this year however I worry about the future. Overall, it was a good attraction with a good atmosphere and interactions from the actors. However the actual purpose of interaction in terms of trials and things to do was certainly lacking, although this may have been due to the fact we were in there 20mins+, most of which was standing around waiting. Did enjoy it all though and would certainly have another go provided there was no queue! (The free photo was a really nice touch from the park, really makes the annual pass worthwhile )

Part of the issue may be that only two trains have been fully maintenaced which means if there is a fault in one of the operational ones, the ride may have to close until that is fixed or until another can be added to the circuit. X was reaching 60minute queues on preview weekend due to two train operation and everything was 20minutes or less. If X is down for the preview tomorrow, I hope they manage to open another flat ride to replace it. Does anyone know what other rides are on the same team? Finally, on a seperate note, do we know if Colossus has finished maintenace on train 2 yet, as it's a nightmare on one train operation during peak times.

Off topic but... On Preview Day I saw the effects working on the Swarm from my view at the Stealth station in the morning. However, when venturing over to ride after a breakdown, none of the effects were on at all(No water, fire, mist or sound effects). What's the deal with this? Is this due to a system reset after a breakdown however the effects not being restarted? If so, why is only the ride reset, not the effects themselves? Would be really interesting to know, a big recurring query of mine as it's a shame when no effects are running at all as it chips away at the overall atmosphere.

I remember back in 2013 where the arms were oiled so that the pods were flipping much easier than usual; this also meant it was run on a slower setting however produced the same overall intensity. As for the cycle intensity itself, there are several cycles programmed by the engineers and a member of staff will choose one of these cycles when they "log in" to operate the ride. Many a time last year I asked for the most intense cycle however was refused as it was apparently "too difficult" to change the cycle until a new operator came over at staff changeover.

Thorpe park have confirmed on their facebook page that there will be live actors throughout the maze. This certainly will improve the experience however I worry about operation costs and how it could potentially end up like Nemesis sub terra or Saw Alive in the near future. As for the sign, I like the "I'm a Celebrity" part of the logo but the rest looks somewhat tacky. However, maybe that's my judgement against the logo from the TV program not Thorpe's replication of it as it seems like it's been accurately replicated. All in all, the experience seems like it will be good so far. However, only time will tell and I will be down on preview night to hopefully be one of the first ever people to experience this maze!

When riding NST last year, I thought it was a really good experience. Our whole group was really getting into it; screaming, laughing, running as fast as we could. The actual experience was really exciting, intense and dramatic for us and the actors at the end who jumped out at us with the torches continued to add to the experience. I wouldn't say that it has a particularly high re-ride factor, however I found it really enjoyable first time and it's a shame to see a quality themed, exciting experience essentially be put to waste. I won't be surprised if this attraction is SBNO by next year along with the blade and ripsaw to make way for the "new ride".

Unsure if this has been mentioned yet but... I have heard "Rumours" that Nemesis Sub-Terra will only be opening from 12pm onwards each day this year and will no longer have the 2-3actors at the end it used to due to the budget cuts. The way Merlin runs completely baffles me sometimes.

Following up to my previous question, when during the Easter Holidays will be the quietest period to visit? I know the whole of the holiday period is likely to be busy, however I would like to visit when the queues are as short as possible. I can personally tolerate any queue length up to around 60 minutes, however anything less than that would be ideal(30-45minute queues for the main coasters). Any help would be really appreciated

As much as I'm looking forward to it, and I'm sure it will be a very good experience, I can't help but think of how bad a decision this was for Thorpe Park to make. Yes this attraction does appear to have amazing theming, on both the inside and the outside; and putting the fact that it's an IP aside, I feel that this attraction could potentially be one of the worst last-minute decisions Thorpe Park have made. I'm not going to completely slash it until I've experienced it, as by the looks of things it looks really good so far, however I think its worth looking at the evidence as to why this could be a bad move for the park: It all comes down to one single point really: Queues, Queues, Queues. Thorpe park made the decision last year that they wanted to be the world's first "Queue less" theme park, however this completely contradicts the whole system of RNR. The purpose of RNR is to be able to do something else while riding the coasters, however this will completely prevent that due to low throughput. We don't know much about this yet, however considering its a "maze", it's likely to have a low throughput. Along with fastrack, priority passes and potentially RNR in play this attraction is bound to reach the 4-5hour+ mark in its opening few months. I'm guessing it's not going to have anymore than around 600-800pph max, so queues are likely to get extremely long after opening. Fright Nights is also returning this year; and with this and the dark ride taking up two current maze spots, the park operating with up to 2 less mazes will be awful. The queues and amount of fastrack were hideous last year, so I imagine it will be even worse this year with less horror experiences. If Thorpe park try and advertise it as a "Halloween" maze with changes later in the year, it's once again going to become the worst queuing nightmare in Thorpe Park history. I have a feeling this attraction is going to be good once inside, however on the outside it's going to be nothing but queuing hell.

The new Stealth merchandise looks beary nice