coasterbill

No big surprise here... very smart move for Disney. I'll be sure to ride it if I ever make it back to Epcot.

Just ignore everything you see on an official Cedar Fair park page about the rain policy. If you don't believe me watch the Cedar Point live cam next time it rains and compare it to what it says in their FAQ section.

Great Adventure's rain policy is awesome. They don't care about rain at all... the only ride that closes in the rain is Kingda Ka (and for good reason). The Safari might close if it's muddy enough but I don't see that happening.

Like Cedar Point the rain policy is horrible inconsistent. All rides may close with no regard for logic, what the rain policy was 5 minutes ago or how hard it's raining. Even if it's not raining but looks like it might they might close everything in the park. I've seen them do that twice. Then you might get lucky sometimes and they'll open something for no reason. For example... 2 years ago we were there in the rain and every single ride was closed including the log flume and white water landing. The only rides we saw running were the Music Express (indoors), the Whip (indoors) and for some reason the SeaDragon. Then we went this year and saw nothing closed in a light rain except for the SeaDragon. It was closed due to weather... we asked. So my suggestion would be to avoid Dorney if it might rain a lot, but if the forecast is just for passing showers it's probably worth a visit.

Glad you had fun! Kumba in that seat is just completely ridiculous... it feels like the ride is actively trying to kill you. That zero G roll is probably illegal in the other 49 states.

One top about Wild One by the way... each car has 3 rows. I really suggest riding in the middle row of any car. Riding in the other rows leads to a much rougher ride. It's great in the middle rows (like a lot of woodies... when in doubt sit one row from the back). And I think you'll like JJ. It's a solid coaster. Don't base your opinion of Intamin Hypers on Superman though. It's good but not great.

Mantis will be fine as a floorless coaster... the first half is very typical of a good floorless and the second half is pretty dull but not nearly as dull as something like Hydra. I would expect it to be another fun, solid coaster... nothing earth shattering but very enjoyable. As far as I'm concerned it's a brand new coaster because I just walk right by the piece of crap ride that's there now and never ride it no matter what. Floorless Mantis is something I'd actually ride.

Back to the last page... I know the lack of crowds on the shuttle loop and mine train is kind of a timeline angle but it does seem to be the case based on the screens. The reason for this is that the queue entrance isn't located at a "decision point". One of the biggest factors in ridership is the location of the queue entrance and that's why the woodie and corkscrew do so well. Building a queue up to a long straight path will negatively impact the ridership. If you put it at a point where the path turns or juts out 1 square so that when guests approach it they can't go straight and have to either go left or right that will greatly improve ridership if the queue entrance is left or right. They pretty much have a 50% chance of turning into it. For some reason this is one of my favorite RCT2 tricks and nobody ever talks about it. In regards to the new pictures I'm a fan of the new midway buildings. I think if you break up some of the parts of the midway where there's a lot of concrete with nothing in the middle it would look a lot nicer. The area in front of sweet treats with the pines is really nice... add a few more smaller landscaping areas like that.

I was really surprised at how early this place closed for the season. I would think they could build a Halloween maze somewhere (maybe in the waterpark) and draw big crowds in the fall. When we were there on Labor Day the place was mobbed. The park seems to have a lot of local support... I don't know why they don't stay open later in the year.

This is going to be a great report. It's a really unique perspective and your enthusiasm is awesome. I can't wait to read more.

They do have an empty building for a Justice League dark ride in the DC area that used to house their Trabaunt ride. Given the fact that it's in the DC area and the building already fits the theme it seems like a great place to put it. It almost makes too much sense not to do it. For that reason I predict that in 2016 Houdini will be replaced with a Justice League dark ride, that building in the DC area will stay empty and they'll remove Kontiki just for fun.

I kind of like Super Mantis... it's so stupid that it's kind of amazing.

I always liked Vekoma flyers and never understood the hate. I prefer the standard Vekoma model to the SUF clones personally but I'm in the minority.

I like that... the monorail and it's interaction are nice near the entrance (with the steel mini) but it's more blocky towards the back of the park. Try to maintain the same types of ride interactions throughout and it would be much nicer. I really like the wood coaster too but not necessarily the way it ends with a long straight fence and long straight monorail. Try to blend it in a little better... it's sure to pay off.

Please don't post about Tomohawk... we need SFNE to forget it's there so they don't get rid of it. If they catch wind of the fact that there's still a family flat ride in the park with mass appeal they'll remove it immediately. Just keep quiet and hope they don't notice.

I almost mentioned that one but I'll give them a pass because as dumb as that was (and it was really dumb) I think they were expecting a return on investment on it (and maybe they got one... who knows?). They tried to brand it as a new experience and they rolled out a ton of new merchandise for it. With Goliath's awful new train they didn't market it at all and there's no way they could have thought it would give them any return. It was just a complete waste of time AND it ruined the ride.

No love for Thunderbolt? I think it's one of the best rides in the park personally.

I've talked with management and the story is there will be a path from Ka to Toro next year but the park wants to build a new path for some reason instead of using the old one. I'm not sure why they aren't using the old path but hey, at least there will be some sort of path. The thing that really amazes me about Six Flags is that they're the cheapest company in the world when it comes to pretty much everything but sometimes they go way out of their way to completely waste money needlessly. They're cheap when it comes to operations by closing rides early, not staffing rides properly and not running all available trains / cars (this isn't an issue at Great Adventure except with the Skyride but it is at their other parks). They're cheap when it comes to aesthetics by leaving parts of old rides they don't feel like removing (Rolling Thunder, the boat ride at SFA and by the sounds of things the New England Skyway towers next year), not theming anything, leaving ride pads empty and putting ugly fences off to block off areas they've closed. They're cheap when it comes to new rides by buying carnival rides in bulk and building low cost coasters compared to chains like Cedar Fair (though some of them do end up being very good rides). Then when it's time to waste money they go all out... At Six Flags New England for example they had a new ride that was great. Everyone loved it, it was running as reliably as it was going to run and it was a major hit. Then they decided to waste a ton of money on a new train when the old one was fine. This huge expense caused the ride to be closed for half of a season, didn't increase capacity at all, didn't make them any money, didn't make the ride any more reliable and ruined the ride experience. They wasted a ton of money and time on something with no up-side, no increased profits and a much worse guest experience. Now at Great Adventure they already have a path and a Safari Discovery area that could go from Golden Kingdom to El Toro. All they need to do is open a wooden gate. Sure there will be empty, ugly ride pads there but that never bothered them before... Instead they're going to clear more land and build a brand new path that's probably going to require electrical work, plumbing work, land clearing, materials and labor and it's completely stupid because they already have 2 paths they could use that are both probably better themed than this one will be and all they need to do is open a gate. That's it. From a guest perspective I don't care but I'll never understand how a company that pinches pennies everywhere keeps wasting money on projects that are completely pointless.

Flash Passes are cheap because you probably don't need them. I haven't been to the hurricane bar in the Mardi Gras area but this park will absolutely drive you to drink so I suggest going there frequently throughout the day.

I normally jump around when I visit parks so throughout the course of the day I rarely ride anything more than a few times. During Coasting for Kids last year though we rode Steel Force 30 times without getting off... we tried that later on with Talon and Hydra but needed to stop for awhile on those. We could have rode Steel Force all day since the drawn out lift hill is a nice break between rides and the ride itself doesn't do anything.

I can tell you right now that I will be spending ALL my time playing online, I can't begin to imagine how difficult to manage an amusement park w/ 4 different sections assigned to it (with or without financial restrictions) I can tell you right now that I will be spending ALL my time playing RCT2. Often imitated... never duplicated and still being improved every day with new parkmaking techniques, custom rides and custom scenery. I wanted to like this game but RCT2 just seems much better based on what we've seen so far.

If this does end up happening I hope it's more of a twister layout like Lightning Run and less of an out and back layout like their older hypers which are really dull rides. That being said I'll believe it when I see it.

Magnum Xl 200 is #13... tied with I305 and better than Nemesis, Montu, Skyrush, Maverick and Kumba. Just think about that for a minute. Personally I think X2 and Magnum are the most overrated rides in history. I think X2 is more overrated as I consider it one of the most brutal and terrible coasters I've ever ridden (I mean Great Adventure Viper and Son of Beast bad) while Magnum is at least rideable once or twice a day though it's pretty painful. That being said many people love X2 so I expected it to place where it did. I'd love to know who actually voted Magnum higher than those other coasters I mentioned. Also, why did Skyrush end up at #26? If it's there because the airtime is painful due to the lap bars then fair enough I guess but someone needs to explain to me how Magnum is #13 then since it suffers from the EXACT SAME PROBLEM ONLY WORSE. Also... Wild Eagle isn't better than Gatekeeper. That's just ridiculous. Steel Force and Blue Streak being ranked so highly is equally ridiculous. EDIT: That's nice that Cedar Fair took out an ad congratulating Europa Park. Very classy...

I think I ended up in that exact seat more often than not on our 3 day trip to Cedar Point last weekend. The ride was amazing as always and headbanging was minimal (and only happened in the cobra roll and the last turn).... I don't get why people think Raptor is rough. Raptor is everything an awesome invert should be... long, forceful and amazingly snappy. Much like Alpengeist I'll take an invert with a snappy cobra roll that knocks your head into the restraint once or twice over a forceless and crappy invert like Silver Bullet. I don't find the 1 or 2 moments of headbanging on Raptor to be painful anyway... usually it just makes us laugh. The restraint has a lot of give and it's not really that jarring. To each his own though, shorter lines for me. if you thought Raptor was rough I hope you didn't ride Corkscrew.