The Walking Dead - The Ride: SPOILERS

[Marc]

7 hours ago, Stuntman707 said:

 

I didn't really notice the lighting changes in the entry corridors and zones, I don't know if it wasn't perhaps working exactly as intended? The theming is much better in the corridors now although X hardly had any theming at all apart from the lights and some signs.

 

When your walking down the corridors they are all marked area A to D I think, as you make way through you’ll hear announcements over the PA something like area b has been compromised, after that all the lights in “area b” switch off. It’s quite effective kostly if your at the back of the group looking behind you seeing the areas turn off behind you. That’s the changes being spoken about.

[JoshC.]

Interesting to hear from someone who prefers the ride section to the pre-ride section!

 

I agree that the pre-show is very basic, for lack of a better word. It creates a bit of anticipation, but it does feel like a missed opportunity, in that they could have done more / really emphasized the walkers attacking you from behind.

 

As Marc says, the corridors to the station is a bit of a subtle bit. As you walk through, the audio and lighting effects are triggered, meaning as you walk into a new section, the previous section blacks out, and you're told the section you're in is compromised. If you're towards the front of the group, or even in the middle, and you're walking at a reasonable pace, you might not necessarily notice it.

[Stuntman707]

After a second go yesterday, I really think the ride keeps getting better!

First just want to point out a criticism regarding safety. The lights going out in the corridor make it very dark. I assume this caused someone to run into the wall where the folding chairs are in the dark as they were lying on the floor. (They were ok) I’d put some bright black and yellow stripes or something around the corners so you can still see where you’re going.

There’s been some tweaks to the exit canteen corridor. Having live actors here makes a huge difference! The horn of the truck was much louder and made you jump when it went off. The last walker sticking out the roof before the exit gives you one good last scare. I think one thing that would make the corridors better would be the sound of a group of walkers playing in the compromised sections of the entry and along the exit corridor.

Overall, I genuinely like the ride, just keep making a few more improvements and get some full time actors or animatronics for the canteen.

[Matt 236]

The Walking Dead Ride is definitely an attraction, which the more times I go on, the more enjoyable it becomes. 

 

Definitely great to notice little tweaks/improvements being made in places throughout, such as the horn etc. Live actors also helps enhance it. 

 

Only criticisms again are the issue Stuntman mentioned above, which just needs some sorting out and the house lights seem to be switched on a lot just after the train leaves the station. Something to do with resetting after a shutdown?

[Mattgwise]

I thought it was great (much to Cooper's annoyance hehe) and in particular the pre and post ride sections. It has been cleverly thought out and I loved the darkness in places. The canteen section was fantastic as well with the live actors. A much better attraction than X! 

 

[Marhelorpe]

Something I've noticed on the last few visits with the ride is the station and bottom of the lift hill have presently got their white floodlights turned on, constantly illuminating the ceiling and mechanics, but this was not the case when it initially opened back in March and was a lot darker. As a result, the station area is now much brighter than it needs to be and the fancy lighting effects used upon dispatch are rendered pointless as a result.

Also, maybe this is just bad memory, but the orange smoke effect after leaving the final brake run with the TV screens just before the on-ride photo does not seem anywhere near as effective compared to when it opened back in Match. The smoke no longer covers riders similar to an archway as they pass through it anymore and instead just fires upwards missing riders entirely.

Lastly, the watch tower in the queue no longer plays any themed announcements through the tannoy speakers bizarrely. Can only guess it's not being used anymore because it was incredibly loud and needed to be tuned down a little bit. But it would be nice to hear them used again if possible.
 

As for the rest of the attraction, it's nice to see small updates and changes being made in places since it's inception and guiltily, I'm liking it gradually more and more every time I try it. Still have a slight preference over it being X previously, purely because it was accessible to more people with the lower height restriction, had an up-beat theme and didn't pretend to be an extreme thrill machine like it is now. But the gap has definitely gotten smaller since March.

[Mattgwise]

4 minutes ago, Marhelorpe said:

As for the rest of the attraction, it's nice to see small updates and changes being made in places since it's inception and guiltily, I'm liking it gradually more and more every time I try it.

?

[L7123456]

2 hours ago, Marhelorpe said:

Also, maybe this is just bad memory, but the orange smoke effect after leaving the final brake run with the TV screens just before the on-ride photo does not seem anywhere near as effective compared to when it opened back in Match. The smoke no longer covers riders similar to an archway as they pass through it anymore and instead just fires upwards missing riders entirely.

I'm pretty sure the flame effect has definitely been altered in some way. There is much less smoke and it is much less effective than it was when I rode it in March. Hopefully it returns back to how it used to be.

[Jack]

How often are there actually actors in the exit corridor?

[streetmagix]

Officially it's at 'peak times', so Apoloclypse Weekends (weekends in May and June), bank holidays, summer holidays and maybe over Halloween. The most I've seen is 2 in the exit corridor though, not exactly jampacked!

[Marc]

I beleve actors are meant to be there at all times now

[streetmagix]

On 6/6/2018 at 5:29 PM, MilesK said:

I'm pretty sure the flame effect has definitely been altered in some way. There is much less smoke and it is much less effective than it was when I rode it in March. Hopefully it returns back to how it used to be.

 

Is that the smoke that the train then speeds through? I know that some people are allergic to some of the compounds in fake smoke so they may have had to tone it down. (Educated guesswork plus knowing someone who is allergic to some forms of fake smoke)

[Stuntman707]

26 minutes ago, Marc said:

I beleve actors are meant to be there at all times now

That's good, it still seems to be evolving as an attraction. Are there any other updates or tweaks?

[Han30]

Went on this yesterday not expecting much and having not watched TWD I thought I’d not “get it” - was pleasantly surprised at how they have changed it from X (which I always found quite boring) - only rode it once so didn’t notice everything but enjoyed it - only part I disliked were the really dark bits in the corridors with those horrible plastic flaps - I could barely see where I was going.  We had 2 actors at the exit who weren’t very scary but then I’ve done several Fright Nights.  One of them reached out to my nieces face and she accidentally gave him a hi-five ?

[NASHERTV_YT]

The Walking Dead the Ride Review June 2018:

Pre show: the Pre Show Has not had Any more changes since the Minor Changes made in May,However From what I've seen and experience people are starting to get creeped out by it alot more since the changes made in May

Indoor Queue Line: This Part of the Experience is Starting to Get Annoying because when the Lights go out everyone can not see where they're going and if you're in the middle/back of the group you nearly Trip up on other Members of the Group and Fall over your own feet,I would like to see a Little bit more lighting So That trips and falls are prevented

Ride Layout: NO CHANGES WHAT SO EVER,The ride is Starting to Lack in Scariness and now I Just go on it to experience air time on the Back row 

Scare Scene: This Scene Is  Not  even Scary at all,it's creepy but it's just Getting a bit boring now

Exit Queue Line: No Changes have been made since May and it's Starting to be Just Boring now,hopefully They'll put something in there at Fright nights to Make it Scary.

Scare Rating:

Pre Show Scare Rating: 6/10

Indoor queue Line Scare Rating: 4/10

Ride Layout Scare Rating: 4/10

Scare Scene Scare Rating: 5/10

Total rating 21/40

[Mark9]

When you say things get boring now is that because you've done it a few times and you are used to it or because you expect them to be updating the attraction every few days.

[Jack]

No actor yesterday, is definitely better with actors 

[Coaster]

After finally experiencing this yesterday... can we have X back?

 

Like, a few of the features were fun, the zombies lighting up as you fly past for example, but it just feels like such an unnecessary change to a family coaster and the exterior is a horrible mish-mash of a brightly coloured pyramid, barbed wire and mouldy speakers.

 

It's robbed Thorpe of a fun ride suitable for everyone in favour of yet another dark, dull, drab theme.

[Whatever]

Depite being plonked next to the gobbiest little sh!te ever on my first ride, I somewhat enjoyed it, which I didn’t think I was going to do. The queue outside in the heat was absolutely agonising as I could barely move or sit. I found the horn of the lorry to be way too loud on my ears but this could just be me for I’m a little sound sensitive. 

It was actually an ok revamp to X that we didn’t need nor want. 

[Han30]

The more I ride TWD the more I enjoy it - think I’ve done it 6 or 7 times now so not that many.

Went on Tues with my niece and we rode it twice - the first time the group we were with ran down the corridor and the group behind were nowhere to be seen so we ended up having the train to ourselves.

After our second ride just as we were exiting I heard over the audio “X - ride on a wave of light and sound” which made me laugh a bit.

 

I like that you don’t have the queue inside - it used to get so hot in that building although in this heat at the moment, outside isn’t much better.

 

I think this is my preferred version of the coaster - I only ever rode X:/NWO once as it gave me horrific motion sickness and X I think I just rode it so many times it got boring - which could potentially happen with its current form.  Just a shame that younger ones who enjoyed X can no longer ride if they aren’t tall enough

[Deejay]

Well I ended up riding this last night and it actually made me feel sad, why you may wonder would a grown man who’s 44 feel so sad to experience this ride?? Well I’m a father of two who are now 6yr and 9yr olds so as you can guess this ( when it was X) was the main draw for my boys due to there height and walking down that corridor again just reminded me of my excited boys getting to ride there favourite coaster , they loved it so much that on some mornings we rode it as much as 10 times in a row , such a shame they made this a 13 yr plus and 1.4 ride and most of all a ‘scare’ ride, we as a family have only visited once this year compared to around 4-5 visits by this time of year in the last few years. Speaking to staff yesterday they where saying numbers are down this year and I’m not surprised we might visit once more over summer rather than every other week , I know it sounds stupid but the loss of this family attraction is the main reason.

 As for the ride in its new state I thought it was pants more like a ride through a department store dumping ground at night where they’d thrown out all the old shop window mannequins. 

[planenut]

Sadly, for me, I felt that once the ride ever went forwards, and they put the lights on, it lost it's madness. I took my two mini-monsters there when X-NWO opened in 1996, and the disorientation of that was amazing, and we all felt it was a great ride.

 

I don't actually like the leaning towards "horror", even feeling that the themeing of Saw is inappropriate for the park, but then, I am a dinosaur, though I do see all this as taking away the appeal to the family group. Commercially, it works for Merlin at the initial stages, but long term, as Deejay states, there is a loss of the re-rideability appeal.  Why else would they throw away money by offering free re-entry after one full day ticket payment, that to me is commercial stupidity; yes a discount, but not totally free. (told you I was a dinosaur)

[Hethetheth]

I did enjoy The Walking Dead: The Ride. However, I didn't appreciate the loss of X, a decent family coaster, to enable this coaster to exist. It's a big shame as it was one of the most light-hearted rides there.

 

I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with the horror themes, but just not at the expense of a good family coaster. I actually had a go at designing a new 'Walking Dead' ride for the park myself, seeing what it could be like if it were a new coaster and not a retheme of X:
 

 

[08newmanb]

8 hours ago, Hethetheth said:

I did enjoy The Walking Dead: The Ride. However, I didn't appreciate the loss of X, a decent family coaster, to enable this coaster to exist. It's a big shame as it was one of the most light-hearted rides there.

 

I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with the horror themes, but just not at the expense of a good family coaster. I actually had a go at designing a new 'Walking Dead' ride for the park myself, seeing what it could be like if it were a new coaster and not a retheme of X:
 

 

I have myself a suggestion, (https://www.roblox.com/games/1611770364/THE-WALKING-DEAD-THE-RIDE). This is an alternative version of the ride, with the same storyline. This alternative ride an enclosed jumbo jet coaster, next to the swarm. Both rides are apocalyptic. Maybe you could try it for yourself!

[08newmanb]

https://www.roblox.com/games/1611770364/THE-WALKING-DEAD-THE-RIDE

This is set in an alternative location, between the swarm and the lakeside tent, which is next to depth charge.