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Photos: Hollywood Dreams Parade Check out the rest of the photos here: http://dejiki.com/2012/01/hollywood-dreams-parade/

It started off from the story on WSJ about WWoHP being built in USH. Here's a similar story: http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Lifestyle/Story/STIStory_740436.html

I was at the Transformers: The Ride Press Conference just now (which was a closed event at Sci-Fi City, in the park!). Michael Bay, Thierry Coup and John Hallenbeck were at the session. While there were the usual "Which is your favourite scene in the ride? What would you do differently? Do you like thrilling rides, Mr Bay? Is there Transformers 4?" sort of questions, Coup has confirmed that both rides in USH and USS are identical once the ride experience begins in the ride building - the only difference would be the exterior (which we all know what's going on at USH) and of course, things like the chinese instructions/subtitles for pre-show videos in Singapore. Coup has also confirmed that there are no plans to build a Wizarding World of Harry Potter zone at USS, despite recent rumours.

While there aren't much "physically moving" effects ala Spider-man, they used more lighting effects instead (e.g: when Megatron fires his missile, a moving blue "glow" is projected onto the ceiling and walls in front of the 3D screen, as if the "missile" is actually casting that glow, producing that illusion that it is flying towards riders). The first scene, actually has a lot of little LEDs scattered over the walls, which are supposed to "flash" as bullets ricochet off them - unfortunately they don't work yet. They also had lights on the catwalk (which the Ravage jumps onto) that flashes in sync to produce the illusion of the robot running on it. I was expecting it to "drop" a little, maybe it was supposed to, or maybe not. I need to go on the ride more often to discover more.

Hi rockysam! Nice to hear from you! Well, I've seen many people who tried to use all sorts of ways to gain entry - some insisted that their 1-day passes and universal express passes were "annual passes" - made a racket when denied entry. The other sort is of course, frustrated parents - angry as they couldn't bring their (crying) kids in. The park crew "guarding" the entrance probably had the worst assignment last weekend; they had to be stoic bouncers for the entire day, and yet stay chipper for passholders. Greg/Bigbear told me that someone actually offered him S$50 to borrow his annual pass. I hope has new plans to control traffic at Sci-Fi City. It was swamped last week during Transformers' technical rehearsals, with many large clusters of people sitting randomly on the street.

In my first ride-through, no. I was focused on the projections - the elevators are hard to notice. As for its speed, I would say that it's like a normal lift? It doesn't go very fast, and other than transporting the ride vehicle, it also carries those expensive HD projectors, which moves up/down with the ride vehicle.

Annual Passholders' Preview is now happening. The ride is closed to regular park guests - and they are all - of course, furious! It was a weekday so most of the ride vehicles were rarely filled to half load, I even had the whole vehicle for myself a few times. Lots of empty EVACs running around the building today.

New Parade show! Hollywood Dreams Resorts World Sentosa announced today that Universal Studios Singapore will launch Hollywood Dreams, the park's first full-scale parade, on New Year's Eve. Before Hollywood Dreams, the park did not have a parade show, except for the one-off "Grand Procession" during the park's grand opening ceremony this year, which was about 15 minutes long.

Yes, there's a lot of wind effects, especially for the street chase scenes, the "drop" and of course, scenes involving the Devastator.

Okay, I've settled down and went through my photos, notes etc. Let me say (again) that it's the most fantastic ride available in USS right now (and possibly Asia?). It takes all the technology from Spiderman and updates several features. The ride programming is obviously different (my personal favourite was flying through Devastator, the ride vehicle becomes some sort of gattling gun there) and the trickery with the elevators was impressively smooth. Scene-by-scene description and everything available here: http://dejiki.com/2011/11/transformers-the-ride If you guys have any questions, just shoot!

^ That's right. I had this feeling that it might open today (they raised the park prices by S$2 today - it can't be just an coincidence??), so I just took a chance - and MY GOD it's open. Started texting all my fellow passholders! Today was a peak day, wait-time was about 30-60 minutes. Single rider and Universal Express is NOT available. Annual Passholders use the Express line. Anyway, here's the short version (long version : http://dejiki.com/2011/11/transformers-the-ride/): - Vehicles are physically similar to Spiderman, with some Transformer logos here and there and a crazy paint job outside. - HUGE screens (several parabolic) and projections are AMAZINGLY clear (except for one screen, strangely). - Transitions between scenes and projections are very seamless. - There are scenes where a lot of action is going on, such as racing on the streets for quite a distance, when the car isn't moving on the track at all (the illusion of movement is very well done there) - NO animatronics of the robots. In fact I don't even see anything that passes as an animated prop. - What happens on the projection screens does not really "affect" the real props (there's some scenes in Spiderman that does this, the ladder is one of them, i think?) - Effects include: Strobe lighting, fog, wind, water and hot air (yes, no flames.) - There are two scenes that use 2-storey high projection screens - yep, they are the elevator scenes. - No on-ride photo op (just saying, because Spiderman had it) BUT.. I would say that this is Spiderman 2.0... with robots. It's essentially a lot of scenes where you experience a battle of sorts (and get involved), then move on to the next. It's an amazing experience nonetheless. I've taken the ride many times (shan't say the real number here - it's MORE than what anyone should ride - but I totally underestimated myself today) and there were no breakdowns. Some of the fog effects were missing during some ride throughs, but otherwise it was very stable. Full details: see my post below!

For those who want to read a ride-through (spoiler-filled!!) description of the ride, head over here: http://www.tfw2005.com/transformers-news/transformers-movie-toys--products-30/first-hand-impression-of-transformers-the-ride-173771/

DRUM ROLL PLEASE. Transformers: The Ride - Annual Passholders' Previews! I just got word that Transformers will be open to Annual Passholders in a WEEK!! The ride will soft open for Annual Passholders on 25th and 26th November, and will be operating during normal park hours (which is 10am~9am). Not sure if other guests will be able to ride. Unlike the previous Annual Passholder Previews, registration is not required. That probably means there won't be freebies anymore. :\ Edit: Official EDM from RWS: Discounts! Superstar pass holders get to enjoy 35%# off KT's Grill™, Hollywood China Bistro™, Starbot Cafe and Celebrity Cafe & Bakery™ on the 25th and 26th November 2011. Fun pass and Action pass holders get to enjoy 20%# off KT's Grill™, Hollywood China Bistro™, Starbot Cafe and Celebrity Cafe & Bakery™ on the 25th and 26th November 2011. # Excluding alcohol and souvenir items

^ That looks very impressive. Bumblebee wasn't even on the marquee last night! Now the life-sized EVAC figure (located opposite this street) won't feel so lonely at Sci-Fi City! Edit: NEW teaser clip!

The ride was open for team members tonight. As expected, the ride vehicle has the same capacity as Spiderman (12 guests, 4 per row) and the 3D glasses (same style as Shrek 4D) are blue (like most of the lighting in the new parts of Sci-Fi City ).

All the toys I've seen so far are mostly tie-in products for "Dark of the Moon". I read somewhere that the EVAC toy will be launched in 2012. Or I might have missed it.

BSG is having a lot of trouble today, with both sides taking turns to break down. That particular problem on Human track has returned: where the brakes on the lift hill suddenly engage during a launch. There was some other issue on the Cylon side which had crew members checking the wheels with a flashlight. Anyway, many photos from the park today: Christmas decor and the Transformers Supply Vault. Some are similar to what has already been posted. The REAL vault is here.. If anyone's interested to see more, head to my photo post here: http://dejiki.com/2011/11/uss-update-nov11/

TRANSFORMERS TO OPEN ON 3RD DECEMBER 2011 http://tftheride.rwsentosablog.com/2011/10/27/breaking-news-transformers-the-ride-premieres-at-universal-studios-singapore%C2%AE-on-3-december-2011-2/

The park has really focused on the overall feel of the scare zone (for New York and Hollywood especially) - New York was really "post-apocalyptic", totally chaotic and noisy: those wrecked cars are not just sitting around there, the car alarms were on overdrive. Plus it's very hard to walk around because of the crazy amount of fog and there were a lot of props and straw strewn all over the streets. Hollywood, being Carn-Evil, was disorientating and like a surreal nightmare - crazy music and crazier characters. The fact that both zones are sheltered kept most of the fog in and also allowed for A LOT of dramatic lighting.

I'm glad to say that the event was GREAT! Halloween Horror Nights - Trip report and photos http://dejiki.com/2011/10/halloween-horror-nights/

Halloween Horror Nights: Pre-event Photos http://dejiki.com/2011/10/hhn-before/ The park has transformed very nicely now for Halloween. Sting Alley (aka The Pestilence) is not a free-roam scare zone, but with limited capacity (and hence, even offers Universal Express). After all, it's located at the New York Harbour area which isn't especially spacious, even if all the props are taken away.

Updates from the park: October 2011 Mainly about new construction, HHN installations, new stalls and merch. Full trip report here: http://dejiki.com/2011/10/uss-update-oct11/

Halloween Horror Nights - There will be six scare zones, covering Hollywood, New York, Sci-Fi City and Ancient Egypt. - The one at New York zone's Water Street is called STING ALLEY, like the US parks. Promotion of Annual Passholders: In case anyone's interested, there are usually two more other large-scale events in Singapore: One held at the Singapore Zoo's Night Safari and the other at the other side of Sentosa Island. Last week, the Night Safari announced that they are cancelling their event though. That will give the other two a good boost.

They've only said by end of the year. From the way things have been done in RWS.. a firm date will only surface about 2-4 weeks before an official opening. Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure While it has been known in some circles for quite a while, RWS has just announced that Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure will be closed from 10 August 2011. It will reopen in 2012 with the second lift (for the final drop segment) working, thus increasing capacity for the ride. The ride always had two drop lanes but it seems that only one lift was actually works (or even installed). There has always been a stockpile of new boats, hidden in between the Mummy ride building and Jurassic Park Rapids loading building, left unused for over a year, so with increased capacity they could finally tumble about at the rapids next year. No other enhancements were announced, although personally I hope that they bring back "Dinosaur Proximity Alarm" in the center of each boat which flashes when the T-Rex first appears in the indoor segment. I'm surprised that the park finally decided to do this barely 3 months after grand opening. I mean, the park had a rather long soft opening period. Meanwhile, for those BSG fans out there, the second train for BSG:Human has went missing in the recent weeks - I hope it's the faulty train getting fixed - the one that kept engaging the brakes on the launch track!

Transformers Construction An area at Sci-Fi City has been blocked off to build the entrance to the Transformers ride.