coasterbill

The new biometric scanning process sounds great. Also, the fact that JB's is going on the dining pass will probably encourage me to buy one as it's by far the best restaurant in the park. Any word on how the biometric scanning system will work on a membership from another park?

I hope you're right, but the important thing isn't really the sequence of elements but the speed each element is taken at and how the element is constructed. I hate to keep bringing up Kumba but it proves my point perfectly. The sequence of inversions is very predictable for B&M's and is the same as rides like Scream!, Bizarro and many others. Loop. Dive Loop, Barrel Roll, Cobra Roll, Double Corkscrew. The difference is that it blows through all of them like it's actively trying to kill everyone on the train.

Primarily wing and dive coasters due to their large, wide trains, I would imagine. I heard Oziris is forceless. But not all new B&Ms are bad. Even Silver Bullet - an otherwise rather forceless ride - has forces - the helix made me grey out, which never happens on Raptor to me. Hydra, while not particurally forceful, is a fun ride. Also, keep in mind that you're going through these inversions with no MCBR and (hopefully) no trims, at some points going faster than any other B&M invert. I think that this layout is hard to make forceless. Oh believe me I don't think the rides are bad at all. I really like rides like Gatekeeper, Silver Bullet and Wild Eagle. They're fun... I'd even go so far as to call myself a wingrider fan as I love the gimmick and I definitely like even the least forceful inverts but I'd consider all of these rides to be "forceless". I'm sure Banshee is going to be a lot of fun, I've never ridden a B&M I didn't like (minus some old stand ups)... but based on what they've built lately it's pretty likely the ride will be forceless. As far as Silver Bullet's helix being forceful it was probably the most forceful part of the ride but I didn't think it was anything to write home about. I have to admit that for a long time I thought complaints about new B&M coasters from people on this board (including Robb) were a little over-blown but then last month I rode Kumba and I completely get it now. After riding that coaster I agree that the stuff B&M builds now (while it's still fun) is kind of frustrating because they're capable of so much more. I'm not going to judge Banshee until I ride it, and even if it's forceless I have no doubt that this coaster will be a lot of fun. That being said given the trend B&M is setting with their new coasters I really don't see any reason to think this one is going to be any more forceful than the rest of them.

Only Six Flags...

Rollercoaster Tycoon 2... Screenshot from Pacificoaster's Starpointe. Rollercoaster Tycoon 4... It's an insult to RCT2 to say that RCT4 resembles it in any way, shape or form.

People are going to get tired of me saying this but ride Kumba in the last row in the seat closest to the unload side (I guess you'd consider it the right side of the train) and save some room for it near the top of your top 10 list. Take notes... this is very important.

We went to Universal earlier this year for the first time. Besides Mummy, Simpsons ended up being my favorite ride at the Studios park (I liked it even better than Transformers which may have to do with the fact that as cool as Transformers is, I know nothing about the franchise). Don't skip it... it has some very funny moments and it's a really great ride. Despicable Me was a lot of fun as was Shrek (which I know you didn't mention), but they're not must-rides in my opinion if you're in a rush. PS: I'm not sure if you've ridden Ripsaw before but don't make the same mistake on this ride and think you'll just get mildly wet since it's a "log flume" style ride. You might drown on Ripsaw Falls but it's awesome and worth it.

I think they key to enjoying these rides (as others have suggested) is to resist the urge to compare the to standard dark rides. They're very different things, and generally high detail is passed over as people are usually too busy shooting targets to notice anyway. I love these rides and I love traditional dark rides, I consider them completely different experiences.

That sounds about right to me. For example if the train ends up traveling too quickly through an element it may produce actual G forces which is unacceptable for a modern B&M ride.

Excuse me???? It clearly says that you'll immerse yourself in rich 3D-Quality graphics. Obviously you've been misinformed.

Hello again! I finally have some more screens. Some of these have been on New Element for awhile so I apologize if you've seen them already. Comments greatly appreciated! The Sunset Mill and Old Mill Grill where guests can sit and eat and enjoy a view of the creek and the park's authentic, functional waterwheel. Sunset Vista's modern wood coaster is Rumbler. Rumbler is a GCI coaster featuring swooping turns, a curving first drop and a station fly through. The Timber Falls log flume and Buzzsaw coaster. The new Shango coaster treats guests to two 90 degree drops and two dive loops. It's located in an African themed area of the park featuring lots of unique shopping and dining options. Shango is an African god of Thunder, Lightning and Fire (according to Wikipedia so it has to be true). The Mountain Pass area of the park featuring a launched family coaster and a rapids ride.

I think Steel Force deserves some credit too. Being the world's tallest and fastest mine train coaster is definitely an accomplishment. In all seriousness though this ride just doesn't do anything. The drop is gradual and drawn out, there's no airtime, no forces, the helix is boring and never-ending... there's just nothing to that ride. I did find the coaster to be pretty decent in the front seat just because of the speed but everywhere else it's just incredibly boring... and I rarely call any coaster boring.

Well if the PR department and COO like it it must be good!

Not for me. I thought it was really smooth. When I rode it I leaned my head forward and grabbed the straps on the turns which might have helped but it's just kind of a natural reaction.

Besides Tatsu, Batman and Apocalypse when it's running well Ninja is my favorite ride in the park. I think it's very underrated.

I hope this coaster is as good as it looks. When I think of Chance Morgan I think of coasters that look impressive and end up being underwhelming but this one looks totally different that anything they've done before. I'm really optimistic that this is going to be a great ride.

That's up for debate. I think Talon is a really solid ride and Posessed is starting to grow on me but other than that nothing there really stands out anymore now that they got rid of Laser and let Thunderhawk get so rough.

I could see Hurler being on the way out too. When we were there for the Haunt I was shocked that this ride was scheduled to close at 6pm for absolutely no reason. They weren't using it's queue for a maze... it was just in a dark corner by itself with nobody over there. Does anyone know why they do this? Closing a coaster for no visible reason on the busiest days of the year seems strange to me.

I've probably been to this park 20 or 30 times in my life as it's only a few hours from my house. We usually go on Saturdays, sometimes in October even and I would agree with this. The flats can get 1-2 cycle waits sometimes but the coasters have always been 5 minute waits tops and they're usually walk ons (except the Mouse which won't be more than 15 minutes and that's only because of it's slow operations). The longest line in the dry park is usually the Flume but it's worth it. The line is usually only 15 minutes but it seems long when you've been walking on to everything else all day. ** The Rapids are technically in the dry park and always have a huge line, but I'd argue that this is closer to the waterpark than the dry park and I think that's the reason why.

The only ones I've been to are Great Adventure, New England, America, Magic Mountain, Great Escape and the defunct Six Flags Worlds of Adventure. Great Adventure is the clear cut favorite for me. Their coaster collection is one of the best in the word, and while the park is FAR from perfect the coasters always make up for the flaws (the lack of flat rides which they do seem to be working on, the inconsistent theming. the dead ends, some really ugly areas, all of the ads and the fact that you feel like they're shaking you down for money all day). When you have great coasters like Nitro, Batman, Kingda Ka and El Toro nothing else really matters. Magic Mountain would probably be my second favorite but it's worth pointing out that the only 2 times we've been there we were running around all day riding coasters and didn't have a chance to stop and notice any flaws the park had. Just to give you an idea... the only non coaster rides we've ever ridden at that park in 2 full day visits are Jet Stream, the Sky Tower and Lex Luthor. New England is the closest major park to me and this park has been in a steady decline since about 2005. The park used to be beautiful (by Six Flags standards) with friendly employees and a lot of great non coaster rides. They've removed a lot of rides and areas that made them unique and replaced them with a lot of ugly rides / areas or just empty pads with no regard for theming whatsoever. Bizarro has also declined a lot over the last few years and is a shadow of it's former self... luckily the park did add Goliath which is a great coaster even though it's horribly misplaced in the park and it replaced a great family attraction when there were tons of other places they could have put it. The thing that really annoys me about this park though is that they have the worst employees of any park I've ever been to. They're extremely rude to the guests and extremely slow at dispatching trains. They're very eager to let you know how much they hate their jobs. Great Escape is actually a very nice park but the slow operations and lack of any major thrill rides put it behind New England for me. The park isn't bad at all, but it just doesn't appeal to thrill seekers (Comet is obviously an exception here). Six Flags America is obviously the worst park in the chain. I don't need to beat this dead horse any more but I absolutely hate this place.

Maybe it's because the area is still a construction site but Pipe Scream looks a lot larger than I thought it would for some reason. It really dominates that side of the midway.

From the map it does look like some kind of gazebo or tent.

I want to play something more thrilling than Roller Coaster Tycoon 4.

Yes. Read the post directly above yours from less than 2 days ago.

I was being sarcastic.