downunder

Checked the mouse out going up the Hair raiser yesterday. No real change to previous photos people have put up. On a side note, Halloscream has regressed significantly from last year (which was excellent) - I guess cutbacks were necessary to improve profitability, and freeing up the big top for events (rather than mazes) makes sense. The performers were killing it though. Got a new season pass yesterday, and they told me you can tap your pass at rides now rather than getting a wristband - didn't try it out because they gave me a wristband when I purchased an AP anyway.

I took videos of every maze at Universal Hollywood and Knott's. I'll get them up on youtube when I get chance.

Lol don't I know it, only way I could work it into my schedule. Knott's and Uni Hollywood absolutely knocked it out of the park this year. I took video of the new mazes at Knotts, and they took over 8 minutes to get through without any stopping.

Going this Saturday, hopefully the crowds won't be absolutely crazy (do have express). After doing Halloween Horror Nights Hollywood and Scary Farm last week nothing would shock me lol.

Lol I wish I'd known that before I bought the maze only Fast Track, WWE being included would have been the tipping point.

Village will keep pushing the envelope until they hit a tipping point as people have observed previously in the thread. Speaking purely as a customer, I'm really not seeing value this year, and would have given Fright Nights a miss it if I hadn't made plans with other people prior to knowing the offerings for this year. I'm going to Halloween Horror Nights Hollywood and Knott's Scary Farm the week before, ignoring the exchange rate, they are much better value and have unlimited express. What's interesting about Universal in Orlando, is that two parks combined have less capacity than any one of the Disney parks yet they are doing comparable attendance numbers to 3 of their parks if you believe TEA. It's quite striking - Islands of Adventure has 29K capacity and Studios 27K. Disney on the other hand Animal Kingdom and their Studios are 60K a piece, and Epcot is 110K and Magic Kingdom 100K. I guess time will tell with Village. I also see anecdotally on every village post on facebook an avalanche of complaints. And I think a lot of parents just want to keep their kids amused so why not head up the road to a better value option.

Thanks for that. I could have sworn previously when I was weighing up Underground Package versus fast track, the extra rooms were exclusive to Underground. Maybe I missed this or it changed, but cool, even more incentive to get fast track now.

I considered the Underground Package, but I didn't think it was good value; and I'm not really into clubbing. I am surprised the package sold out. I imagine as it's the only way to get to the special rooms in three houses it would have been attractive that way too. I don't know anyone personally who went for it.

Yep, since I posted I've heard that fast track hit capacity so they had to stop selling the package. As regular fast track is still available, logically capacity may be tied to accessing the special rooms.

Interesting, the underground package has dropped off the ticket offerings and been replaced by a $75 cover charge to get into the Underground Club. I don't know if the package sold out or they withdrew it due to lack of sales (if so, not many people will get access to the special rooms).

They did a lengthy refurb in 2022 (if memory serves me right) and then it opened for a few months, and was closed by Halloscream last year, so there must have been some complications. As mentioned in this thread previously, they do have heritage regulations to meet. I'd be very curious about the specifics, do they have to retain every part of the structure that isn't compromised for instance.

^Thanks for that. I was trying to get a clear shot from the train, but it was hard.

Went by on the train just then, almost the entire coaster is not there at the moment, except the lift hill supports.

Project Horozon at Alton Towers has been dropping RMC hints for their new coaster in an existing show building. Maybe Wild Moose, maybe something else. Busch Tampa just got rid of their mouse, which is in a boxed in location. We'll see....

Maybe we'll see some Wild Moose models popping up soon. A good-sized plot has been cleared at Camp Snoopy at Knott's Berry Farm - that's a possibility, and it's sufficiently different from Coast Rider on the other side of the park, time will tell. I also wonder if Sydney Zoo would look at installing some permanent rides, maybe have a Camp Snoopy style kid's area. Soon we'll see if LP meant late summer as in Jan/Feb 2024 or December 2024 for the refurb.

Lol that's a good one. Are the operations consistently on-track yet? I'll have to pay Luna Park a visit some time and see how they're going.

My wanting one here was purely a wish. Adventure World is the only place that comes to mind. Could they shoe-horn one into Luna Park Melbourne, like they did with Metropolis (not sure what would have to move, or if the space is now taken up by anything more permanent), and Gumbuya probably won't need a new coaster for a long time.

The RMC Wild Moose looks like a cool ride, hopefully someone down here gets one.

Have we got any Rove McManus impersonators out there?

It sounds very iconic, and maybe they can build the helix of a coaster around it so it can be the first hotel in the world inside a ride. Seriously, I'd stay there if I was doing a night event like Fright Nights and the price was reasonable. Conferences and film production people might be a good occupancy base on top of tourists.

I'd love to do WWW at night, even better if there's an overlay. Not on fast track, sigh.

It doesn't look like the Underground Package even has fast track for the rides just the mazes lol. I guess Fast Track Mazes and Rides will cost almost the same, hard choice. I value the ride component because you don't get to ride MW coasters at night all that often.

Oh sorry, I thought it was Wicked Twister 2 lol. Are amusement parks around the world having a comp for the least imaginative ride name? Will it really get to the top of the back spike, or will it do a Tower of Terror 2? I was fortunate enough to ride the original many times and will always remember the pure exhileration of that launch.

I've been involved in a lot of product wind downs, and in my opinion which hopefully is obvious, just tell them the product is being wound up and here's your options, emphasising benefits. Jacking up the prices ridiculously and hoping people quit the product lol. It really creates a perception about VRTP. I'll visit eventually too, though I'll be quite circumspect about it. Maybe some better product offerings for Fright Nights will get me up. Last year I wasn't going to bother and only went to Fright Nights because friends were going too, who I hadn't seen in 3 years thanks to COVID. At the end of the day VRTP can do what they want and consumers will do what they want based on what value perception they have of their product offerings.

Lol I only noticed that on the g-link heading to the airport bus yesterday morning (we were staying at Surfer's Paradise north). Did Infinity for the first time in decades. Still seems to be going strong. Shame Dracula's haunted attraction is gone, so cheesy. The talking shark animatronic was hilariously ridiculous, and the way they suggested sharks are just sitting there waiting to prey on humans.