goatdan

Wow! I figured there was a bunch of rides that I'd have gone on that fell into this category, and while they are, all the really good wooden coasters that I was thinking of are almost all exactly 80 feet tall. Weird. The one that no one else has named that was amazing to me is Zippin Pippin. I didn't expect much from it, and I found it to be absolutely amazing. A true gem.

Heh, the only time that I felt unsafe on a ride due to the harness was I think at Indiana Beach on one of their little metal fair-like things. My buddy and I sat down, and the attendant who had been closing the lap bars down because they were controlled by a locking mechanism on the outside of the car somehow so you couldn't pull them down yourself for whatever reason didn't, and he pushed our car out onto the track. We shouted at the attendant to close it, and he waved at us. We both held on like crazy the whole ride, and when we hit the brakes for the other attendant to get us off, he unsuccessfully tried "opening" the already opened restraint, and then glared at us like we somehow did it. Didn't exactly leave me with a great feeling about that park's ops.

You may be forgetting that for chain driven coasters, their starting point is not zero miles an hour, but whatever their speed is when they disengage the lift. This speed can be adjusted, and often is. One that I really remember is that Son of Beast went relatively slowly up the hill until you got near the top, and then for whatever reason it really sped up and almost shot you over the top. I seem to remember that in testing it had valleyed a few times or something, which made them do that, although it was so long ago my memory may be fuzzy. You can see it happening in POV of the ride. On a completely different topic, for the person asking how to get on a coaster crew at a park. I have some experience with the hiring process at a major park (not Cedar Point though), and I thought I would give a few pointers from my memories of how things worked where I was. This may not be the same for Cedar Point, but I figure it isn't too different... The first thing is when you go in, don't talk about how you're a coaster enthusiast, unless it is something like, "I've always wanted to work at a theme park, and I thought Cedar Point would be a great one because of all the coasters!" minor like that. If a person walked in and told us that he was a huge coaster guy, it was a red light for us to usually try to not put him at a major coaster until we saw how he was. It's sort of like the Acer vs. TPR thing, a lot of people who came in saying they really knew coasters could do stuff like tell maintence how to change the ride to make it "run better," try to explore nooks and crannies of the rides that are supposed to be off limits to everyone, would try to take parts of the ride, and my "favorite" would explain that they worked there so they could ride with the harness however they wanted to. Mind you, the people who did this were a relatively small group of the people that identified themselves as enthusiasts, but if someone is going to do something stupid, you'd rather have them at a flat ride where you can see how they work then at a major coaster. Generally, the trouble makers get really mad at the park for not being on a coaster quickly, or show up to be a guest in the park and demand that now they are an employee they can do what they want, and get weeded out. The good ones, at least where I was, would usually be promoted after a "trial" period if you will into leadership positions. Learn everything you can. TPR is much better than just about any other site I've ever been to about not claiming to "know" how the rides work more than the people there. Learn what is going on, and if you thought something worked a different way then what you are shown, the person showing you is right. Next up, if you land a position don't talk about it online. This is something I forgot to mention above, but is hugely important too. The bad enthusiast employees would do absolutely stupid things like post rumors that they heard online while claiming they worked for the park, which is a headache PR shouldn't have to deal with. Or, they would post pictures of them doing stupid stuff. Either of which was instantly fire-able offenses at the park that I was at. (We had one guy once post a picture of him in a train before opening not riding properly saying, "Guess what I did?" The entire crew was fired the next day.) Parks do not want you posting the maintenance schedule of the rides because things change from moment to moment with everything. If you post that they are putting the faster wheels on a ride the next day and they aren't there, you'll have people complaining at guest relations. You can hang out and post things online, but I would just suggest avoiding your park altogether. It's been *years* since I worked seasonally at a park, and while I'll tell friends about it, I still won't specifically name the park I worked at or the rides I ran online. Find fun in your job. You are doing a job that no matter what is extremely repetitive, but also extremely important. You have to find something fun in that, where you can check 5,000 harnesses in a day, make sure all 5,000 of them are *perfectly* done (again, you have to watch out for people - generally people who claim to be enthusiasts - trying to get away with stuff. My favorite was always the Acers who would show you their membership card and tell you it was the license to ride the coasters with the harnesses not engaged... uhm, no)... and still have fun at it. For me, the crews that I had been part of had extreme pride in our ride, it's history, and getting people through it. We busted our hump every day to get every single person possible through it, and were all a team to ensure that everyone did it together. It made what was otherwise an incredibly dull job on the surface a blast. If it paid better and was year round, I would do it today still. The final thing as people said, no matter where you end up, the experience is less about working at the ride, and more about forming friendships around working there. Your memories when you are done will be less things like going on Raptor, and more things like the time you went to Dennys at 2am after a long night. Believe it or not, if you go on any rides enough, the experience of them gets a lot more boring. It's an experience that I am extremely glad that I did when I did, and was one of my favorite experiences in my life. If you do all of that stuff, at least again at the park that I was at, you'd gain a lot of respect, and usually learn more. A few times, the maintenance workers showed me details of the ride I was at because they knew I'd be curious. A few times, I was let in on new capital early because again, they were certain I'd be curious about it, and they knew if I was told it wouldn't be online ten minutes later. I even had people ask my opinion on thoughts about how things were done, and my suggestions in a couple instances actually changed things. Getting that respect was great, and it made me feel like even now years later, I made an actual difference at the park I worked at during the time I ran rides. Every park is different, but I hope this helps in some way. Maybe it's a "Coaster Enthusiast's Guide to Working at a Park" or something. Good luck!

I don't think it even worked that well for Animal Kingdom. AK didn't have attendance issues that DCA, Paris Studios and Hong Kong had, but there is a reason that they closed SO much earlier than all the other parks and it isn't because of the animals. Disney makes a TON of money through food and merch sales, and having a park close at 5pm regularly doesn't help those numbers at all. They tried to fix it first with quick fixes like the dinoland junk, then tried a bigger fix with Everest that did a little but not a ton (similar to TZ:TOT at DCA), and will soon be spending TONS to build Pandora to try to keep people there. I wonder if Disney has figured this out, and if any future parks will be full-day at opening...

A lot of interesting stuff here... I think that most of the time, moves that appear stupid are done for really solid business reasons. It's relatively rare that a park does something completely stupid without there being some reasoning... To reply to a few things in particular: If I recall correctly, part of RCCA whole promotion of building the ride was the claim that no one coaster manufacturer would touch it. I think CCI actually had a statement that they wouldn't build rides above a certain height around that time too. My memory may not be perfect, but I remember that exact thing coming up back then. Re: Dark Knights. Yeah, the ride may not have been up to par - I'd argue the ride itself is fine, it's just the theming makes no sense. Someone described it as a "Batman Acid Trip" and that is exactly how it feels. It's intense enough to be a solid *themed* attraction, but once the pre-show is done, what's going on... but enough bagging on it, let's be honest -- basing your big summer ride on what may have just been the largest movie blockbuster ever isn't a bad idea, even if the ride wasn't up to par. Re: Parks buying prototypes that break down a bunch. It's always a risk, but you never know. Often times, manufacturers work with parks to discount the first prototype to get it right, and when you look at the success something like Batman: The Ride had, it's a tempting thing to go with something cheap(er) and one of a kind instead of something established. It's also way easier to market, and marketing is what the game is all about. It's way "cooler" to claim a "first ride with _____" then it is to just say, "Hey, it's a wooden coaster!" While I'm be more interested in that wooden coaster, the general public wants to know they were amongst the first to go on something, or they want to go on the biggest. Re: Mark Shapiro hired with no theme park knowledge. Remember, before they brought Shapiro in, Six Flags had people with theme park knowledge running the parks, and the parks were run absolutely into the ground. Dirty parks, no infastructure improvements, and massive debt were how they were run. There were actually reasons for this, that I could write a much longer post on (someone once told me I should do a "mad money" theme park thing...), but essentially they made it so the parks were absolutely bleeding money. I believe the losses were in the realms of $200 mil + / year, if I remember my stock reports right from back in the day. Shapiro came in and said let's get clean, let's improve infastructure, let's target families, and let's add rides for a few years specifically to try to bolster our image. The parks went bankrupt, but in his tenure he took parks that were bleeding $200 mil + per year and made them essentially break even. The "success" of the chain now and their ability to build big rides again has more to do with bankruptcy wiping out a ton of their debt, and the parks having been improved so drastically during his administration. It may not have been the best for enthusiasts, but it was the best for the chain. Re: Disney has Eisner. At the end, Eisner (or perhaps Eisner's team) started doing some strange stuff, but it's hard to deny the huge success he had for years. MGM was a smash hit, he made huge strides in the Orlando hotels, he forged partnerships with the parks for Star Wars and Indiana Jones, and so on. At the end, yeah - not as hot. But in the beginning, he was amazing. Just on thing I'll toss out there for now... Disney parks after MGM - For what I just said about Eisner, I think MGM taught Disney a bad lesson. They built it as a half-day park, and it was PACKED from the moment it opened. I remember attending that first year when there was little there, but what was there was really amazing and my family and I were okay waiting in line for like two hours to do the entire backlot / backstage tour at once. It was a cool thing. They spent a lot of time slowly expanding the park to meet demand... but, for whatever reason, I think Disney took this idea as anyone who goes to a Disney park will be happy and they can build a lot less when they make them. I think MGM got by because the "studio" tour was SO long (about three hours total I think) that if you waited for a couple hours, it was still worth it. The few other things there -- Indy show, Great Movie Ride -- were pretty impressive too, and took a while. That's all I remember from that trip, but I remember LOVING it. It seems like they took that concept and said, "Cool! We don't need much and people will come!" Animal Kingdom was a half day park at best when it opened, and while it is beautiful there just wasn't much to do. Disney Studios Paris I went to when it opened, and I was ready to go an hour later. It had like 9 attractions, one of which was a parade and one was a shopping zone. The tram tour was okay-ish, Rock N Roller Coaster was what it is, and they had an Armageddon (sp?) thing that was fun, but not repeatable. California Adventure made me feel the same way. They had shoehorned a few things in there, but not enough to be interesting. It seems like Hong Kong was the same way. They could get by without having to "fix" these parks if they built them better to begin with. In particular, DCA looks incredible now and I hope to go back sometime soon. ...fascinating topic overall.

Bingo. I'll also add to this that it shows just how Six Flags does not as a company look far in advance. There seems to be some sort of belief from people that the parks are on a five year plan or a ten year plan or whatever that helps them keep aware of what they are building when. If they knew what they were building for the year that followed, they could put the money aside to start construction on their projects before they actually do. I think it's particularly interesting that they don't really commit to anything until the last possible moment. I have heard it is better under current management, but I know of at least one park under Premier that started getting parts for a ride that they were under the impression they were not getting. Just a few years ago, didn't Great America take delivery of Chang, only for it to be shipped to Six Flags Great Adventure instead? It's an amazing way to run a company, really.

I agree that it doesn't add up. The longer it goes without the park being open, the harder it will be to actually refurb it to opening. It was said that Six Flags didn't put everything in it away properly to begin with, so who knows how much more damage is done every day... Having said that, I think the fair board really deserves the bulk of the blame here. Six Flags was clearly really trying to make a go of it until the end. They were repainting rides, adding small but good capital investments, and what really seemed to be attempting to turn the place around. I think the fair board figured they would always be there, and so it didn't matter if they were a profitable park or not, Six Flags had to listen to them. The park didn't get money for parking and when it was the week of the fair, they had to open their gates and sell rides individually like carnies... while carnies actually set up rides right outside the park to get people to ride too. The fair board said that they had "no idea" this was coming and would have been happy to talk with Six Flags before they pulled out, but they couldn't. Before Six Flags had a legal way to break the contract (bankruptcy), why should the fair board negotiate with Six Flags? They didn't need to give anything up... It's too bad, but I agree. This is all posturing so that when something new goes in the same spot, especially if it is a casino or something else not whole-family-friendly, then they can say that they did, "everything they could" to re-open the park.

I can tell you the reason for at least one of the additions... imagine someone sitting in the front row there. Now, imagine them extending their arms all the way up. Since there was no shoulder restraint keeping your arm down, you could put your arm all the way up. Now, look at the wheels and how far away they are. I had the luck of seeing one of those trains up close before modifications, and a normal proportioned person could sit and reach the wheel. Whoops.

I wonder if there is actually some strategy to it. Like maybe they purposely hold off the opening to try to grab some press in the summer, because they know that Disney / Universal / Knotts will suck up all the press earlier in the year? I don't have any actual knowledge of that, but it seems like they are always so ridiculously "behind" that maybe there is something more going on there than what meets the eye. Then again, this is Magic Mountain we're talking about, so who knows?

Interesting post. Agreed, but it is also worth pointing out there are two schools of thought on doing this. While the AM maintenance inspection is an issue, you can find other parks that pretty much never run one train. The theory behind this is that there are regular maintenance that needs to be done on the trains weekly or whatever it is, and if you run them all all the time, you can keep them on a schedule so that maintenance doesn't have like five trains needing things at the exact same time, and then other times when they don't have anything. Neither theory is wrong. Believe it or not, there was a study too a while back where people want to wait between 10-20 minutes to ride a ride to feel like they got their "money's worth." If everything is walk on, they get through the day quickly and feel like there wasn't enough to do. If everything is really long waits, it wasn't worth it. But hit that middle and suddenly everyone is really happy with their experience. Odd, as I'd rather walk on stuff, but I get it - they don't make parks for me, they make parks to make money.

Zyklon at the now closed Indiana Fun Spot. Take a pretty darn brutal compact coaster, and for some reason add miserable over the shoulder harnesses to it so that at every bad transition you smash your head on the harness. It made Shivering Timbers roughness later that day (and it was pretty darn brutal that year) seem not that bad. I also found both Space Mountain and Indiana Jones at DLP to be completely brutal rides. I feel like a second ride on Space Mountain may have fixed that, but I don't need to do that over. For wood, Shivering Timbers was bad and Son of Beast was really bad. Shivering Timbers you could at least tell had some real possibility to be awesome, and I heard it got retracked since I've been on it and it is again, but that year was rough. I also didn't ride Mega Zeph a second time when it was a walk on during my visit to SFNO because it was so rough. Sad, that thing looked awesome.

I got my plaque today... First off, I thought it was expensive, but after a lot of thinking about it, I decided it was one of those things that I knew that if I got, it would always remind me of the time that I rode it on the super fun trip where it was the highlight that I described a few pages back, and if I didn't I would probably watch eBay or whatever constantly to get one in the future. I then found they were being limited to just 250, so I felt even more compelled... I still think the ride experience sucked, but that wasn't why I had positive memories of the ride. I'm surprised by the actual plaque. It's much bigger than it appeared to be in pictures, with the piece of track probably around 1' by 1' in size. The track is also mounted about a half inch off the plaque itself, which makes it look really quite nice. The pictures seem to be printed on a printer, but look rather nice unless you look at them from an inch away when the one of the ride looks a little low res. It also came with a certificate of authenticity, which was wholly unnecessary - who is really going to try faking this? - but kind of nifty too. The only negative is the bottom right part of mine has a sort of scratch / gouge, but after originally thinking about returning it I figured it gives it character. Number is 210 / 250. I'll try to take a picture of it sometime and post it. I'm rather happy with it overall, and it will happily go with the other random ride parts that I've acquired throughout the years.

Are you basing that on CCI designs too? If not, I'm just curious what of theirs isn't holding up. Admittedly, I have been on only the Zippin Pippin rebuild, but that thing was an amazing surprise. I was under the impression from others that basically everything *except* Hades of theirs has been holding up pretty well, but I make no claims to being right on that.

I don't know if I even consider myself an "enthusiast" any more. I haven't been on a real coaster in over a year and I haven't felt tons of withdrawl or anything. I was never good at "counting" my credits. I tried once, figured out it was north of 150, and then realized that I didn't care. My goal for going to parks is having fun. To that extent, I've been in the position to be to a few parks that weren't even open, and I can honestly say that my visits to them were equal to if not better than parks that I have been at that were open. Having said all that, while a long time ago decided that I was done riding rides that I knew that I wouldn't like - either because I would get sick or whatever... spinning mice I'm lookin' at you - I also will hop on them when I get a chance. Try to ride Cobra at SFDK in the front, and it's a blast. I couldn't stop laughing. Go downhilll slowly, and then rocket back up the hill because the train is SO long everything works backward. Stuff like that is what I remember the most from visiting these parks - for me, it's the experience of being at the park and having fun doing different stuff. I've also now got a little one, and while he has only been on one "coaster" yet - a Dragon Wagon at a local church thing, something I don't even consider a coaster - and he had a blast, I'm sure that as I start getting back to some places in the near future, I'm going to have more spectacular memories on these small things.

Hey... I said that I liked it a few pages back. But I also admitted that I liked it because of the special memories that I had of the trip that I went on with buddies where it was basically the highlight of the trip, and from what I understand it didn't run decently past that first day. And, when I rode it again the following year, it was a piece of crap and one that I never needed to ride again. So yeah, I liked it. But I'm a realist too.

I think it is because sadly, while this thing looked awesome it's hard to escape the fact that it rarely had anyone on it. Add to that the weird ownership stuff - since it wasn't actually *part* of Boomers, they had no reason to try to upsell it and get more people on it, and I'm just guessing people don't really know about it. It seems like everyone rode the Big Dipper or at least went to that park, and the Jersey Shore ones were on the news so everyone knows about them, but unless you know about the ride which it seems that most people don't, no one has heard of this one. It was a different era though when someone could get funding to build an awesome, giant roller coaster next to a (from what I have seen) sort of decent FEC. Who would give you money for this today?

B:TR at Great America. It was 94 I think, and I had been terrified of looping coasters. I skipped some that I wished I had gone on, and finally someone convinced me to go on Batman. We were with a group, and decided to get in line really late shortly before the park closed so we wouldn't waste their time, just my dad and I. The ride broke down as we got in line, but we were told we could stay and they would do their best to fix it. The wait was getting long, and I was getting nervous, so I made a deal with my dad that we would leave in 15 minutes if it didn't get going. The park was long closed by this point. Just over 14 and a half minutes later (I was totally watching the time), the ride started again. I was terrified. I got up to the station, and we got somewhere in the middle. When we got back, they offered us to ride again if we wanted. My dad said let's go, and I said no way and buckled back into the ride for another go around. I got off it and thought I was going to hurl, but thought it was amazing. Even though I had been to a bunch of parks before that point, that ride and experience single-handedly is what got me so fascinated with the amusement park industry

Neat to see how different everyone's tastes are. Unpleasant Superman (SFMM) - I had this ride built up since the moment it opened, but never got to actually ride it at MM until a few years ago. It looks so intimidating and sounds so intimidating that I was floored that the experience was so... anti-climatic. It wasn't a bad ride, it just wasn't 1/10th what I thought it would be. Pleasant Raven - This thing was built up for me by a few friends SO much that by the time that I arrived, I though it would never get close to the overblown expectations I had of it. I thought it exceeded them.

Wood - Son of Beast Steel - Superman (SFMM)

The issue with doing anything with SOB from the very beginning is that the redesigns that have been done of the couple rides to make them different use the same basic structure... and therein lies the problem. Son of Beast doesn't... er, didn't really have much more that you could have done. The structure of the ride is SO big already and honestly so dull that there really isn't much that you could do to liven it up. The points when it could have actually done something different - like the lead up to the loop - it was going back through the structure and would have required ridiculous changes to the ride.

Agree with everyone hear who says that the parks that have the resources to build a hypercoaster are generally the ones that won't shut down, but a little bit of information that may be relevant... - As others have mentioned, Six Flags went bankrupt. The reason that it didn't close all it's parks was, when you stripped away what they were paying in bank fees, they made enough to be worth more as operating amusement parks then they did as vacant land. The parks that closed did so because they weren't generating enough money for whomever was the owner. - While parks that have hypercoasters do tend to be the more successful parks, I can tell you that just because you build a hypercoaster it is no guarantee of long term success. For one example, a park that I know of built a hyper one year, and had a good attendance year, although it really didn't increase much from the year before. The following year, they decided not to do anything major, and had the largest year to year attendance drop in the history of the park. The presence of the hyper was not enough to draw the same crowd in it's second year even. As for the question of which rides do parks need to be successful, there really is no rule at all. I think that success has to do with having both a variety of things to do, and a critical mass of 'stuff' for people to want to do while they are at a park. Too little, and lines will be really long and not worth it. Too much, and you'll be paying people to staff and maintain things that aren't getting used and people won't stay long because they'll get through what they want quickly. The too little way will guarantee you people won't come back, and the too much way will make it so they don't spend any money in the park, both of which can sink a park. i think the main thing when adding any new attraction to a park is that it has to be marketable. What the means exactly is more open to interpretation, as a good marketing team can make something small and simple seem amazing, but if you can sell people on WHY they want to come, then you can get them to come. It's a tough industry. Building a hyper isn't the answer.

I just saw this thread - woot for stopping by this site for the first time in like three years over the last few days - and I wanted to glance at the pics in this thread since the coaster seems to have become the poster child for the storm, and in a lot of ways encapsulates the damage in a way that other pics or just hearing the death tole doesn't. It's surreal. I'll also toss in this two cents about the rebuilding process / insurance stuff - The issue that the piers may have in rebuilding is that insurance is usually not for the full cost to rebuild, it's usually for something like the depreciated value. That was a big part of Six Flags not rebuilding SFNO after the storm - they got the 'current value' of a lot of the assets, not the 'cost to rebuild' back. And, since the park wasn't doing so hot, it made more sense for them to take the lease lawsuit hit and send off the parts they could then it was to invest more money in rebuilding. I expect the same thing will happen here, but without the lawsuits thanks to the land lease. The piers that were doing great business and were run right will be back up and running surprisingly quickly, and the ones that weren't doing so hot will have the owners take the money and do something else with it instead. On a positive note, that picture of the coaster in the water I think will drive a TON of media attention to these piers if they re-open. They replace that Star Jet with the Zyklon from Fun Spot in Indiana and I'm sure they could get national coverage for the "new roller coaster opening for the one that fell in the ocean." If they are smart, just like the rest of the businesses and stuff like that, it's a temporary set back that will hopefully give them a great basis to build something even better for the future. I am much more saddened by the loss of life then the loss of any amusement ride.

Someone else can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that what happened was that Dubai was seen as this big worldwide tourism spot that was going to just expand like crazy and everyone would go there, and they started building all this crazy stuff, and then the worldwide economy basically stalled and the attractions that opened didn't really get anyone there. Universal, Six Flags, Paramount and Legoland, amongst others all announced plans to build parks. I think that the Ferrari park is a victim of having actually gone forward enough to get some stuff open. The whole Dubailand idea was a pretty strange one. They had plans to build like 15 or so theme parks. With *that* much competition, I don't know there would have ever been enough tourism to keep the doors open on even half of those parks. Dubai was hoping for 15 million. By contrast, it's supposed to be about 50 million that go to Orlando, and that area supports 8 big parks (including Disney's two water parks). The only thing that this park beyond a really special ride is that the others didn't happen, but it's theme does it no favors for repeat visits of locals. It was clearly built to entice tourists to stop there once, and since Dubai hasn't been getting those tourists, well... I hope them the best. I'm amazed that this park actually made it off the ground, and I think that the wacky theme to it makes it really unique. Something tells me though that unless I get really lucky, I won't visit Formula Rossa unless it happens to move somewhere else for some reason.

I've always wondered with Moonsault exactly how much of that was used, and if it was the height of the track or the height of the spires at the front of the ride. It had a max top listed speed of 55.9 MPH, which based on other coasters means theoretically is only is using 150 or so feet of that height. Obviously, with the monster Gs it was pulling, there was a reason they wouldn't have gone higher. And I don't know exactly how I'd count Daidarasaurus, wince it was a racing coaster that got modified to go around twice. I guess it's longer, but it just feels like cheating. Totally forgot about Hypersonic (and that I could have done that search on RCDB too, thanks!)... Personally, that giant swooping left hand turn was one of the things that I really loved about the ride. It gave you a moment before the ride essentially disappeared to see the train swooping above head, and it gave riders a chance to realize that they were really high up in the air on a wooden ride before that first plunge. Too bad that right after that point was where it started hurting so bad.

Thanks for the DT pics. I know I'm weird, but that is one of my favorite CP rides, and I'm very sad to see it go. I haven't visited it in a decade, but I did visit it earlier in it's life... I really think they sent someone to Star Tours queue who took pictures of it, and then built the same thing without the Star Wars characters at a fraction of the price. I can't tell if it was at all there still in your pictures, but they had the same baskets of random robot parts floating above your head from place to place. The difference is that the theme was more of robot incompetence than Star Tours - In Disney rides, you tend to get in and then "something goes horribly wrong" whereas with Disaster Transport, you knew this was a bad idea to begin with. I wish I had the foresight to have taken pictures. Of the five or six times that I rode it, *everything* in that theming was always very spotty, so it may have been even cooler in 1985... but I do remember the robots.