CedarFlags

Saw the POV and the views are spectacular but holy moly this ride is SHORT. From cresting the lift to hitting the brakes, it's about the same length as Kingda Ka or SFMM's Superman.

The orangey-yellow replaced the green. Unclear if it's going to get a new color scheme as part of the renovation.

Anybody got the scoop on promo filming? I remember there was an open call for riders when Twisted Colossus was new, but with these small 12 person trains, I wonder if they'll bother finding outside help.

Reading the last few pages of this thread, plus also seeing the new El Toro Ryan video about Millennium Force I just have to say.. What. the HELL. is happening to Cedar Point? This park was the gold standard of ops and efficiency for years. Did somebody important leave the company and get replaced by 2 kids in a trench coat?

I just really hope they get this thing built quickly, and I get to ride it before Texas makes it illegal to be gay again.

"It's All Coming Back to Me Now" has lately been coming back to me now. This song is a banger and that's that.

Xcelerator at Knott's has been down since February, and Top Thrill Dragster didn't open at all this season.

Waiting on parts from Intamin seems to be all the rage right now... It's insane how slow their process is.

I noticed a lot of landscaping and foliage around the ride in the animated POV... what do we think the odds are of any of that actually happening?

Wow, I was NOT expecting that!!!

Do the projections in JL seem brighter now without the 3D? That was always an issue for me... it was all just so dim I could barely see anything. And the animation is also a mess. It's like they couldn't decide if they wanted cartoon or live action, so they met in the middle and made it uncanny valley.

Inspired by multiple comments on the article being shared...

So glad that Lex is finally back open. Controversial opinion... I think Lex is the best attraction idea that Magic Mountain has had in decades. With the removal of Freefall, the park had a drop tower sized hole in its flat ride lineup. For a very small investment, the park filled that hole with a successor that upped the thrills, broke a world record (SHATTERED the American record), and thematically tied in to an existing attraction. It's a win all around.

Not surprised by either announcement tbh. Also, this is the same thing happened to Xcel in 2017/2018, and the same thing that happened to Hangtime last year. Knott's really needs to figure out a way to stock some more replacement pieces rather than having rides be down for months on end because they need stuff shipped from Intamin/Gerstlauer.

Fantastic news: work has resumed on Primordial and there's been really significant progress. The future of this ride was looking bleak for a little while, so I'm really glad to see this.

Ya, I think 2 months is the absolute soonest we could expect. There's gotta be electrical work, station & queue work, testing, marketing, employee training... and that's assuming that literally nothing goes wrong from here on out. So maybe mid-late September is realistic. Right after the big yearly sale on passes & memberships that usually happens on Labor Day.

If you can get there early, Sundays are usually pretty chill until about 12/1p (families have church & chores, kids want to sleep in, etc). Because the park is SO big and has SO many attractions, it's really hard to make a definitive game plan. It really comes down to which rides you care the most about experiencing. But here are some things to consider: Full Throttle has very low capacity and is the first coaster guests encounter, so that line gets long and stays long. So if you get there early, hit that one first and call it done. X2 , West Coast Racers, Tatsu, and Superman are also low capacity. WCR also has a lot of downtime. Ninja's capacity shouldn't be a problem but the last few times I've visited, the ROs were sloooow. The Twisted Colossus line can get long but it moves consistently. Fastest ops in the park, but it's an RMC so it's very popular. Goliath, Viper, Scream, Gold Rusher, and Riddler are also decent capacity. If you get the mid-tier Flash Pass, you can make a reservation for one of the low capacity rides while you wait in line for one of the better capacity rides and it'll probably be ready when you get finished. And then just repeat that cycle for the day. I don't think crowds will be crazy enough to warrant shelling out the insane price for Platinum. Unless you're hell-bent on getting every single credit in one day.

Usually (not always, but most of the time).... the park will have two designations in terms. "Temporarily closed" means that the ride went down for some reason but it supposed to be open. "Closed" means that it's not being offered at all. So if it was showing as temp, then that should mean it's not on any kind of extended closure. (Fun fact: they started doing this a few years ago on the app, after I sent an email to Guest Relations expressing some frustration that there was no way for guests to tell the difference. So sometimes parks DO actually listen and take suggestions!)

the daytime will be pretty slow on a Thursday or Friday in October, should have no trouble getting on rides. Thursdays are also the lightest crowd days for Scary Farm, but they do pick up a bit as you get closer to Halloween. One downside is that you do have to exit and re-enter the park, even if you have a ticket for both.

I'm just thinking even San Diego's Manta. It doesn't have a lot, but it has SOMETHING.

I was always under the impression that the city had a HARD no rule about stuff involving the public roads. That's why we've never seen anything try to expand west into the grassy overflow parking lot. But maybe tunneling technology has improved to the point where it doesn't have to disrupt regular traffic on Beach?

I just watched another Emperor POV and I'm mad all over again. Who the heck decided that the ride experience for the penguin coaster was going to be "zooming around a giant pile of gravel"? Just a little bit of theming work would have made such a strong impact. Some rock work with "snow" like on the walls of their animal habitats, and a little water feature (maybe at the bottom of the drop, so you dive into it). Hell, even just making some of the gravel blue to suggest the idea of water. It's such a massive downgrade in presentation from what we've seen Sea World be capable of.

This is getting out of hand...

I've always been more partial to Knott's because HHN is entirely dependent on if I happen to care about the movies they picked that year (and i usually don't). Also I get very tired of the HHN formula (open door, push button, loud noise, close door, repeat), Knott's feels more immersive and creative to me. The crowds at HHN used be way worse but Knott's was jam packed last year too, so it might be a toss up now... though Sunday early in the season shouldn't be too bad. If you want to do HHN but also go on some rides, you should check out the Day/Night combo ticket. It lets you into the park starting at 2:00, so you can catch some rides and a Water World show and then already be inside the park once the mazes open. Also, if you're looking for a haunted attraction in the LA area that's not an all night commitment, check out Reign of Terror. It's a bit of a drive (Thousand Oaks) but I cannot recommend it highly enough. It's a stand alone independent haunt that is EVERY BIT as good as the mazes at the theme parks.

Trip Report from last weekend. TL:DR - First visit, very impressed. Visually beautiful, great coaster collection, solid operations. This park is extremely slept on. And the coasters... they ALL slap. This was the shocker for me. My home Six Flags park is Magic Mountain, and even though it has 20 coasters, it doesn't have 20 good coasters. I skip half the park every time I visit. There are NO skips at Great America. The closest thing to a skip for me would be Demon, but that's literally it. Everything else is so good. Missed out on Maxx Force, Joker, and the red side of American Eagle. Ride Highlights: Batman - My dearest love. The OG. Loved experiencing it over real landscaping instead of gravel and asphalt. Also the ride ops were KILLING. I've never seen another Batman clone ever dispatch without stacking. I didn't even think it was possible. Raging Bull - I have to admit, I was a hater based just on videos and my general "meh" ideas on B&M hypers. But this is a good one. It's not god-tier for me, but it's definitely solid and fun. Getting absolutely YEETED off the first drop from the back row... amazing. Also blazing fast ride ops and dispatches on this, so the line moved very consistently. Magic Mountain could NEVER. Goliath - It's funky but I liked it. I definitely understand why RMC aficionados don't rank this higher, but it's one of those situations where... even a low-tier RMC is still objectively a great coaster. X-Flight - Surprise hit of the trip for me. I've only been on one other B&M wing coaster (Gatekeeper) and I didn't care for it. But X-Flight seemed much less rattly and the pacing is also waaay quicker. The turns above the water and the roll through the building are great. Downside was one-train ops. That line was pretty slow. American Eagle - Only got to ride Blue, I've heard that Red is the crazier side. But even still, super fun. I love the feeling of gaining more speed as you go down the helix and it starts to feel more out of control. And it's not really all that rough. Viper - Absolutely slaps, especially in the front. Definitely a sleeper hit. Whizzer - Being inches away from the ground on those turns was super exciting.