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Ghost Train - NEW for 2023


coasterverse

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20 minutes ago, JoshC. said:

Ghost Train does well at blending the scary bits and the humour, a bit like with the Dungeons, but it has to be careful that to hit the mark each time. It's easy to go too far on the humour, or for it to just not work if the timings are off.

 

Couldn’t agree more - the places where humour are used on Ghost Train, is done perfectly. There’s a good amount of time between them in a way that ‘gets you’ every time it happens - if it was too frequent it would be predictable and cringeworthy. The ‘Thorpe Rail’ announcement at the end is a perfect example of good comedic timing too, totally unexpected and I’ve only seen positive reviews of that bit.

 

Also totally understand about the shop ending now - it’s well and truly lost its impact. It was great on DBGT because the audio was balanced perfectly and there was no light leak so you couldn’t see the secret door opening… that’s no longer the case. However, I’m almost certain this is near the top of their agenda to fix over the next 4 days.

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1 minute ago, tactic said:

I’m going to be honest, I have absolutely no recollection of them playing believer by imagine dragons at all when I went on it…

 

When in the ride experience was it played?

 

(Sorry for the double post!) It’s played in the second pre show batching area just after the stairs. It’s designed to be a passing feature though as you’ll only ever be held here if there’s a delay with the train, so not unusual that you didn’t hear it!

 

If it wasn’t for my secret voice note recording for my first (and so far only!) run through I probably would’ve forgotten about it too 😂

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7 minutes ago, tactic said:

I didn’t notice at all somehow. I remember being overly engaged in the weather report on the tv screen instead of paying attention to anything else…

 

Perhaps it's only played as a transition once the weather report has finished then maybe? Saying that... I'm almost certain the weather report was playing when I heard it, so who knows! Maybe it's on some sort of timer to prevent it from running constantly?

 

Side note... genuinely surprised there's not been any sneaky Ghost Train POV's uploaded yet! I give it until the end of the 6 weeks holidays 😂

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1 hour ago, JoshC. said:

I think the Imagine Dragons song is a more recent addition...I don't remember it playing during my runs on the preview event, but heard it on my run on Friday.

 

Definitely was there for my runthrough on the Friday, so perhaps it’s just inconsistent… *shock horror* 😂

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GST TRN seems to be continually in my socialz as a sponsored post so I like to see what people are commenting.

Seems to be universally panned by those that ride, but I think the main issue is that people don't feel it's worth it vs. the queue length, so straight away they are expecting a lot because of waiting so long.

 

I won't get to ride until Fright Nights most likely, when it'll probably be on version 3.0 and/or a special Engineering Works version for spooky szn.

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I see a lot of negative comments about it.

 

With some context it’s a good ride considering history of building and realising that it’s not that easy to just knock down a ride. I see it as a good ride knowing these things but as a ride in a theme park it’s not great.

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47 minutes ago, MattyMoo said:

I wonder if it wouldn't hurt to have something on the entrance sign with some sort of tagline to say it was an "experience" etc. People will just expect that it is a ride and not an actor led Dungeons-esque experience.

I agree, just something saying it's an experience rather than a ride would help loads. Since it's near TWD, many people might assume it's another indoor rollercoaster or some sort of ride. Anything simple, even like 'Ghost Train: a fully immersive horror experience' would clear up to many what the ride is actually about

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Just seen the Facebook ad comments…eek.

 

It really doesn’t sit well with the general public.

 

Lots of people want Derren brown back 😂

 

”Build proper rides”

 

They say there’s just a lot of shouting and nothing visually 

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14 hours ago, JoshC. said:

They do need to so what Towers did with Hex and make it a bit clearer it's more an experience than a ride. I hope they can make that clearer soon.

 

At least Hex has a ride portion as the finale of the whole attraction, with the pre shows building up to it.

 

Ghost Train needs a lot more than telling people it's an experience. A massive white elephant for the park and always has been since it opened. 

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I reckon another bit of a retheme was always on the cards over the winter season anyway, a bit like they did with Derren Brown. It'd be a logistical nightmare to massively upgrade components during the season as it would require much more than just 4 days of downtime and therefore would definitely not look good in the eyes of the general public having a brand new (lol) attraction closed for a long period of time in the same season it opened in.

 

Those vocal with the changes all seem to be echoing the same things, so I'd be very surprised if the following changes weren't made for next season, or at the very least this weekend once it reopens (SPOILER WARNING):

  • Cutting down the preshow and some of the scenes on the train (I personally don't feel like this is needed, but others apparently do!)
  • Making the walk from Chapel Station to the crypt more engaging rather than just a long black corridor
  • Repainting the colour of the runner in the crypt scene
  • Fixing lighting on the ghoul in the crypt scene
  • Adding something to the windows to make it feel more realistic - I don't think it'll be screens (annoyingly) because of what they've already mentioned, but curtains at the very least would solve the problem indefinitely better
  • Audio improvements everywhere on the attraction to make jumpscares more impactful and less predictable
  • Moving the TV screens back to where they used to be in DBGT in the fake shop scenario to fix the light bleed revealing the hidden door for the jumpscare
  • Adding a new actor to the fake shop scene in a costume rather than the Thorpe Park uniform
  • Adding a noticeboard outside of the attraction mentioning that it's an actor-led experience rather than a ride

 

It's a real shame there's not more room to achieve a good quality pepper's ghost effect in the fake shop ending - having a full apperition of the station master appearing on the stage where the jumpscare happened to do his cringy "this is SOUL REDEMPTION" spiel would look much better than it just happening on a TV screen.

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1 hour ago, Lunar_ said:

There is now some clear signage outside the ride stating that Ghost Train is an 'immersive story-led experience' and 'unlike our core lineup of thrill rides'

 

 

 

 

Fantastic!

  • Cutting down the preshow and some of the scenes on the train (I personally don't feel like this is needed, but others apparently do!)
  • Making the walk from Chapel Station to the crypt more engaging rather than just a long black corridor
  • Repainting the colour of the runner in the crypt scene
  • Fixing lighting on the ghoul in the crypt scene
  • Adding something to the windows to make it feel more realistic - I don't think it'll be screens (annoyingly) because of what they've already mentioned, but curtains at the very least would solve the problem indefinitely better
  • Audio improvements everywhere on the attraction to make jumpscares more impactful and less predictable
  • Moving the TV screens back to where they used to be in DBGT in the fake shop scenario to fix the light bleed revealing the hidden door for the jumpscare
  • Adding a new actor to the fake shop scene in a costume rather than the Thorpe Park uniform
  • Adding a noticeboard outside of the attraction mentioning that it's an actor-led experience rather than a ride

That's one down! I've already seen a post on the passholders group praising the adjustments, so that's awesome to hear! Anybody there today/this weekend to verify what those adjustments are? I opted not to be there this weekend as I didn't think the changes would be substantial enough to warrant another solo trip right now... beginning to regret that decision now!

 

Thorpe replied to the comment saying that there's still more tweaks to come as well - I cannot begin to express how nice it is that after all these years, Thorpe are finally listening to the general public and giving them what they want.

 

The future is definitely bright for Thorpe Park - it makes me so, so excited.

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Has anyone been on it since reopening?

 

I’ve seen one or two reviews and it seems they did some behind the scenes fixes to improve reliability of effects.

 

I am curious to know what they did as 4 days is a long time for what they have supposedly done

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8 hours ago, tactic said:

Haven’t been on it since reopening yet, will most probably get on on thursday though. Do we know if they have added lights or similar in the windows?

 

Not been down yet, but I think it's a very small likelihood - something like this I reckon will need a fair bit longer to achieve, so will probably get done over closed season.

 

I've seen lots of good reviews on Twitter, but haven't seen anybody go into detail as to what's actually been changed yet though!

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8 hours ago, coasterverse said:

 

Not been down yet, but I think it's a very small likelihood - something like this I reckon will need a fair bit longer to achieve, so will probably get done over closed season.

 

I've seen lots of good reviews on Twitter, but haven't seen anybody go into detail as to what's actually been changed yet though!

Ok, sounds good. I will report back the changes tomorrow if the attraction is open!

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On 6/21/2023 at 9:12 AM, coasterverse said:

 

Excited to hear it!

I’m going to be honest I don’t think anything changed at all. Or nothing notable that I recognised. There were maybe a few more pitch black moments on the first train ride and the actor at the end in the fake shop was in a jacket and tie. But apart from that nothing was changed I don’t think.

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