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

[live2tell75]

^ Great, thanks Eric!

[Aaronupsidasium]

I'm planning my tour strategy and have a question. Anyone know which of this year's houses line entrance begins in WoodyWoodpecker's Kidzone area but exits over between MIB and Simpsons? In the past, usually 1 of the 2 house entrances in the kid area exits by MIB while the other exits by the house line entrance. Thanks!

 

My advice would be there for opening at 6pm then to head to Walking Dead, then La Lorona and then Afterlife since their exits lead into each other. It's saves lots of time and walking. Plus you'll be in the right area for the first showing of Bill & Ted (usually a little after 7pm) if you don't hit too many lines.

 

I get the Frequent Fear Pass and do three nights while on vacation so I can do all the houses, shows ect without express. But if you want to do it in one night and see the shows you really need an express pass.

[live2tell75]

^ Thanks. That's exactly what I was planning. This will be my 19th year attending and will be doing the annual passholder's night this Friday. Even though it has gotten very expensive, I cannot even imagine attending without an Express Pass.

[rollercoasterbuff]

I have to share with you all. Finally got our trip all booked! We did purchase express passes for HHN. I also was hoping for some suggestions from all you IOA and USO pros out there.

 

We arrive to our hotel (best western plus) on the 14th. We are about a mile from the parks. We check out the 17th.

With that said, here were my potential plans for what parks on what days.

 

Option 1: 15th Head to early entry of Wizarding World, hang at Islands of Adventure for the day, next day,16th, hang at USO and that night knock out HHN.

Option 2: 15th hang at USO for the day. 16th Early entry at wizarding world and then head into IOA for the day then head to HHN that night.

Option 3: Hit IOA for two days, then knock out the few rides we want to do, and the mazes at HHN with express pass.

 

 

I don't know! Help me out guys. I will have my car so I am tempted to maybe even hit Busch Gardens one day, or one of the disney parks while we are over there for a day.

 

Any help, suggestions, anything would be fantastic!

[downunder]

^For IOA, definitely hit the Harry Potter ride first thing, if you're willing to separate your party single rider line is good.

 

Busch has a bus that leaves the Universal bus lot and costs $10 if you don't have a park hopper for their parks if you're not driving.

 

I'd look into the stay and scream thing where if you're in the Uni during the day you stay, they clear the park and then straight into HHN. Also the behind the screams tours during the day are excellent.

[rollercoasterbuff]

With express pass, would we have time to do all of universal during HHN? Cause if we can skip it, I wanted to check out a Disney park or possibly even Busch gardens.

[Wes]

What's the consensus on the best maze this year?

[PCW_Nut]

^For me it goes as follows:

 

Best: American Werewolf in London tied with Cabin In the Woods.

 

Worst: Havoc

 

Both Werewolf and Cabin had some amazing sets. Evil Dead was up there too but I found that more of a walk through of the movie rather than scary, if that makes sense. Werewolf had some great scares where you'd get hit from both sides with a whole "no place to hide" type of feeling. The puppets were absolutely incredible and never before have I felt this scared by a puppet.

 

Cabin's sets were great and they too did a lot of the scares from both sides. The final stretch of the house was just absolutely amazing for scares. I got hit 3 times during the final "cubes" scene and there was a nice couple of HHN Easter eggs in there from HHN's past as well.

[necoastergp]

What's the consensus on the best maze this year?

 

I thought American Werewolf in London and Cabin in the Woods were the best of the event.

[jordanTNE]

im going to HHN sunday october 14th, whatre my chances of actually going through all of the mazes ??

[Invertalon]

I would vote Evil Dead and Cabin in the Woods as the top mazes. Following those two, Werewolf and Llorona. At the bottom for me would be Resident Evil and Havok, although I did not find any house bad. All were quite enjoyable.

[jarmor]

What's the consensus on the best maze this year?

Hands down "American Werewolf in London"!

 

im going to HHN sunday october 14th, whatre my chances of actually going through all of the mazes ??

are you doing the stay and scream? Regardless I would do cabin first...if you have time do werewolf right after...RUN to kids zone and do walking dead followed by llorna. It will put you out by afterlife...hit that up. Head to havoc then do the remaining soundstage houses. I would do evil dead then resident evil.

[Invertalon]

We did four nights straight and had all the houses, each night, done in about 1.5-2hrs with careful planning and utilizing stay and scream as well as two nights with the passholder early entry.

 

But for normal stay-and-scream, they take you back to Werewolf in London... Do that and go right to Cabin afterward. Once Cabin is complete, go to Evil Dead then to Resident Evil. Go right back to the 3D house and try to get that done and Llarona afterward which usually has a shorter wait compared to the Walking Dead house... By this time, walking dead is probably very busy. Go back up front and hit Havoc and catch Bill and Ted depending on timing. Later on, Walking Dead dropped to 10-20mins from the 60+min waits right in the beginning. You should easily be able to do them all if you work quickly at the beginning.

 

The longest waits of the event were always Cabin, Evil Dead and Walking Dead... I would focus on the front houses first though, as like I said, the Walking Dead/Llarona houses got shorter later on.

[Aaronupsidasium]

im going to HHN sunday october 14th, whatre my chances of actually going through all of the mazes ??

 

It's open until 2am that Sunday (actually the 13th), so if you get to into the park at 6 and hit Walking Dead, La Lorona, Afterlife and Havoc first you should get done those by 8pm. Which should give you time to hit the four soundstage houses as they'll have an hour or so wait. You might be able to get the last show of Bill & Ted by 2am. But it's always good to utilize Express Pass, Stay & Scream or Frequent Fear Pass if you can.

[COASTER FREAK 11]

Over at Orlando United, someone rented a helicopter and flew it over USO and took tons of pictures of the Harry Potter Expansion. Page 1 is a video, and there are a ton of pics on several of the other pages.

 

Take a look here.

 

Thanks to Screamscape and Orlando United.

[Jew]

That's....excessive. OMG, buildings!!!

[Garet]

Over at Orlando United, someone rented a helicopter and flew it over USO and took tons of pictures of the Harry Potter Expansion. Page 1 is a video, and there are a ton of pics on several of the other pages.

 

Take a look here.

 

Thanks to Screamscape and Orlando United.

 

Damn, for some reason i always get an IP block for that site from here in South Korea

[Moose]

They're main website is down for maintenance for 4 days... Bad timing.

 

That being said, that's a whole lot of buildings. The station in IoA is really crammed in there, and there is only one track, will this have only one train?

[Garet]

They're main website is down for maintenance for 4 days... Bad timing.

 

That being said, that's a whole lot of buildings. The station in IoA is really crammed in there, and there is only one track, will this have only one train?

 

Won't it be like those funicular railway trains such as the ocean park express? Where it's one track until the middle where it splits into two and the trains pass each other then back to one track.

[coasterfreak101]

That being said, that's a whole lot of buildings. The station in IoA is really crammed in there, and there is only one track, will this have only one train?

 

There's a section of track halfway between the stations that has a second set of rails. Two trains, each will have to be timed with the other so that they come to that point together. So it's two trains run as one system.

[Moose]

^ & ^^ That's what I thought but I didn't see the double tracked portion in any of the pics.

[coasterfreak101]

^ & ^^ That's what I thought but I didn't see the double tracked portion in any of the pics.

 

If you look at the two updates on this page, you can see the track switch at the bottom right corner of the last picture in the first update, and you can see how there's a wider section just under the watermark in the first picture of the second update.

 

Oh, from a while back here's a blurry picture from Screamscape where you can see two tracks!

[COASTER FREAK 11]

The Train is a single track with a switch in the middle and it seems like it will run on a cable pulley system. But, unlike regular funiculars, they cant use gravity to assist in the movement, so I think it will be one big cable loop, the with the trains attached to it, so the trains gets pulled in each direction. I think this is correct because you can see the wheels for the cables on the turns and there are two rows, meaning there are cables going in each direction.

[jray21]

Interesting stuff! It is pretty crammed in there, but I'm sure it'll look amazing. I guess since it's an alley, they didn't want to make it to big.

[IsThisTheRealLife]

In case anyone hasn't brought this yet, the local news is reporting that the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit got stuck. (If it's the wrong park, blame the news)