TopThrill182

Call me crazy, but I'll take Boomerang over GhostRider (as it stands now) any day of the week! While I agree new Boomerang trains would be great, if you position your head a certain way throughout the ride, it's really not all that bad... (Not sure how I feel about its new paint, though...) Is this Boardwalk expansion leaving anyone else rather cold? I get the whole family park argument, which I think is legitimate, but this whole project seems sort of "blah" and uninspired to me. (Maybe I'm just still upset they took PP out... haha)

Iron Iron Rattler looks sick. As others have mentioned, the track really slithers like a snake! That first drop leaves me speechless. The carnival slingshot rides are a different story... I find them incredibly ugly, especially this new trailer version. Yuck. It just doesn't go with all the other high-quality, permanent attractions.

It's nice to see the park find new life with Hart, but why is he so interested in reopening the place? I love amusement parks and all, but KK is so buried under a mountain of bureaucratic crap, the park seems more trouble than it's worth.

Wow... Agree about Tatsu and Scream's ugliness. I'm guessing a Tatsu paint job would prove difficult and expensive given it's mountaintop-esque location? As for Scream--they really have no excuse there!

While I'm surprised you didn't care for Xcellerator (I, too, enjoy it far more than Kingda Ka), I completely agree with your review of Silver Bullet. The coaster is way underrated IMO. Sure, it's not the most intense B&M invert out there, but it's one of the most fun for me. The overbanked turns provide a nice flying sensation that I don't feel on other B&M inverts. My favorite sequence of all is the counter-clockwise corkscrew followed by the s-curve thingy (I don't know what it's technically called) followed by the clockwise corkscrew. I actually enjoy the shallowness of the first drop, too. I like the slower way in which the ride picks up speed.

That's because it only has three pieces! ... Haha! One of the funniest posts I've read in a long time. I honestly don't see the big deal about Superman being closed. People have suggested any number of plausible (albeit lazy on the park's part) reasons why the ride closed when it did. And plus, considering new rides at most parks elsewhere in the country are only open May-October, SFMM seems to have ground to close the ride for a while. As much as I like new rides, am I the only one who thinks the park needs some money put into general upkeep / repair? In addition to some paint jobs (e.g. Tatsu), I can't believe that they still hasn't cleaned up the ex-Deja Vu area.

^ Agreed. I think Raptor is way better in the back than the front. And Raptor is my favorite B&M invert by far (granted, I haven't ridden many). The one B&M invert I think is really underrated is Silver Bullet!

Beautiful!

^ Why is it a temporary installment, though? Admittedly, I haven't been following this thread religiously, but I was assuming this thing would stick around for a while.

Am I the only one who thinks this looks really ugly? haha Why are there so many wires? It looks like a radio tower.

I find this announcement pretty underwhelming and disappointing. As a thrill seeker, of course I would've preferred a giga coaster over any of these family installments. But that's not where my disappointment stems from... There are many family rides I thoroughly enjoy; I can go to Disney and be content all day, for example. So it's not that I have a problem with attractions aimed towards the entire family. I do, however, take issue with general mediocracy in the form of uninspired family rides. A recycled scrambler and an off-the-shelf wild mouse coaster comprising 2/3 of this addition? In comparison to recent, exciting additions at neighboring Disneyland (e.g Cars Land) and SFMM (e.g. Green Lantern, LL:DoD, and FT), as well as Universal's impending Harry Potter extravaganza, I'm afraid KBF's future plans simply look pathetic in comparison. The only thing I can figure out from all of this is that Knott's is trying to further position itself as a "low-cost" alternative to its bigger-budgeted rivals. From a business perspective, I understand that's a viable, perhaps logical, route to take in the face of aggressive competition; but for me, as a patron, I don't feel much of an impulse to visit the park more frequently. Personally, I think the park has enough low-capacity, menial family rides. I think KBF is in desperate need of a sizable investment--not just in terms of cost, but one that demonstrates substantial thought, creativity, and (dare I say) originality. I will say, however, that I like how they seem to be keeping the boardwalk theme! The retention of some water in the area will be nice.

Went to SFMM last night... The crowds were insane! We got to the park a little before 8pm, and parked in one of the last possible rows in the overflow lot. By the end of the night, they were parking cars along the road, even turning the toll booth area into a parking lot. (Does that happen often?) Given the time constraints combined with the large crowds, we decided to forgo the maze wristband. Instead, we focused solely on rides. We got on three rides between 8pm and park close (12:30am): LL:DoD (90 minute wait), Scream! (30 minute wait), and X2 (110 minute wait). Scream! and X2 were awesome as usual (the latter of which felt particularly smooth last night, too, which was a nice treat). LL:DoD was probably my favorite part of the evening. This was my first time on the ride. I usually don't get too anxious on rides anymore, but I have to admit that this ride got my heart going... Although I'm well accustomed to 400ft coasters, a drop tower at that height felt totally different. The slow raise to the top was truly exhilarating, and the ride vehicles provided a beautiful sense of freedom IMO. Adding to the excitement, I was amazed how significant and noticeable the swaying / vibrating was when S:EfK launched. Not totally prepared for swaying back and forth 400ft in the air! Overall, I think LL:DoD is a win for the park. Despite its abysmal capacity (which seems to be the new norm for the park), I thought the experience was second to none.

A brief Haunt review from last night: Combining my group's late start (we didn't get into the park until 9:45) and insane crowds (to be expected on a Saturday night, I suppose), we didn't get as much done as we had wanted to... All in all, we experienced 6 mazes: Trick or Treat, Dominion of the Dead, Delirium, Pinocchio Unstrung, End Games, and Virus Z. Trick or Treat was my favorite maze of the evening. While it wasn't necessarily the "scariest," the theming was top-notch. There was tremendous attention to detail, which really helped the witch's house "come alive" IMO. There were so many awesome moments (e.g. the ghost covered with bedsheets standing at the front door, the witch rising up above the dining table, etc.)--all of which helped me fall into the story. Pinocchio and VIrus were also impressive IMO, rounding out my top three. The marionette in Pinocchio was a cool moment, and the Carrie ending of Virus was nicely done, too. All in all, I thought both of these mazes had great stories and were executed in such a way as to help those stories come alive. While I thought Dominion had an interesting concept (the violin playing vampires, while not necessarily scary, seemed like a fresh idea), it was poorly executed. Many of the walls throughout the maze were entirely bare, which "deflated" the overall experience for me. Not a favorite... Delirium had a cool concept as well, but the set dressings appeared cheap, and I never really believed half of the things I was seeing (I felt like Knott's was going for the "gross factor" with this maze, but I feel like it's hard for painted wood to appear disgusting). Again, this one couldn't compare to the first three mazes I experienced. End Games was definitely a sensory overload experience, but the whole thing felt oddly disjointed. There were a lot of props inside, but I didn't understand how any of them related to one another (e.g. how does the rock monster fit with the apocalyptic, video cameras watching the survivors' every move concept?). I felt like End Games was the result of Knott's having a lot of props left over (even though none of them really harmonized well). I thought the live stream videos of people going through the maze was really interesting, and if Knott's were to focus on this particular theme (perhaps something like "Hunger Games"), I feel like the maze could become stronger. The first time I went to Haunt was in 2010, and I found myself both underwhelmed and disappointed by the experience. They had a lot of mazes, but many of them felt cheap and one-dimensional to me. I feel as though the event was much improved this year. I had a lot of fun. Although I didn't experience everything, I felt like I got a nice sample. Overall, I feel like Trick or Treat should be the model maze for Knott's going forward. Like Terror of London, which I experienced back in 2010, Trick or Treat demonstrated a Universal-like quality that really allowed me to feel immersed in the story. I still prefer Universal's event--primarily because I feel as though they value quality over quantity; Knott's, on the other hand, still seems to be focussed on quantity rather than quality. They had some great mazes, but also a substantial number of not so great ones, too. I'd love to see them jettison one or two of the not so great ones, and invest that money into making all of them really great.

I couldn't agree more. Even if CF had found a way to "stabilize" the ride from future wear / safety issues, the combination of horrible roughness and a boring layout made the ride unsalvageable in my book...

Noooooo! That picture almost killed me... Does anyone know why PP ran into such capacity issues? Was there a reason for running one boat rather than laziness / efforts to save costs on the part of Knott's?

I'm really rooting for Knott's to get something major. I'd even be happy with a non-giga addition. I just think te park deserves a major capital investment. To be honest, though, I wasn't a huge fan of Leviathan. While enjoyable, the ride experience reminded me of driving on the freeway. I'm exaggerating of course, but the ride experience wasn't as exciting for me as I had hoped.

No! Say it ain't so! I'll always hold a special place in my heart for PP. (I have many fond memories of my friends and me on the ride.) I think the ride experience is crazy awesome (especially the airtime coming down the first drop). And call me crazy, but I find PP one of the most photogenic rides anywhere. I absolutely love the bright colors up against California palm trees and a blue sky. I have two framed photos of the ride in my room... Also, I have to wonder if this removal has anything to do with Windseeker's sudden location change last year... Maybe it's just wishful thinking on my part, but I have a feeling there are big plans for the area.

Also speaking as someone who's worked in the theme park industry, I have to defend SFFT's Guest Services Department on this one. As others have already mentioned, most of these guest services employees receive hundreds of complaints throughout any given season. More often than not, the complainers (for lack of a better word) immediately want to speak with the GM / President. While upper management will frequently deal with guest issues, they can't possibly attend to every single guest complaint. They, quite frankly, have other (more important) matters to deal with. If a park's GM were constantly tied up responding to criticisms about the park's stale food, no refund policy, etc.--s(he) would never be able to focus on the larger operational issues. Don't get me wrong; those criticisms deserve someone's attention, but not the GM's. Quite frankly, there are other "lower" employees more than capable of dealing with the situation. And wanting a refund on a season pass that's already been used twice--yeah, good luck with that one. Few parks are going to acquiesce to that request. So, quite frankly, I'm confused what the Guest Services employee did wrong here... I can't see any evidence that she was "lying" to the OP; parks often specifically train their employees to avoid involving the GM in issues that can be handled by someone else. I certainly agree that the LO-Q employee needs to be reviewed, and his behavior--if accurately described by the OP--addressed. But, in all honesty, telling the LO-Q manager that the employee needs to, "learn a lesson in his young life and... be fired," seems a bit unreasonable IMO. It certainly sounds like the LO-Q employee handled his interaction with the OP quite poorly, but he may very well have been trained to fill all available rows without giving guests a choice on where they sit. Still, though, it doesn't sound like there was a need for security to be called, and I can understand how that would be frustrating and embarrassing. Overall, this all seems really overblown. It's definitely the OP's right to be frustrated, but I don't personally agree that SF deserves the black mark he's given them.

I'm left wondering, though, what is the park realistically going to have time to do to Wildcat's spot before opening day? Ouimet has said (at least I think he has) that he doesn't want the midway looking ripped up once the park opens. It's probably going to take a few days to take the ride down, and then removing the concrete underneath the ride for any sort of landscaping would probably fill up the rest of the remaining off-season time by itself.

Personally, I love the fact that MF retained the flood lights. While the LED patterns on Windseeker / Giant Wheel are cool, I think the flood lights are beautifully simple. And if MF's new flood lights are LED, that's even better! Hopefully they will last longer. Also, did MF's lights ever really look like this: http://www.joyrides.com/cedar_point/millennium_force4.htm? I would love to see the lights look like that again. But of course, who knows if that picture was really edited.

@99er -- WOW! Thank you so much for sharing! That's really beautiful. Were there a lot of color combos?

While I admire CP's efforts to include the GP in the naming process--Dragster H20? No offense to its creator, but that has to be one of the worst--and most Roller Coaster Tycoon-ish--names I've heard in a while... I'm sincerely hoping that, like most other Soak City slides, the slide's name won't be prominently featured anywhere. I blame the P&D department for even letting this name get on the ballot!

This is great news! I'm happy that the park will be re-born. But I can't help but feel that the $15-20 million figure is rather low... Given how the park has sat idle, I feel like it's going to be pretty costly just getting things back to an operational status. I don't feel like that will leave much cash for anything new (which seems like a bummer considering how SF gutted the place).

^ Yeah, haha. I have to say that I'm sort of disappointed Sky Cabin reopened! I thought something was brewing for its location.

^ That's my concern, too. MF had an awesome lighting package when it first opened, but the park never really seemed to maintain it... I hope they work harder to maintain Windseeker's!