The "Pleasant/Unpleasant Surprise" Thread

[CedarPoint27]

Pleasant: Gemini at Cedar Point, i loved this thing and i had a blast riding it.

 

Unpleasant: Magnum XL 200 at Cedar Point. So i went to Cedar Point expecting this ride to be nothing but amazing, sadly it was a let down, the first couple hills were really rough, on the first drop i went to put my hands up and my head smacked against the back of the seat.

Magnum trains don't even have head rests

 

I know that but i hit my head hard of something.

[XII]

Pleasant Surprise:

 

Gemini - More airtime than I expected and just a really fun overall ride.

Cobra @ La Ronde - Another really fun ride that I enjoyed despite all the negative reviews it gets. Its got some forces, some nice speed in the first half, and even a nice pop of ejector air.

Hydra - Not nearly as forceless as I was expecting it to be.

Scandia Screamer - Do not underestimate the power of this ride. It may not look like anything special and just appear as a credit whoring coaster. WRONG!!! Ejector Air and Insane Laterals are all throughout the ride and it is just crazy awesome.

Space Mountain @ Disneyland Paris - Its fun and not NEARLY as rough as other people claimed it to be (or that might just have been a side effect from riding Gouderix the day before).

Manta @ Sea World San Diego - MUCH better than I was expecting with great airtime, laterals, and just overall being one of my favorite coasters in California.

 

Unpleasent Surprise:

 

Shivering Timbers - Not nearly as much airtime as I was hoping for.

Hades - Ouch.

Full Throtttle - Somehow this ride failed to meet my expectations, even after setting the bar incredibly low.

[Angle O. Descent]

I just got back from Florida...

 

Pleasant Surprises:

 

Rip Ride Rockit - I didn't expect much from it, but it had some decent drops, turns, and airtime going into the brake runs. The on-board select-a-music was a neat bonus too.

Kraken - Looked like a typical B&M sit-down, but it was pretty smooth, and you get a nice whip down the drop in the back row.

Scorpion - I first rode this when I was 7, but I completely forgot how forceful it was.

 

Unpleasant Surprises:

 

Kumba - Good ride, but I found it to be by far the roughest B&M sit-down I've been on. It makes sense, considering it's been operating year-round since 1993.

Cheetah Hunt - Again, good ride, I was just expecting a little more intensity like Maverick.

Gwazi - This must have been the roughest woodie I've ever been on. Strangely not painful though.

[djcoastermark]

Sorry that this is a long post but,now that its passed, the Florida state fair had not 2, but 4 pleasant/unpleasant surprises. The first 2 involve coasters. First off, the disappointment. All the local papers were bragging about the "largest traveling coaster" in the U.S. At first, I was excited, then I found out it was an Anton Wildcat. Ok, so that's not really "fab" but, hey, Its an Anton ! HOWEVER, Anton would be rolling over in his grave seeing how they neutered his coaster. In its original location in Texas years ago, it was listed as having a height of 65 feet. However, something happened along the way and now its height is only 50 feet. while the ride still looks good, but it didn't look quite right. The slopes of the drops had changed and it just crawled through the course. So much so that we wondered if the cars would make it up the hills.

Next up was RC 48. It was pouring down rain when it opened at 5 pm. Wow, what a surprise. It flew thru the course and felt like a real coaster that would be in a park. In fact, this is the one that was at Morey's in the early 2000's. (pic from RCDB) We rode it in all its duct taped glory 5 times. It was raining too hard to get a good pic so this pic is from when it was at Moreys.

The next bad was that unbeknownst to us was Wilding Friday. As the night wore on, the kids there became very unruly, resulting in over 100 ejections from the park. The fair says they will address the problem. The last was a plus, the ramen noodle burger. Yum !! A square burger patty on a ramen noodle bun topped with green onion stalks and oriental cole slaw. OMG, it was great!

[cfc]

^That burger does look good.

[djcoastermark]

Our local paper, The Tampa Bay Times, Printed up the recipe on how to make it, if anyone is interested. Being a "foodie" myself, this looks easy enough to try at home. It was quite good.

[rcjp]

Had a big pleasant surprise yesterday at portaventura: stampida! Based on what I had heard, I was expecting a terribly rough ride. However, while it wasn't smooth, I didn't find the roughness that unpleasant. I might have sat in the front but none of my schoolmates who rode it closer to the back complained. I don't have a lot of wood coaster experience have have definitely never ridden a top one (the best ones I have been on were lightning racer and blue streak) and so this will deserve high spot on my list as I found out it had plenty of moments of air and some strong laterals. It was, overall, a really fun experience.

[VF15]

Pleasant Surprise - California Screamin'. I had heard reports of it being forceless and boring, but I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. The launch is cool, the loop had great positive G's, and there are a few pops of floater air here and there.

 

Unpleasant Surprise - Raging Bull. Don't get me wrong, I really like Raging Bull, but for a B&M hypercoaster, I was expecting a lot more.

[JonnyRCT3]

Corkscrew @ CP.

 

Pleasant:

That airtime hill provides some awesome negative G's. Arrow's first ever vertical loop packs a punch as well.

 

 

Exterminator @ Kennywood

My favorite Wild Mouse, ever! Those sudden drops in the dark were great.

 

 

Unpleasant:

Blue Streak @ CP. The airtime was great, but my back was NOT having it. This is coming from a person that LOVES Mean Streak & Mantis.

[fraroc]

-Skyrush: the restraints about killed my legs...and it stole my phone right out of my pocket

It really is a shame that Skyrush has such crappy restraints given the awesomeness of the ride itself. I rode it last summer and didn't place it in either the "pleasant" or "unpleasant" categories as, basically, I was amazed by the intensity and airtime of the ride but then very disappointed by the restraints which stop it from being my no 1 ride. I do really wish they do something about that.

 

I really like the restraints to Skyrush, you get so much upper body freedom that you actually get scared because you're only being held in by your legs....God, my first time on that ride was one of the few times I was actually scared when riding a roller coaster. But I loved it.

[The49er]

Pleasant: Verbolten - I knew it would be fun, but everyone was saying, "It's not that intense." I honestly think it was about as forceful as some of the other coasters there.

 

Unpleasant: Griffon...it's a good ride, but it seemed a bit over-hyped. That, or perhaps it's because I'm not really scared of most roller coasters anymore.

 

Also unpleasant: My second ride on Roar @ SFDK. I hadn't known what to expect from this particular ride, but I'd heard good things about GCIs in general. It turns out that whenever you gain a significant amount of speed, the ride tries to rattle you to death. I had a nasty headache afterwards. Maybe that's because I was in the back, but it was just too painful to enjoy. That's too bad, because it had some decent forces to it.

[nannerdw]

Pleasant surprise: Boss at SFSTL

I didn't know anything about the layout before riding, so I was surprised by the sheer size of some of the drops, and that double down at the beginning was totally unexpected. It's a great ride in the back seat, if you can tolerate the roughness.

 

Pleasant surprise #2: Space Mountain at Disney World. I was expecting a tame little kiddie coaster, but I was surprised by the amount of airtime I got in the back seat. The last drop REALLY took me by surprise, with headchoppers that came out of nowhere in the pitch blackness and a drop that felt like it went on forever, even though it was probably only like 20 ft. lol

 

Unpleasant surprise: The Beast at King's Island

I was really not impressed at all. I'd heard such great things about the ride, but to me it just felt like a large mine train with long, drawn out sections and very little airtime.

[gerstlaueringvar]

Pleasant: the knock-off Loop and Screw at Chuanlord Holiday Manor. That ride is relatively smooth compare with the other knock-off Loop and Screw. The size of the loops are very small and the shape of them looks somewhat like Anton's loop. I greyed out started from the first half of the second loop! I only greyed out at Titan's upwards helix before. The first drop also offers some very strong ejector if you are at the back seat.

[SFOGdude25]

Pleasant surprise for me: GhostRider

Yes, as crazy as it sounds, I really enjoyed my one ride on this infamous woodie last year. I was even in the very back seat and trust me. I was prepared for the worst, but what I got was a decent mid-sized woodie with some good airtime here and there and an overall nice ride. Any roughness somehow went unnoticed with me. Either that, or I must have a back of steel haha. Of course, coming to a dead stop on the MCBR was a sad reminder of what the ride used to be, but then again, maybe the slower speed helped with the roughness. I must have caught it on a really good day.

[Angle O. Descent]

Pleasant Surprise: Batwing at SFA. I dreaded roughness as per Vekoma standard, but it was smooth enough and pretty forceful. I'd even peg it ahead of the B&M Superman flyer clones.

 

Unpleasant Surprise: Apocalypse at SFA. Newly re-built ride, so I assumed it would be somewhat smoother than other B&M stand-ups... oh me oh my was I wrong.

[paulm12]

Pleasant Surprise: Apocolypse at SFMM! Looks can be deceiving; it was one of the first rides I went on at SFMM in 7 years, and it looked like a small, warm-up sort of ride! Man was I wrong! The thing felt fast and out-of-control, and it really caught off guard. I love bringing "new" guests to the park and telling them it's my favorite ride, watching them be like "whaaaaaat," and then watching their reactions on it. The thing is tearing across the first turn before the actual drop, and when the "real drop" hits, my ass is off the seat the entire time. Good fun.

 

Another pleasant surprise was Flight Deck at CGA. I was expecting it to be a forceful B&M like Batman, but I'm not a huge fan of Batman for whatever reason, so I wasn't expecting to "really" like it. The pacing was incredible; there were some moments of airtime, the inversions were fabulous, and the dip to the helix at the end above the water was marvelous. I loved it!

 

Unpleasant Surprise: Green Lantern at SFMM. While I had had some relAtively "mild" rides on it before, I was totally unprepared for one ride I had on it. Everything was fine loading, until two super-fat ladies crowded the group in front of us once we had loaded the car on the other side. We were face-up the entire way up the lift, and the rest of the ride was so painful I would rather not remember it. The ride felt like it was grabbing ahold of my balls and forcing me into various contortions and flips, and the restraint locked against my thighs by the end of the ride quite painfully. It's interesting, I feel that everyone else loves the ride, but since then it's been painful every time.

[Angle O. Descent]

Some more from my recent New England trip:

 

Pleasant Surprise: Cyclone SFNE

On paper it doesn't look very thrilling, but the first drop was pretty solid, and keeps a good pace though out.

 

Another pleasant surprise: Comet Great Escape

I knew it would be good, but it felt like I was riding Phoenix, which is a great thing!

 

Unpleasant surprise: Goliath SFNE

Easily the most painful coaster I've ever been on. It was the first time in my life where I actually wanted a ride to stop. Seriously, the older boomerang (not to mention, no more than 20 yards away) was more enjoyable than this thing.

 

Another unpleasant surprise: Boulderdash

CLOSED????

 

Overall, somewhat of a bust. Although Bizarro was every bit as good as I imagined

[rcjp]

Unpleasant surprise: Goliath SFNE

Easily the most painful coaster I've ever been on. It was the first time in my life where I actually wanted a ride to stop. Seriously, the older boomerang (not to mention, no more than 20 yards away) was more enjoyable than this thing.

Wow this train really has been killing the ride!

[canadianparkfan]

Unpleasant: Would have to say any flats like looping starships, Larson fireballs... pretty much any of those rides with tons of hangtime that face you straight at the ground, against the restraints. I don't know what I hate about it, as on coasters, a lot of the hangtime moments don't freak me out at all. On a lot of flats though, I hate it.

 

Pleasant: Would have to say, hands down, my first SLC. I, like almost everyone else on here, had heard the horror stories about these rides, but when I rode Flight Deck at Canada's Wonderland (an older one, and a notoriously bad one at that), it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. There was barely any headbanging, and in terms of intensity, I'd rank it right up there with the BTR clones. I'd actually say, if it weren't for the few rough patches (or, as I've heard with some SLCs, the entire rough ride), then B&M and Intamin would definitely have some competition on their hands!

 

Actually, my experience with most Vekomas, and even TOGO stnadups (yes, you heard that right, TOGO standups) has proven that they're really not as bad as people say... they just seem to be rides with great potential, but not always executed well. I don't know, maybe it's just the fact that up until recently, we didn't have the greatest rides up here in Canada, and we needed to appreciate what we had, or maybe I'm crazy, but a lot of these so called "bad" rides seem to be more hype, or a running joke on the TPR forums than anything else.

 

Hell, they even have an emoticon for it!

[loop-de-loop]

^I do agree some rides up here get a worse reputation than they deserve, but Time Warp definitely deserves every ounce of hate it gets.

[Superbatboy]

The Beast, wanted to ride it for so many years and finally rode it and thought it was terrible

[Emiroo]

Pleasant: Drop Tower at Kings Island. I was terrified of it but got peer pressured on anyway. It was awesome! I rode it 5 more times. The best part is that the friend who pressured me on had a full on panic attack while waiting at the top for it to drop. That's a bad location to discover a fear of extreme heights.

 

Unpleasant: Cyclone Sam's at Worlds of Fun. I had never been on a wipeout before and though I barely tolerate spinning rides, I gave it a shot anyway. It was so much worse than I imagined. It was incredibly forceful and pushed me to the limit. I thought it was never going to end and was mere seconds from barfing. That said, it is an outstanding ride if you like spinning.

Edited June 28, 2014 by Emiroo

[cfc]

^I'm not into spinning rides, either, but I was pleasantly surprised by Cyclone Sam's. I think being indoors helped, and I like the sound and lighting effects.

[Emiroo]

^ Agreed. The lighting and storm effects were awesome, I just couldn't handle the spinning.

[Atter]

For me, Gold striker was a very pleasant surprise. I was not expecting such an awesome wooden coaster. I re-rode it like 5 times in an like an hour. I don't think I've ever experienced an awesome GCI before this one.

 

Green lantern First Flight was an unpleasant surprise, for some reason I thought it was going to be fun. It was painful.