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Six Flags Darien Lake (SFDL) Discussion Thread


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Does the lighting package on SkyScreamer move, change, scroll, etc, or it stays in the same configuration. It doesn't matter, I am just asking. In my opinion, Darien Lake has beat Canada's Wonderland this year. Wonderland does not have anything close to as beautiful as this. If they could put a lighting package on the giant wheel like this it would be amazing. Congratulations, Six Flags Darien Lake. Darien Lake has been beating Wonderland in some areas for many years now. The theatre show is far superior to any show at Wonderland. Wonderland's theatre show is a cirque show that has not changed for over 10 years now, very boring. A nice 30 minutes of sleep time. Also Wonderland has StarLight spectacular. It is a nice dancing waters show along main street, but it really could be so much more. Seen it once, seen it twice. Most people just keep walking by and there are too many trees to really see it good. I could watch Darien Lake's laser show every night of the season.

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Does the lighting package on SkyScreamer move, change, scroll, etc, or it stays in the same configuration. It doesn't matter, I am just asking. In my opinion, Darien Lake has beat Canada's Wonderland this year.

 

One park built the tallest, fastest and longest dive coaster in the world that dives through a lake and Winterfest and one park bought a starflyer. Darien Lake doesn’t care about “beating” Wonderland, so it doesn’t matter anyway, but very few people will agree with you.

 

Wonderland does not have anything close to as beautiful as this.

 

You mean other than a very similar ride with a better lighting package?

Starflyers are better rides, but Windseeker wins in the lighting department

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Went to the park briefly today. My 2 free cut the lines turned into 4 because the guy was feeling generous (thank you!) -- since there weren't many crowds I'll save them for later in the season.

 

Rode Predator in the back and thought I'd die but honestly it wasn't a bad ride at all and my back wasn't hurting or anything. It was pretty fun.

 

Ride of Steel seemed way shakier than the normal shuffling.

 

I didn't see skyscreamer run at all.

 

The "home made" pizza slices at timber ridge was nasty... I think the personal pan from last year's review was somehow better. Just... No.

 

Fascination was fun for a few rounds.

 

Grabbed a fresh squeezed lemonade as a snack.

 

Was a short day but despite the park looking pretty full from the lot, everyone must have been in the water park.

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^ yesterday (June 8) SkyScreamer was indeed up and running. We rode it a couple times in the early afternoon and in the evening around laser show time.

 

As for lighting package, it has several different sequences but it’s been only doing the rainbow gradient for the past week-ish. I assume for pride. Why else would they stick to one pattern? (Guess we shall see when July rolls around )

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For anybody still for some reason curious about the music situation, no music whatsoever today in the park.

 

Mind Eraser train 2 in the same state as seen last week in the photos posted.

 

Blast off car fully on the track with power running to the ride again.

 

Shipwreck bridge has posts installed now, can’t be too much longer.

 

Other than that, nothing really noteable going on at the park.

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Short trip report for Darien Lake, this was primarily a trip for a 3 year old though.

 

The good: it seems like there is a fresh top coat of asphalt everywhere. the kid area is good for a 3 year old, not too large or intimidating. Moose on the Loose is an odd gem. I don't know why I love it, but I do. I snuck in a ride on Viper while my daughter was riding with her grandma; for how old it is it ran very well and smoothly today, only one sharp yank.

 

The bad: it was hot so everything smelled like fresh asphalt. The Moose on the Loose line is super slow due to terrible capacity. Most things need a fresh coat of paint. It didn't really bother me and I probably only noticed it because of this thread, but there wasn't any atmosphere music in the park and it was a little odd.

 

Best part of my day: my daughter rode Hoot and Holler a bunch of times and loved it. It was a lot of fun watching her on it. She has a coaster credit now that I'll never be able to get (54” Maximum height)

 

Overall we had a very nice day. The most important thing to keep in mind when heading to the park is keeping your expectations in the right place. I told someone before I left for the park, think Geagua Lake (circa 2000) not Busch Gardens or Cedar Point. If you keep your expectations in check you can have a really nice day here.

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For anybody still for some reason curious about the music situation, no music whatsoever today in the park.

 

Mind Eraser train 2 in the same state as seen last week in the photos posted.

 

Blast off car fully on the track with power running to the ride again.

 

Shipwreck bridge has posts installed now, can’t be too much longer.

 

Other than that, nothing really noteable going on at the park.

 

I would audibly laugh if I got to the park and they had music BLASTING because of the few enthusiasts complaining its "too quiet". Especially if that's why the system was off.

 

For all we know they could have (and very likely do have) quite dated infrastructure and it probably needs quite the boost to get to a more modern and reliable point.

 

Back when I worked at Wegmans, they had a really nice sound system installed throughout the entire building that broke completely within a couple years use. That was indoors in a controlled climate building. They then resorted to a boom-box type set up near the produce and prepared foods section of the store, whilst using two sound bars (independently controlled with iPads mind you) for sound on front end and back where I was in grocery.

 

Sound systems aren't always easy to work with and sometimes the easier and cheaper answer that most places go with unfortunately end up being the go to more often than not. If you look at the state of most all of the physical outputs in the park, they're in terrible condition and its amazing that most of them still work at all. Though I'm still shocked people are that interested about it, as a sound guy (in the theatre world at least - I wear many hats) I'm not at all surprised they're having issues, and neither should anyone else.

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Wonderland does not have anything close to as beautiful as this.

 

You mean other than a very similar ride with a better lighting package?

Starflyers are better rides, but Windseeker wins in the lighting department

 

Honestly I prefer the SkyScreamer lighting package where the entire tower lights up, but I do understand the appeal of the Windseeker style where the swings themselves are beautified. I also have to admit the lighting effects I've seen on Windseeker models seem to out-perform the few I saw at SFDL but that could also be the person programming these towers more than it is the capability of them. (Do the manufacturers of these things program the lights? I'm not so sure they do. Maybe they have like a default set up - but parks can reprogram a-la Cedar Point's Giant Wheel? If that's the case I wonder if they're hiring... Darien Lake if you're listening give me a call)

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Does the lighting package on SkyScreamer move, change, scroll, etc, or it stays in the same configuration. It doesn't matter, I am just asking. In my opinion, Darien Lake has beat Canada's Wonderland this year.

 

One park built the tallest, fastest and longest dive coaster in the world that dives through a lake and Winterfest and one park bought a starflyer. Darien Lake doesn’t care about “beating” Wonderland, so it doesn’t matter anyway, but very few people will agree with you.

 

Wonderland does not have anything close to as beautiful as this.

 

You mean other than a very similar ride with a better lighting package?

Starflyers are better rides, but Windseeker wins in the lighting department

 

Windseeker has projection lights for the tower, SkyScreamer has LED along the entire tower. (Completely different system, Bill.) In all fairness, I have not yet seen Yukon Striker at night, but visually speaking at night time, the Vortex/Yukon Striker area is not lit up very well at night time. Darien Lake beats Wonderland in this department. They always have. Now if only they put new light-weight LED on the ferris wheel.

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^ goodness I hope you mean RGB Flood lights not projection lights... not to get picky here but projection lights as they are never referred to are usually what parks use for gobo projections on surfaces (if they for some reason decide to not use a Source Four like a normal human being would). See Cedar Point’s main midway at night, the Disney villain’s after hours event had a bunch of those and Darien Lake specifically used a handful of them for Fright Fest last season.

 

/ end theatre tech “rant”

 

MORE IMPORTANTLY: how in the ever living Hell does Darien Lake beat Canada’s Wonderland in the lighting department? Last I checked Darien Lake doesn’t have projection mapping on a big mountain dead center of the park with multicolored water fountain effects along its entryway, nor does it have lights on most any of its attractions. Ride of Steel’s lighting is poor at best, viper doesn’t have anything anymore, Mind Eraser is shotty, Tantrum has what, one or two white floods on it? NONE of their coasters have any show stopping lighting element. Darien Lake has SkyScreamer (which you know is brand new this year) and Rolling Thunder. Everything else has either NOTHING, White Floods (though you can’t even guarantee they all work anyway), or old dated lights that don’t work properly. Take it from a guy who knows a TON about theatrical and architectural lighting and is almost always looking too far into the capabilities of lighting infrastructure- Darien Lake in no way comes even close to topping wonderland’s lighting. Two Intelligent LED lit rides compared to a full arsenal of attractions that have their own awesome lighting packages (soaring timbers, windseeker, skyhawk, lumberjack, Yukon striker I’d assume, even Behemoth has a red chase going up its lift hill for God’s sake, and all their rides with well maintained classic packages like knight mares, shockwave, the interior lighting of Thunder Run and more that I don’t care to list out) prove DL is WAY behind. Especially with their big giant wheel that puts most park Ferris wheels to shame is dark at night. How this translates to Darien Lake winning is beyond me.

 

In my opinion there’s only three things that Darien Lake “wins”

 

1. Night time show - Ignite the Night has lasers, fireworks and so many other special effects that can’t be beat by projection mapping and water effects (even if I enjoy both)

2. Crowd levels - I’ll take a 10 minute wait over an hour wait any day.

3. Proximity to my house - 30-45 minutes is much better than 1.5-2 hours

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SFDL loses on not replacing the Giant Wheel lights alone. Back in the day when ROS had the floods and the smoke it looked intimidating at night, but Steve is right... nothing at DL is lit like it should be.

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^ goodness I hope you mean RGB Flood lights not projection lights...

 

Projection lights as in flood lights at the top of the tower projecting down the side of the tower. (the cheaper way of lighting up towers)

 

/ end theatre tech “rant”

 

MORE IMPORTANTLY: how in the ever living Hell does Darien Lake beat Canada’s Wonderland in the lighting department? Last I checked Darien Lake doesn’t have projection mapping on a big mountain dead center of the park (the projection mapping is so dull now, you can barely see it) with multicolored water fountain effects along its entryway, (there are so many tall trees along the fountain that the only way to see it is to climb up on a concrete block and stand in a flower bed). Two Intelligent LED lit rides compared to a full arsenal of attractions that have their own awesome lighting packages (soaring timbers (led light bulbs that have never been in sync that they received from the touring carnival that they bought soaring timbers from.), windseeker, skyhawk, lumberjack, Yukon striker I’d assume (never assume), even Behemoth has a red chase going up its lift hill for God’s sake (ooooh), and all their rides with well maintained classic packages like knight mares, shockwave, the interior lighting of Thunder Run (when was the last time you were on Thunder Run?) the interior lights are never on anymore, you can't even see the dragon anymore) and more that I don’t care to list out) prove DL is WAY behind. Especially with their big giant wheel that puts most park Ferris wheels to shame is dark at night. How this translates to Darien Lake winning is beyond me.

 

In my opinion there’s only three things that Darien Lake “wins”

 

1. Night time show - Ignite the Night has lasers, fireworks and so many other special effects that can’t be beat by projection mapping and water effects (even if I enjoy both)

2. Crowd levels - I’ll take a 10 minute wait over an hour wait any day.

3. Proximity to my house - 30-45 minutes is much better than 1.5-2 hours

 

I was actually referring to SkyScreamer, Rolling Thunder, the new boardwalk, compared to Yukon Striker/Vortex area, which is always a very dark area of the park at night, sir.

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I’m sure that’s intentional. Ever heard of theming?

 

Also, based on “its too dark over there” I’m almost 100% positive you’ve never walked from Mind Eraser toward the Bumper Cars past 9pm because it’s horribly lit minus whatever “bounce” comes off of Rolling Thunder (which I will tell you right now if you’re not right up next to it, it isn’t much). I’m sorry but you can not convince me that Darien Lake has better lighting than Canada’s Wonderland.

 

To me that’s like saying Cedar Point has better theming than the Magic Kingdom. There’s no comparison.

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Will Six Flags Darien Lake begin running second trains on the rollercoasters now that they repurchased the park? The single train coasters were a big downside of going there on days when the park was packed.
Unfortunately, still one train ops on every single coaster besides Tantrum. On the plus side, it appears 2 train ops could possibly be coming back to Mind Eraser for this season, but the second train is still in pieces in the ground.
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