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

P. 625: Harry Potter Ministry of Magic revealed!

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^ Well you can blame that loose article policy on one fucking guy along with the removal of this ride. Also I wouldnt be surprised if someone bought them, B&Ms have a high value and if it is scrapped this would be the first one (yes even Time Machine wasnt scrapped despite sitting abandoned for 5 years, its in Vietnam now according to RCDB)

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And the response on Facebook has been crazy and is STILL going strong...

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Holy damn, Robb. Those metrics are INSANE. Is this your top FB post ever? I work for a company that has FB followers of 1.7 mil, and we'd KILL for the reach you're getting on that. Pretty much the only time we ever get anything like those numbers is, sadly, when we mention that a popular music artist has passed away.

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That's so sad a great ride will be gone. Glad I got to ride it, they were fantastic coasters. B&M inverts tend to be some of my favorite rides especially these older ones that still kick @$$.

 

I enjoyed the Harry Potter lands but I am not a die hard fan, I don't feel the need to see them again really. Personally I had little desire to return even with Dragons, now I really have no desire to return to Universal. The attractions they continue to put in seem boring, because I've already ridden the 3D glasses screen ride that I'll be sprayed with water at some point too many times at that one park. I'll take my money to Disney, Seaworld, FunSpot, and BGT next time I'm in the Orlando area.

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^I am pretty sure the last time a coaster this highly ranked was removed was Eagle's Fortress. But that coaster was understandably difficult to maintain, and Everland somewhat made up for that by building one of the best (if not the best) wood coaster in the world.

 

I mean T Express was open at the same time as Eagle's Fortress and I think there was talk about getting new trains at some point to try and save the ride so I think if they'd had the option, they'd have kept it going. That's completely different from Universal where it could be kept going maintenance wise and expand in other places. It was not fun having never ridden it and having to see it SBNO for years.

 

Also if we are going to use Eagle's Fortress as an example, removing a very popular ride hasn't exactly worked out there either. The site was pegged for an on-site hotel, and now the whole area is being turned into a garden based on some overhead shots. Considering they just did this with Global Village, it's leaving that area a little bare.

 

The parks never going to be doing too poorly considering the population size nearby and minimal competition but the park hasn't exactly been thriving. Attendance hasn't really changed much in the last 4 years and their big investment was in pandas (I don't have the article on hand but the whole project cost was around the price for quite a big coaster) and despite a huge media push, huge waiting areas originally painted and one of the few rides to offer queue pass, outside of holidays, it has been pretty much walk-in every day since day one.

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And the response on Facebook has been crazy and is STILL going strong...

thumb_screen_shot_2017-09-05_at_22_5.png

Holy damn, Robb. Those metrics are INSANE. Is this your top FB post ever? I work for a company that has FB followers of 1.7 mil, and we'd KILL for the reach you're getting on that. Pretty much the only time we ever get anything like those numbers is, sadly, when we mention that a popular music artist has passed away.

Oh, no. That's pretty common for us actually. We get probably about a dozen posts a month reach those numbers:

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Then about once a month we'll get a post that goes CRAZY viral:

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And that's still not the best post we've ever had! We've had posts with reach into 100 million!

 

To bring this back on topic, we are STILL getting re-tweets and comments constantly about Dragons from general park fans....

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Was fortunate enough to ride it as Dragon Challenge during my trip to Universal and Islands of Adventure in 2014. Never got to experience the dueling aspect it but did get to ride both sides and you can tell how much fun dueling would have been. I can only imagine. A lot of people say it felt out of place but I actually thought they did a really good job with the re-theming to Harry Potter.

Just wish I could sit down with a spokesperson and hear, in detail, why they thought it was best to remove this ride and not clear new space (that they have available) to build a new roller coaster.

Keeping both would have been best, but they know more than me right?

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Had my first (and last) rides on Dragon's Challenge back in 2010 when the Harry Potter section first opened. I really enjoyed the ride, especially because A) it still dueled back then and B) back then everyone was so busy with all the other Harry Potter stuff that the line for Dragon's Challenge was never more than about 5-10 minutes. It was a solid ride and the dueling added a lot (in my opinion). It's interesting that Harry Potter was the incentive that got me to finally get to IOA and try the ride for the first time and that Harry Potter will ultimately be the reason that the ride is leaving. I wonder (as some say the ride still had life in it), if Universal tried at all to look for a potential park to buy the ride or if they just scrapped it without a second thought.

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It's kind of unfortunate that a lot of those retweets were people who just found out about Dueling Dragons closing and are dismayed at not being able to get their last rides in.

 

It really is a shame that I was never able to get a ride in when I was in Orlando (even moreso not riding when they still dueled). There's no other pair of coasters like Dueling Dragons and they will be missed.

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https://www.universalorlando.com/web/en/us/things-to-do/shows/terminator-2-3d/index.html

 

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Terminator 2: 3-D at Universal Studios Florida will run its last shows on Sunday, October 8 to make way for an all-new live action experience based on a high-energy Universal franchise. It will open in 2019. This is one of many exciting new experiences coming to Universal Orlando Resort as we continue our epic growth. Stay tuned – more details will be released soon.
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Today is final day for Dueling Dragons. Here is some vintage footage from around 1999-2002. While I personally am not sold that this is a "good decision" we will wait to see what the future holds. Went to take our final rides a couple of weeks ago and stood at the exit shooting some footage for a while and I watch the MAJORITY of guests exit the ride and *RUN* back to the entrance to ride again. I'm just not sure why a park would want to touch a ride that still seems to have such high satisfaction.

 

I mean attractions like Universe or Energy or Great Movie Ride usually gets reactions like "Wow, I'll never get that 27 minutes of my life back" so I understand why those rides time have come. But that's not the case for Dragons.

 

Oh well, all I know is that whatever they are planning to replace it with has a high bar already set for it and I feel it will be difficult to to beat Dragons, but we shall see. Enjoy the video...

 

Hi, I'm new to this forum, but I really want to know what song you used during that video. Unfortunately several music recognizer apps etc. returned nothing.

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Over/under that this will become a Harry potter attraction?

The statement says it's a franchise Universal owns themselves. I'm betting on Secret Life of Pets.

 

That's what I thought, too. I remember early postings about Universal working on some kind of attraction,

based on SLofPs, to go into the Hollywood park. Maybe they're going to do it first in Orlando?

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