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Universal Orlando Resort (USF, IOA, Epic) Discussion Thread

P. 625: Harry Potter Ministry of Magic revealed!

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I just got a Survey from Universal Orlando that was asking about an additional Universal Express product that would "allow visitors to view attraction wait times and make ride reservations all from a hand held device". Sounds like they are thinking of adding a Q-bot style system in the future. This would be a downgrade from the current Universal Express, so I hope they won't raise the price on the "classic" version too much.

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All I can say is wow! I was very impressed with all of the new enhancements that Spidey received. Also a side note, did anyone else notice that Cat In The Hat is back at the normal insane spinning mode again?

We were actually talking about this at Orlando United. Some cars spin a lot, some don't spin that much.

 

I was on Cat in the Hat one week ago on Saturday 3/3 and the cars barely spun at all. That would be pretty retarded if some cars spun a lot and some cars didn't at random with no indication...perhaps they are testing? I hope they restore the spinning to all cars soon. The ride is a complete bore without it.

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Universal Orlando has sent us a press release regarding the opening of the Hollywood Drive-In Golf at Universal CityWalk.

 

Today, Universal Orlando Resort officially opened central Florida’s newest and most outrageously-themed miniature golf experience– Hollywood Drive-In Golf at Universal CityWalk. Featuring two 18-hole courses based on classic drive-in era horror and sci-fi movies, this all-new venue is the only place where the entire family can enjoy teeing off through the open mouth of a giant space worm or the basement laboratory of a towering haunted house.

 

To celebrate the grand opening, some of Universal Orlando’s iconic characters “hit the links.” Universal’s classic monsters – including Dracula, Wolfman, Frankenstein’s Monster and the Bride of Frankenstein – putted their way through a creepy cemetery on “The Haunting of Ghostly Greens” course. On the opposite side, Men In Black agents and Frank the Pug played “Invaders from Planet Putt” – a course themed after the “little green men” science fiction films of the 1950s.

 

Designed by Universal’s Creative team in partnership with Adventure Golf Design and Development, Hollywood Drive-In Golf is now open to the public daily from 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. Admission rates to play one course are $13.99 plus tax for adults and $11.99 plus tax for children (ages 3 to 9). For more information on Hollywood Drive-In Golf, visit http://www.CityWalkOrlando.com.

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Spidey looks freakin' awesome, as does the mini-golf, as does New Fantasyland. I envy you Orlando-ites. There's always so much changing there, so all of our trips are pure madness, running around trying to catch all the new stuff in the few days we have. But we did finally invest in one of those non-expiring 10 day WDW park-hopper tickets.

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And a side note....I hate Potterland. That part of the park just gives me an anxiety attack now.

 

It's probably the creepy robes and capes they CMs have to wear.

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And a side note....I hate Potterland. That part of the park just gives me an anxiety attack now.

 

It's probably the creepy robes and capes they CMs have to wear.

 

Between the CMs and GP it's hard to keep it straight! There's just way too many people in that area and I have absolutely no idea what's going on. I just hate it. But the butter beer is good.

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^And where else can you buy a stick for 100 bucks?

 

 

Don't even get me started on the line for that place. It blows my mind. And I asked Steve today, I wonder how much they actually make on selling Butter Beer each day. Everyone is walking around or leaving that area with a cup. But like I said, I know nothing about the whole thing so I can't really say. I just can't imagine standing in a line like that for the chance to purchase a twig or even standing in a long line to purchase Butter Beer. But that's just me. More power to everyone else willing to do it. More time for me to ride Dueling Drag....I mean Dragon Challenge.

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^And where else can you buy a stick for 100 bucks?

 

Well it depends on what you need it for...

 

Also, I'm sure this has been discussed before, but I think that Harry Potter World directly killed Dueling Dragons (I insist on calling it that still). Without the money-grabbing retheme, there wouldn't be as big of an influx of GP and first-timers, and with that the shi- erm, knuckleheads that threw stuff at each other on the ride causing Dueling Dragons to not duel any more.

Harry Potter is terrible and I hate it. Get off my lawn!

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Regardless of how much you love or hate "Potterland", you have to at least somewhat agree that much of the recent additions/upgrades to the park are probably a direct response to the success of "Potterland" and the park trying to ride the success of "Potterland"...

 

I mean, Harry Potter has just brought in crazy amounts of money to the Universal Orlando complex!

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^And where else can you buy a stick for 100 bucks?

 

Well it depends on what you need it for...

 

Also, I'm sure this has been discussed before, but I think that Harry Potter World directly killed Dueling Dragons (I insist on calling it that still). Without the money-grabbing retheme, there wouldn't be as big of an influx of GP and first-timers, and with that the shi- erm, knuckleheads that threw stuff at each other on the ride causing Dueling Dragons to not duel any more.

Harry Potter is terrible and I hate it. Get off my lawn!

 

 

I don't think that HP caused any influx of knuckleheads. The ride was open for 11 years prior to Potter, and there was never any shortage of idiots at IOA in that timeframe. Harry Potter fans in particular certainly aren't any worse than the usual teens that patronize IOA. Anyway, I don't understand why a mesh screen can't be put between the space where the trains come at each other.

 

In any case, if given the choice I would much rather have Forbidden Journey with non-dueling dragons than no FJ. I know there are a lot of HP haters on this site, but I personally think it's the best dark ride ever created.

Edited by OrlandoPete
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^I agree that the occurence of the Dragons "incident" after the opening WWOHP was simply a coincidence. And, as I've stated elsewhere, I don't hate the Harry Potter stuff, I'm just not a big fan of the franchise. Forbidden Journey is a good ride (even though I still prefer Spider-man), and the area itself looks good, if rather cramped.

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Honestly, I don't think the lack of dueling killed Dragon Challenge. It removes a bit of the uniqueness and some offride photo opportunities, sure, but you barely ever saw the other train anyway while you were on the ride, and you still get two shining examples of snappy B&M inverts from before bimmers became soft and forceless. Basically, what I'm saying is the ride experience is the same, really.

 

What I do think you can blame on HP that DID make the ride worse is the removal of themeing that came from the DD->DC conversion. I miss the entrance from DD so much sometimes...

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I don't think that HP caused any influx of knuckleheads. The ride was open for 11 years prior to Potter, and there was never any shortage of idiots at IOA in that timeframe. Harry Potter fans in particular certainly aren't any worse than the usual teens that patronize IOA. Anyway, I don't understand why a mesh screen can't be put between the space where the trains come at each other.

 

I agree.

 

In any case, if given the choice I would much rather have Forbidden Journey with non-dueling dragons than no FJ. I know there are a lot of HP haters on this site, but I personally think it's the best dark ride ever created.

 

If given the choice, I would actually rather have the Dragons dueling along with its old theme than FJ.

 

And I am a fan of the ride, but I still think Spidy is by far the best dark ride in either park. ...Especially, with the updates.

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Did a quick lap around both parks today to check out any progress on a number of things. Spider-Man seemed to be very popular with a posted 75 minute wait the whole time we were there. Potter was also a pretty long line. Dragons, sadly, was only a 15 minute wait. Not sure why that ride never seems to have gotten the love it deserved.

 

Anyway, I got a few pictures of the current state of Jaws and Despicable Me. Jaws fans, beware, there is basically nothing at all left....

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Here's the progress on the queue area for Despicable Me. Looks similar to the old queue area, but getting touched up a bit.

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Here's another view. That's a mighty fine looking dumpster, isn't it? :D

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And this picture wraps up the dumpster portion of the update.

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There's a side view of Gru's house...

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And the front of Gru's house. Pretty exciting, no? =)

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Here's the same view I took about 10 days ago, so you can see they've progressed quite a bit on it!

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Some new theming added to the area.

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These are some Jaws area photos I took about 10 days ago... there's something going on behind the wall.

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And that something are the old Jaws buildings being eaten by this monster!!!

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Munch...munch...munch... Om...nom...nom....

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Jaws eating monster says "Buildings taste good going in...but they sure BURN coming out!" Ouch!

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Can you see that 10 days ago, the old maintenance building was still standing.

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I'm told this is brand new theming for Jaws. SPOILER ALERT! The shark pops out of the truck!!! Crazy!!!

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Another overview of what the Jaws area looked like 10 days ago.

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See, building is still there. Cool, huh?

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Here's a look around the corner.

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And as you can see here, the Amity buildings on the opposite side of the Jaws were still standing 10 days ago.

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Here's what Jaws looked like today! Even more of the rubble is gone, and as you can see none of the buildings on the ride side of Amity are standing.

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Here's another view of beautiful piles of dirt!

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This is the lagoon side of Amity as of today...all the buildings have also been demolished.

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Another view of where Amity used to be. This is sort of where the Nathan's Hot Dogs building was looking over towards the old boathouse (you can see the Jaws shark in the picture)

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More dirt....

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And even more dirt!

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Here's a look at the area from the side closer to Fear Factor, again, you can see the shark in the picture for a point of reference.

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And here you can see that old maintenance building is now totally gone.

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Here's another look at the lagoon side of Amity...all buildings now just a memory!

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I believe the only thing left from Amity are some of the games that they've moved near that bridge which leads to Simpsons.

 

Anyway, that's it for this update! Hopefully we'll have more soon! Oh! Keep an eye on our Facebook page! We have some Jaws stuff we'll be giving away! TPR's Facebook link is in my signature.

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Love the fisheye lense, hate to see Jaws in the state that it's in. But at least they are moving along rather quickly. The remorse is already leaving as the curiosity inside me settles in. Thanks for the update. (Love Minion Way)

 

BTW, the fifth picture is sideways. Don't know if that was intentional, accidental, or is that to make it more exciting?

 

EDIT: Got it! Just making sure you knew.

Edited by VinTheAttendant
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BTW, the fifth picture is sideways. Don't know if that was intentional, accidental, or is that to make it more exciting?

I'm aware. It's our stupid forum which is incompatible with the Exim information the iPhone spits out. Fixing it would require me to re-do almost the entire update as I didn't catch it until the end.

 

I was on my way out the door so it was either leave the sideways picture or not get the update posted until tomorrow.

 

As for the Fisheye thing it's the new GoPro I was testing out for photos. Funny, I'm actually not a fan of fisheye lenses at all, and for POV video it works well, and I guess for this it's nice too, but I personally find fisheye photos a bit too distorted for my tastes. Glad you guys liked it though!

Edited by robbalvey
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I knew there was a lot of available space with Jaws out of the picture, but after seeing those pictures with the land cleared out, I didn't realize it was that much!

 

Going to be a lot of space for Muggles and wand-waving and the what-not.

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Just curious if anyone has ever seen the wait for the dragons longer than a few minutes? I have no idea why that is not more popular even before they ruined it by taking away the dueling. That is going to be a very big area for the new expansion. I had no idea jaws took up so much space.

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The area they have for this is quite large, and even though I'm not much of a Potter fan, I'm very excited to see what Universal has up their sleeves! It is hard to see a classic like Jaws go, since that was an iconic attraction at the resort.

 

Universal's WWoHP Part 2 vs. Disney's Avatarland?

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