Gav

That seems to be different product. You get unlimited re rides with no booking required on that one, sort of like Flashpass platinum and they usually cost an arm and a leg. It's not really comparable to a booking system that this Genie is.

So if im understanding correctly, if you had a family of four, and were going to the four main parks at Disney World, you would have to pay $240 extra to use fast pass, with no "free" fastpass option included in the ticket price?lockquote widgetlockquote widget

Any random 4D or Indy style motion base dark rides. I liked your POVs of ones like Tokyo Panic Cruise or that Speed of Dreams one at Ferrari World, but I know there are many that have gone under the radar, particularly in China.

The footers for this were going in when I was there in December. You could tell it was going to be a coaster, but it looked so rectangular, I thought it might have been a Eurofighter or something. Good job, a family invert looks great!

I was in Japan over Christmas just now, and yeah I was quite surprised too that Fuji Q was better than expected and Nagashima seemed worse in terms of operations. When I arrived at Fuji Q, the park was under a blanket of snow, and coasters didn’t start opening till 1pm (Though sadly Eejanaika never opened, I got a couple of laps on the rest, plus the minor rides like Fuji Airways, the Naruto dark ride, the hospital, Duncan, the Thomas treasure hunt, rapids etc) But I was impressed how hard they worked to clear snow from the tracks and get rides testing. At Nagashima, I barely got 1 lap on each coaster (Except Ultra twister because it was closed), and that was relying on express passes, because of silliness like only running 1 side of Arashi (so 4 seats per dispatch!), 1 train/station on Acrobat etc. The park closed 5:30 but queues shut for SD2000 and Hakugei before 4, so frustratingly only 1 go on each….I sprinted to Acrobat and got a 2nd lap on that at least, using an express pass just before they closed the queue for that one too. On the other coasters, ops were slow, eg on the Corkscrew, the op would get in a couple of people, they’d deposit their items, take their seats, then the next couple of people would follow and so on. So what looked like a 10 min wait ended up being 30. The park, was alright, tidy and good rides, but the staff seemed lethargic. Surpisingly, outside of Disney and Universal, I thought the quickest and most courteous ops were at Legoland Japan!

It's a garbage incinerator plant by Architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-21/the-japanese-waste-incinerator-that-has-its-own-tripadvisor-page/9780872

Just on the first day, would you consider leaving on Friday night and driving to some point till around 10pm. Then on the Saturday set off and you could spend an extra afternoon at Dollywood and have a go at a mountain coaster or two. Also, for CP, rather than 3 days, I found it worked well to go for 2 days, but purchase Fast lane plus, which would probably work out fairly equivalent to an additional night of hotel. I know everyone loves CP, but at the same time, 2 days, with one of those days having queue jumping is more than enough to ride a wide variety of attractions and take in the atmosphere.

They also finally opened their Flying Theatre, Sky Voyager, today after an 8 month delay. Awesome news, Dreamworld have needed a signature full circuit thrill coaster for so long. Blue Fire is fantastic, and the shuttle launch and spinning car will add a bit of interest over and above the base model.

Reminds me of the Moody Blues Trip ride from Hard Rock Park.

If it becomes too much of a problem you could just install a diffuser over the nozzle set foward enough and wide enough that it is not possible to seal your lips over it.

Wouldn't the 'puddle' of water the raft is in move through with the raft? Problem? This is basically just a giant auger pump.

DC Rivals HyperCoaster opened Saturday. In a word, stunning. I know you are expecting some local bias, but the ride is objectively good, and my favourite "hyper/giga". Certainly beats anything B&M have done, and is more comfortable than the Intamins. For context in terms of what I am judging against, I have ridden all US hypers (Except Wild Thing and Mako), plus the Pepsi Max Big One. I think Skyrush is the closest contender, but DC Rivals feels more fleshed out and longer, and is of course more comfortable (Though I didn't find Skyrush that uncomfortable) In terms of comparing with Superman at SFNE (Often hailed as the worlds best), DC Rivals has a significantly better first drop, and better turns and variation, (though I think DC Rivals could have had one extra "normal" hill...possibly in lieu of the stengel) I felt DC Rivals had a bit more "flair" in the design. What I liked about Rivals it that it seemed like a "Greatest Hits" of some of the worlds best. The crazy first drop felt very "RMC", the first hill feels like something from SROS (And presumably EGF)....The non inverting loop is the first one I've felt with ejector. The middle section of the ride channels bits of Fury 325 and i305. The high speed bunny hops at the end felt crazy like the Lightning rod quad down / the mega lites. So overall, the ride has excellent pacing (Only moment it lets up is on the top of the stengel dive overbank thingy), very strong airtime at several points, quick transitions . The queue is clean. A bit SF in terms of cut outs and comic book panels, except the scale is enormous. There are four queue lanes...General, Backwards, Fastrack (not in use) and Singles. The trains seat 22, 6 cars, but that Mack chassis design means the back car only has 2 seats that face backwards. It's a $10 upcharge to ride backwards, in timed blocks. I'll give my thoughts later on. Though its incredibly entertaining because the whole queue gets to watch the backwards riders going up the lift crapping themselves. The lift hill is quite speedy for a chain...not actually that much slower than some cable lifts. First drop is nuts. On the right hand seat the rail actually goes slightly beyond vertical due to the heartlining. As mentioned, The drop feels like something RMC would do, so you are really chucked out of your seat, and dont get caught until you reach the bottom. The airtime hill, well you know what to expect, a good couple of seconds of sustained ejector and as you dive down a bit the track twists. Awesome. You get a cool effect of flying under a tangle of track as you enter the non inverting loop. Like most big loops, its not that forceful at the bottom, then the positive g's build up, but then as you reach the top it suddenly changes tack and tries to chuck you out the train. A combination of ejector and intamin style "twistyness". It is like being on the outside of an inline twist, so it is that fast rotation that creates the negative gs. You drop out and into the stengel, which gets a bit of sideways floater. I suppose every hyper needs to have a tall overbank type thingy, but I would have rathered some form of hill here instead. Next up is the incline dive loop, feels like a zero g roll on entry, but again, the personality changes halfway through and you hurl around the top and out the bottom of the half loop with some pretty strong positive force. There is a low to the ground fast turn next, which is sweeping, but then transition into the next turn is very snappy, this leads around into one of those twisting S hills, so a quick pop of ejector at the top, a bit like the first hill on Rita. Following from that is the helix, which undulates up and down a bit and varies radius, so it doesn't feel like a true helix of death like the one on Titan SFOT/Goliath SFMM, but its forceful enough. The final part of the ride is a masterpiece. You bank snappily to the right, do a hard u turn, then bank snappily to the left, and then line up for the bunny hops. It positively belts through these, very agressive ejector airtime twice in a row, then a left turn and a third ejector hill over a creek, and it is sort of on a wierd bank like those ones you see on RMCs. One last quick pop as you enter the brake run, carrying a lot of speed. The ride runs pretty well (some of that rattle some Macks have, but nothing terrible by any means) The seats are very comfortable. In keeping with Australian safety regulations the ride has backup seatbelts. The whole clip assembly is about the size of a smartphone, and comes from under the crotch like a B&M invert, and there is a metal guide channel in the top of the lap pad, so net result, it is not fiddly to do up and cannot be inserted upside down. What is even better is the seatbelt unclips and falls out automatically at the end of the ride, so no delays. A really nifty set up that works better than the seat belts that go under lap bars. As for the backwards seat, its cool because you can flop forwards going up the lift hill. It has all the crazy ejector you expect, and the first drop obviously is more unexpected. It really does trigger that primal "im falling and going to die / waking up at night feeling like you are falling" type sensation, which is pretty cool. The backwards seats do feel a tad nauseauting, nothing unbearable, and not the vile feeling you get on something like an air race, but I wouldn't call it as re-ridable as any other row. I've done about 8 laps. I like the back fowards row for the airtime and the crazy first drop, but the front row is good for views, and the non inverting loop feels better there. So yeah, come to Australia and ride it. We have Superman Escape too

I still think a Tetris themed drop ride would be perfect for this.

A full reservation based system is always going to be challenging because there's no handbrake on people "joining" the queue. People can tap at the totems at a far higher rate than the rides dispatch interval, so its clear how virtual queue slots would be eaten up very quickly. With a standby queue there is a natural reality check when you see the line and ask yourself ”Can I really be bothered waiting?" and that works as a natural handbrake, and people naturally distribute themselves more evenly around the park, to attractions with spare capacity. Id agree with other posters about it limiting choice.... Id be annoyed at any park if there was a key ride I came for that I was totally booked out, with no option to suck it up and standby. 'No lines' only works too if there is enough to do during the virtual wait. To be fair they do have a lazy river and wave pool, but I think a good proportion of visitors would get bored with doing passive activities such as those for long periods.

Did Zamperla ever improve the Volares?