robbalvey

I'll move this to the main forum since we moved out of California about five years ago now.

Our max limit depends on what the parks offer. Many times as we start to get more ticket sales, the parks may add on more stuff to accommodate more people. This is why it's so important for us to front-load ticket sales as much as possible as we have a better chance of them giving us additions early on than later. So we don't really know the limit for sure until tickets go on sale and we see how sales are doing. That being said, events with more than 200 people start to push the boundaries of "cool stuff" you can do with a group that size, so when we reach that number, we look to the parks to open options for us. We once had over 600 at West Coast Bash at SFMM and IMO that was just way too many. After that year we started significantly limiting ticket sales so we wouldn't have that big of a group again. Quality > Quantity is what our events are about.

I feel like I've heard "work is starting again on this project for a new opening date..." so many times that I honestly don't buy any of it. I'll believe it when it opens.

Interesting email in just now from ZDT's... Hello! The moment you've been waiting for is here! Here's the official announcement we've been teasing for the past couple of weeks: When completed, #Switchback should officially claim the title of world's STEEPEST wooden roller coaster! That’s right, a record breaking wooden roller coaster is coming to ZDTs! The steepest point of the ride will occur on the ‘Grand Spike’ at the tail end of the ride, where the riders will ride upwards, stop, and then fall backwards to ride the track again in reverse. While the track itself will reach upwards to a full 90 degrees, the designers of the ride estimate that the train should reach a near vertical 87 degrees before falling backwards (topping the current wooden roller coaster record of 85 degrees). The only way to know for certain… stay tuned for the official test run results on a date to be announced! If you have any question I will be more than happy to answer them! Thank you, ZDT's Amusement Park

Wow! So we have just passed the "100 tickets sold" mark for West Coast Bash already! Tickets have only been on sale for two days!!! This might be the fastest sell out we've ever had! When general ticket sales open, I would not waste any time getting them!

In bigger, more popular areas like Tokyo or Osaka, yes. Once you get out of those areas though, like down in Fukuoka, you'll start seeing a lot less English on signage.

^ This might sound crazy, but it a way it's hard to even classify Falcon's as a "Drop Tower" as it feels so much different. You actually don't get as much feeling of "falling" as you do on a traditional tower like Blue Fall (Which I still think has one of the best OMFG moments when you hit the bottom.) But what Falcon's does do, is just so insanely cool, awesome, and fun, that it's hard not to call it the best drop tower in the world just because it's so screwed up in the best way possible! lol I actually prefer the traditional Intamin Giant Drops to the larger seat versions like Zumanjaro and Lex Luthor. Those are a hell of a lot of fun too, but the is just a "moment" on Blue Fall where you are seriously like "OH CRAP!!!!" that I don't get on those others...

I would put it Falcon > Blue Fall > Zumanjaro > Lex Luthor I dunno, though. Blue Fall is still REALLY REALLY good. And Falcons is just really different. I'm not even sure I should compare them.

While I'm glad you got on everything and things worked out for you in the park, I have to question why you would leave the "brand new highly anticipated ride" until the very last hour of they day??? That just seems so risky to me as new rides always tend to have issues, especially in their opening year. I can't tell you how many times we've been to a park with our group where we say "MAKE SURE YOU GET ON THE NEW RIDE FIRST...JUST IN CASE!" only to have something happen to it later which closes it for the rest of the day. Like I said, I'm glad you got on everything, and luck was on your side, but whoever advised you NOT to go to Colossus first gave you really poor advice.

While maybe not a TV or Film celeb that everyone may know, this guy pretty much is responsible for a lot of the video games world we know today. http://www.kotaku.com.au/2015/07/nintendos-president-satoru-iwata-has-passed-away/ Nintendo has just issued a short statement announcing that president Satoru Iwata has passed away at the age of 55. The statement reads: Nintendo Co., Ltd. deeply regrets to announce that President Satoru Iwata passed away on July 11, 2015 due to a bile duct growth. Iwata was forced to skip last year’s E3 due to his poor health, and shortly afterwards underwent surgery to remove the bile duct growth. Iwata first joined Nintendo’s HAL Laboratory in the 1980s, where he worked on games like Balloon Fight and EarthBound. He became a Director of the company in 2000, and in 2002 was appointed as only the fourth President of Nintendo when he succeeded Hiroshi Yamauchi. In his time as President, Iwata oversaw some of the strongest (Wii, DS) and weakest (GameCube, Wii U) periods in Nintendo’s history as a video game company. In recent times, he developed almost cult status as the host of the Nintendo Direct programs. An immensely popular figure both within the industry and with Nintendo fans, he will be sorely missed. Rest in Peace, Mr. Iwata.

Today was the final day for the Hiro & Baymax Meet & Greet so we went down to say one final goodbye... Photos by Jack Crouse: Thanks for the great photos Jack!

I don't want to alarm you, but someone may have hacked into your account. It's like Rick & Garbles have swapped places.

I think if I were the ride op I would have reacted the same way. "Didn't we tell you to keep your hands inside the ride???"

Wow! West Coast Bash tickets only went on sale a few hours ago and we already have 9 states and four countries represented at the event!

If you are a member of Club TPR, you can purchase tickets for West Coast Bash RIGHT NOW! Click: http://www.themeparkreview.com/store/index.php?categoryID=22 West Coast Bash 2015 is: Six Flags Magic Mountain - Saturday, September 12th Knott's Berry Farm - Sunday, September 13th We apologize that we were unable to offer Club TPR discounts this year, but we are offering early ticket sales for you to purchase and guarantee admission to the event. You may buy as many tickets as you need for any guests you might bring to the event. If you are NOT a member of Club TPR, general ticket sales will open later in the week. Please keep in mind that this event WILL SELL OUT so get your tickets ASAP! Thank you again for your support! --Robb Alvey www.themeparkreview.com

First off, it's Japanese. Secondly, the name of the ride is アクロバット and the name of the park is ナガシマスパーランド That took me approximately 15 seconds to find using Google. If you know what you're looking for and you're somewhat intelligent, it's really not that hard.

Today we were invited by Walt Disney World to come check out the new Harambe Market and sample some of the different food offerings. In addition to Zuri’s Sweets Shop mentioned on the page before, the new Harambe Market features four more food stalls sort of in a "food court" layout that each offers very different items from spicy ribs, curry corn dogs and "adult beverages." Everything we tried today was very good and highly recommended. Check out some of the photos we took from todays' Animal Kingdom visit... Spending our afternoon at Disney's Animal Kingdom today! Main reason for coming out was to check out the new Harambe Market and enjoy some of the new offerings the park has introduced. First off, I just want to say that we highly approve of the new selfie stick ban! Thank you Disney! The new Harambe Market is located just around the corner from Kilimanjaro Safari and it's great to see more "quick service" food offerings in the park. Ribs, corn dogs & beer! What's not to love? The signage around the area was great! lol We were given some of the new BBQ sauce and this combined with the ribs was a huge win! Taking a look at some of the theming of the new area... It really fits right in with the rest of the park, and this was all just a "backstage" area before, but you'd never know it. It feels like it's been there since the park opened! Let's check out the ribs first since we've heard a lot about these. It's basically a "ribs & beer" shop. I'm 100% down with that! The ribs did NOT disappoint! They were awesome! First it's a huge portion and then throw in some very tasty flavors and a slight spicy kick and you've got a winning combo! Yes, the ribs were absolutely "dreamy!" Next up.... some sausages... Or should I say "Curry Corn Dogs! The curry spice was baked into the corn dog batter and for those who aren't into spicy food, don't worry, it wasn't over-powering but gave a perfect hint that it's in there! Once again, craft beer is the theme here, and I'm totally ok with that! The sweet shop had some amazing looking treats! Cookies of all shapes & sizes. Apples turned into monkeys... ...and elephants! Kristen chose to go with the giraffe cookie! And it's pretty much the rule that with any animal shaped food, you have to eat the head off first...you know....quick death. We spoke with Walt Disney World Executive Chef Al and he talked about the Imagineering team that went to Africa and tried some local foods and it was important that they included some of the spices and flavors into the offerings at the new Harambe Market. While the Walt Disney World parks are focused on "family fun" they also understand the importance that adults need to have fun, too... The wide variety of alcoholic drinks and souvenir cups is always a huge plus of these parks! The last location for us to check out was the "grill." Two REALLY GOOD offerings here... The Chicken skewer had very tender pieces of chicken, again, spiced perfectly to be very flavorful, yet not too spicy to scare away some people. And the ground beef flatbread sandwich also followed in those same flavorful footsteps wrapped in a great tasting bread. What's interesting about some of the theming is that you do actually see Mickey Mouse paintings like this all over these parts of the world! Like I said before, the area really fits into the park and feels like it's been there forever! It's really well done. NOTED! "Do not feed the baboons!" Of course we will obey those rules! (Sorry, Banks!) Yes, we get it! We get it! Some of the other merchandise items found around the market and Animal Kingdom. And just like in the Lion King...you can eat bugs! I know I'm spoiled with Tokyo Disney's flavored popcorn, but I will give this a try! More awesome African-inspired Mickey drawings. I thought these were really cool! More of the theming and if you've been to Animal Kingdom before, you know it's one of the more immersive parks in the world! Thank you Harambe Market! We will have a fine day! We decided to have "Second Lunch" at one of our favorite locations on WDW property, Yak & Yeti. The food here is soooo good! With restaurants like Yak & Yeti and quick-service areas like Harambe Market, there is so much good food around the parks! And of course no trip to Animal Kingdom is complete without taking a ride on Expedition Everest! Still one of the top Disney attractions in the world! From the lift hill of Everest, you can see some of the Avatar area construction in the background. It's gonna be huge! Bird on a Stick was not with us today...maybe next time... That yeti is always causing problems for us... And I don't care what people say, no matter what condition the yeti is in, he still looks amazing! Oh! We had to make a quick stop by the new Starbucks in Animal Kingdom! This is the final of the Starbucks locations to be installed at Walt Disney World and it looks fantastic! A little bit of Tokyo Disney follows us home! Thank you again to WDW for having us out! Great day at Animal Kingdom! The ribs were the star of the new Harambe Market, but really everything was great and highly recommended! And we'll just end our little report with this...

Stuff.

And this is the biggest issue. In their mind, they think they know what a ride's safety system should be based on what is pounded in their heads regularly regarding day-to-day safety. And often times their assumptions are grossly inaccurate for a ride. And no matter what you tell them, they are right and you are wrong. And when they feel that they aren't being listened to (because they are wrong), all of a sudden the park gets news trucks showing up at their door step. And no matter how much a park tries to explain to the news the actuals of the situation, the news paints the picture that they feel will get them the best ratings. Which feeds right back into why the guest freaks out in the first place. It's a vicious circle and it sucks that we have this sort of mentality in our country. This is the scenario that SHOULD take place: Guest: OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!! MY SEATBELT CAME UNDONE!!! OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!! Ride op: Oh, that seatbelt isn't actually part of the ride's safety system. Guest: Really? Super Cool! Rock on! Let's ride again! But this is what really happens: Guest: OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!! MY SEATBELT CAME UNDONE!!! OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!! Ride op: Oh, that seatbelt isn't actually part of the ride's safety system. Guest: WHAT? F**K YOU!!! THAT SEATBELT NEARLY KILLED MY GRANDMOTHER!!! YOU'RE FULL OF HOT BULLSHIT!!! I'M CALLING THE POLICE!!! AND THE NEWS!!! AND RUSH LIMBAUGH!!! AND EVERYONE!!! YOU'RE GOING TO HELL!!! THAT'S A SEATBELT ASSSHOLE AND IT SAVES LIVES!!!! If people could only "listen".... *sigh*

^ At least they are good for something.

Someone has a problem reading, don't they?

Our next day took us to the town of "Beppu" which offers quite a bit to do in Southern Japan. One nice thing about the way we put this trip together is that we had a lot of days where people could just go and do whatever they wanted based on preferences. For our group, we either had been to parks in the area like Kijima before, or wanted to do something different, so while some of the group went to go ride one of the few wooden rollers in the country, we went and did a selection of more random things this day, starting with Hello Kitty and ending with monkeys! This is a BIG day of 100+ photos so be sure to get through all of them! Lots of fun stuff in here! Today was one of the days we all split up to do different things. While some of the group went out to Kijima to ride Jupiter, some of us wanted to go see one of Japan's biggest celebrities... HELLO KITTY!!!! For some it was about riding one of four wooden roller coasters in the country.... for us we wanted to check out Sanrio characters, Ocean Sunfish, and Monkeys! Our day started off on a train named after a video game character. This was the "Sonic" train! lol Each train comes equipped with an emergency door penis. Yes! We are in the area where everything is going to get sugary sweet! Harmonyland is basically the home to Hello Kitty and all her cutesy Japanese friends. It's a legit theme park which much of it being themed better than 95% of the parks in the USA. And yes... you can meet Hello Kitty! And many of her friends are here, too! We figured we'd get the Hello Kitty roller coaster out of the way first. Yes, it's a Vekoma Roller Skater, but it's a completely custom model and it's actually really good! It feels more like a "mine train" and less like a "Roller Skater." Some funky little pops of airtime on this ride, too! Next we hit up the controversial "Hello Kitty Train." The controversy comes with the coaster nerds. Yes it runs on "tubular steel track" and is powered on it's own gravity for some of the trip. The girls don't give a crap what coaster nerds think, they just want to ride to get down the hill to the Sanrio Boat Ride! But as you can see, the ride does have familiar looking rails... It does climb a lift hill on one of the legs of the ride... ...and it does coast downhill with the speed controlled by the operator. So what do you think? The girls say "Anyone who counts this as a roller coaster is not someone we would ever go out on a date with!" Next up was the star attraction of the park... the Sanrio Boat Ride! It's sort of like "It's a Small World meets a LOT of Sugar!" The storyline is simple - All of Hello Kitty's friends get an invitation to her party.... And then they spend the first part of the ride getting ready to go! And yes, a penguin (Badtz Maru) gets spanked. This right here makes it an AWESOME ride! My Melody & Kuromi are both going to the party.... Pom Pom Purin seems pretty happy to have gotten his invite! And then they all take off to the party! Badtz Maru chooses jetpack to get there... My Melody takes some sort of dirigible. Yay! They gang is all here! And let's celebrate Hello Kitty! "The rest of you all suck! My Melody is my TRUE friend!' Here is the ride-through of the Hello Kitty Boat Ride. We got a lot of complaints about this on YouTube, which kind of surprised me. Yes, I get it that the ride is very sickening "sweet" but it's also a totally legit, very well done ride! If this was in Orlando, it would be one of the better dark rides in the area! Check it out: After the boat ride, Kristen went to do this sort of Sanrio "Ninja Warrior" course. There was a lot of money bars... slides... climbing walls... And falling on faces. She is a true Sanrio Ninja Warrior! The park is really a lot of fun, and all the rides are totally themed to Sanrio. The Ferris Wheel has each cabin themed to a different character. And there are a lot of different Sanrio characters! There goes a few of them... The girls got the Little Twin Stars car. Hello Little Twin Stars! And YAY! We got Badtz Maru! We are all bad penguins. The park most certainly seems to have an "old and new" part, with the newer, more well themed section being towards the front of the park... and the less themed, more "pavement" part towards the back. The girls loved it! And yes, there is a little powered coaster here, too. There are just so many things wrong with this picture! lol I love these random little "put your kids on display" rides that you see all over Japan! Hello Kitty themed Tea Cups. Hello Kitty themed roulette wheel to the death. The parade was about to start and this area went from empty to totally packed in about 90 seconds! More sugary sweet Sanrio stuff... More Hello Kitty.... ...and lots of bubbles! Elissa hanging out with her favorite character. The girls just chillin' Yes, because headbands make you awesome! I'm not exactly sure what this character is... but apparently he's totally naked!!! lol All the Hello Kitty stuff you could possibly want! Tons of plush... seriously TONS of it! The umbrellas were amazing! And plenty of Hello Kitty swag to take home and make you cool. Kristen is channeling her inner Pom Pom Purin at Harmonyland. Next we went to do some more random stuff in Beppu. Found at the train station.... Kristen looks absolutely thrilled about this! lol This was the zoological park which included an aquarium and a "monkey park." Yup, there were sharks... ...and some big ass ugly fish. And these really screwed up looking sand worm things! Dr. Shrunk from Animal Crossing was here, too! But this is what we were really here for...the Ocean Sunfish! Kristen is obsessed with this really bizarre looking creature. She calls it the "half fish" because it looks like someone cut it in half. Make no mistake about it, this is one UGLY animal! WOW! But, it's also a very rare animal and they are difficult to keep in captivity (the USA only has one) and Kristen loves it, so we accept it...but man is it UGLY!!! lol Wait, what is this? The tortoise and the rabbit? Oh, I get it... Yup, they hang out together! In the "Never in America Department" we have the kids splash pool that is actually PART OF THE DOLPHIN ENCLOSURE! Yes!!! You can see the kids splashing in the foreground and there are the dolphins swimming in the background! From above you can get a better look at this. But it's Japan, so all they need to do is put up a sign, and people pay attention and obey it. If this sign was in America, instead of not throwing things at the dolphins, people would probably be smacking them with their selfie sticks or throwing their kids in the water. But in Japan, people actually obey the rules. Here's another dolphin enclosure where they allow people to get very close to them. "Dolphins like the taste of human arms...don't put your hand in there, stupid!" And people respect this. (Yes, it IS too much to ask at our parks here in the USA.) Random stuff to do at the aquarium. This chameleon took a liking to me and my cell phone. It was awesome you could get so close to all the animals! Across the way was the "monkey park." We kind of knew what to expect here, but it sort of exceeded those expectations. You could either take this tram to get up to the monkeys, or you could walk. They monkeys were everywhere! And they really seemed to spend a lot of time grooming each other! Some of them even groomed each others butts! There were hundreds of them, just hanging out everywhere you turned. "I find these monkeys are cooler to hang out with than most people!" Monkey Boobies. Is this one alive? Who knows! They were everywhere! Climbing around and pretty much didn't care about the people around them. So many of them had monkey babies. "Yes, hi...there are monkeys here...can we go now?" "Yup, that's a pile of monkeys over there!" Not sure what's going on here... "Will work for bananas." I love that they were doing the "Share a Coke" thing in Japan, too! Next stop was Canal City.. I mean.... um... Oh.... "Hey Reed! Check it out!" Yes...Japan has Shakey's Pizza! lol We had to try it. They menu was totally bizarre! Yes, those "Mayonnaise" pizzas had some sort of cream based sauce instead of normal pizza sauce! (the original pizzas were actually pretty good!) This was the "Rosemary Potato" pizza! Really weird, but actually good! It was all about the dessert pizzas, though! This was the Cinnamon Apple! And "Quatro Chocolate!" Yes, it had four kinds of chocolate for all your diabetic needs! The REAL meal of the night was... you guessed it.... YAKITORI! Ooooh, soooo good! This place is Fukuoka does "Bacon Wrapped Cheese!" There it is... perfection! DELICIOUS! Yakitori and beer...now we can go to sleep happy! Although Derek found Zima in Japan! Yes! They still have it! lol We will end this update with some Japanese porn...because shouldn't all updates end up with a bit of Japanese porn???

Of course they do! Because it's a really fun ride and should be at more parks! And all BGW has done is proven how wrong obnoxious coaster dorks can be. And this makes me happy!

You need to stop looking at the amusement world with a closed-minded enthusiast perspective. While I 100% agree with you, you also have to understand that most of the world is scared to death of roller coasters and don't understand that a "lap bar" is perfectly safe. Most amusement operators will agree with me when I say that whenever you add an inversion to a coaster, you automatically alienate a certain percentage of the population that come into your park. There are people that just refuse to go on anything that "goes upside down." So you need to do as much as you can for potential riders to feel "ok" with that. The "comfort" descriptor in "comfort collar" does not necessarily mean "comfortable" as in a physical feeling, but more a state of mind. I can't tell you over the years how many times I've heard people say "The ride goes upside down and has just a lap bar??? That's not safe!!!!" So perhaps Busch Gardens felt that for their demographic they needed something to make people feel more secure, even though it's just smoke in mirrors. Of course, the person who said "this story wouldn't happen if they weren't there" is also correct, but like they say, hindsight is 20/20....