Derren Brown's Ghost Train: Rise of the Demon

[JoshC.]

Very weird video really.

 

Nice to have the ride captured in a good quality video, and to be able to relive the VR, if for nothing else other than just archiving / documenting it. Obviously no dark ride is shown in a better light in a video compared to experiencing it in person, so it's a bit of an odd move from a Thorpe / marketing perspective (and with Jack effectively being an extension of Thorpe's marketing, it makes sense).

 

But to not include all the VR is weird and odd, especially to skip over some of the better bits. The video really highlights how bad scene 2 got, and also how worn the scenery is there. The extreme darkness in the finale is obviously there to hide the fact the demon costume doesn't exist properly, but makes it come across even worse. And whilst a solo POV is easier to record and makes sense from a practicality perspective, it really does make the experience feel even more awkward. 

 

Nice idea and all, but what this really does is highlight many of the issues with DBGT and little else.

[coasterverse]

1 minute ago, JoshC. said:

But to not include all the VR is weird and odd

 

I'd imagine this is just Thorpe Park themselves being scared of releasing anything that I guess is technically Derren's intelectual property (although, I very much doubt he would care at all as he clearly washed his hands with it fairly quickly after opening). I would really, really like the full HD footage of the VR sections though - if not for anything else but archival sake.

 

Putting my annoyance about the demon costume aside (although I'll never forgive Thorpe for that), is it weird that the video is slightly... nostalgic? Weird considering it's the newest massive investment for the park and that it's already closing a mere 6 years after debut. It's bittersweet for an attraction that never really fulfilled its full potential, but I'm optimistic it's for the best and that the new attraction this year will vastly surpass it (although it doesn't exactly have massive shoes to fill).

[Inferno]

There’s a better POV online

 

 

[coasterverse]

Discovered ElevenLabs' AI text to speech tool today, where you can upload audio files of anybody talking and it converts it into text to speech. After a little while thinking about who I could upload, for some reason my brain went to Piers Morgan (the bloke talks a lot, didn't think it wouldn't be hard to grab a short audio clip of him! 😂). I also managed to clone Derren Brown's voice and wondered what the Ghost Train preshow audio would sound like if I used text to speech for it.

 

It was actually pretty good! And then I decided to see what it would sound like if Piers Morgan was the face of the attraction instead... take a look for yourself hahahaha

 

ahh boo ahh boo

[JoshC.]

Moved discussion of Ghost Train to it's own thread: 

 

This thread has now been condemned to the past, and will forever be here now exclusively for conversation on Derren Brown's Ghost Train: Rise of the Demon - Venture into the Tunnel: The Secret of the Coughing Person Who Doesn't Have Covid But Makes You Wonder if they Do

[thorpephan]

SPOILER (although not sure if appropriate now its closed/changing but just in case!)

 

Do people reckon the gift shop ending will remain in the new iteration?  

 

Also does anyone have an images of the demon in that last scene? or how the effect was done? 

 

 

 

[coasterverse]

48 minutes ago, thorpephan said:

SPOILER (although not sure if appropriate now its closed/changing but just in case!)

 

Do people reckon the gift shop ending will remain in the new iteration?  

 

Also does anyone have an images of the demon in that last scene? or how the effect was done? 

 

I hope it does, but I don't think it will. I've got a feeling they're going to be gutting the attraction out pretty much entirely and refitting with completely new scenes across the board - which is disappointing because I really did love the fake shop ending - it was so unique!

 

As for images of the demon costume, I don't think there are any online (or at least if there are, they are extremely scarse), so THIS is probably your best preview of it:

 

(taken from Jack Silkstone's POV when the attraction closed)

 

The low light really doesn't do it any justice as the costume was essentially in total disrepair as far as I'm aware in the later years of the attraction, hence why they hardly (if ever!) used it in the years leading up to its closure.

[coasterverse]

I have way too much of an interest in this ride for what it was... noticed that there's never been any high resolution copies of the DBGT logo (especially none without that horrendous drop shadow thing!), so I did my best to recreate it. Managed to get a low resolution version of the logo, painstakingly removed the drop shadow, used Illustrator to trace it, turned it into a vector, imported to Photoshop and tried my best to replicate the blue glow thing 😪

 

Nobody will probably use it for anything ever and is probably just an annoyance me and only me has ever had, but I can finally rest at last!

 

Hey, at least if I ever need the logo for any content I've finally got something to use 😂

[Matt N]

Out of interest, does anyone know how much involvement Derren Brown himself actually had in the design of DBGT?

 

The PR material always inferred that he'd been very heavily involved in the design of the ride, but I've heard rumblings that most of the finer details of the experience had already been decided upon prior to Derren's arrival, and his role was merely as a marketing figurehead for the attraction. Indeed, I've heard rumours that Derren himself actually wasn't very fond of the attraction at all...

 

Does anyone know how much involvement Derren Brown actually had in the attraction's design and development?