DaptoFunlandGuy

Honestly the practical effects seem to get more attention (when they're working) than the digital stuff. I'd rather they switched to practical however possible (though noting some don't translate well). Hanna Barbera Land used to have a bedrock style house, with doors and such with things that opened and shut - including a sabertoothed cat's tail that would growl (like a sabertooth cat) when kids would pull on it. The effects don't have to be stupendously amazing. And nothing that relies on consumables - like fog juice etc - water spray or sound effects triggers are just fine - heck even the madagascar statues in Dreamworks that spray water get the laughs every day from people caught out. Given Doomsday's literal high bar to entry, having things that amuse the kids in the surrounding areas should be a priority. And get rid of the RFID crap.

^what he said. I packed it on over COVID, and started having issues in the mid-130s. (It was a good kick in the ass to do something about it). Try the test seats if they have them. Don't be afraid to give it a go. Most operators will do everything they safely can to get you to ride and experience has taught them a few tricks to try to get you to fit. Understand though that if an operator says you can't ride - don't give them a hard time - they're keeping you safe. (Not saying you would but the number of people i've seen abuse ride ops because they don't meet rider requirements is ghastly). Also don't judge similar rides the same. At my worst, Rivals was a struggle but possible, and on the same day, Taipan was effortless.

The stage does look much better - i'm hoping that the tree survives being buried under an extra cube of dirt. (It does look like they adjusted the fairy lights when the garden went in, so that's a good sign).

It'd be on the opposite side of the pathway - which based on the markings we've seen, they're keeping the path intact. I would like to see them repurpose that space though - even if they park a coffee cart or something there for parents to chill.

READ. IT. AGAIN. However: Just no. See Also: Brogent's attempts at getting SkyVoyager approved under Australian requirements... "in the coming weeks" is famous here for a reason. Effectively a copy-paste rollercoaster with minimal changes, and it still cost $30Million. A flagship copy darkride is still going to smash that out of the park, and $30Million is about the limit of ride investments here in Aus. This isn't fantasyland. its. not. going. to. happen.

And I'd also like to reiterate: While history has shown that true creative australian theme park attractions are possible without blowing the bank (see Bermuda and LTRR as examples), simply copy pasting an attraction from overseas is generally not within the budget of our parks. The fact that both of those examples no longer stand is also a testament to the willingness and budgets of our parks being able to cope with the maintenance and upkeep requirements of those attractions long term too. I think the issue here is the studios are just too... used. USH can do it because their backlot is so vast that if shooting is occurring on one set, the tour simply diverts to another. Our studio tour is literally nothing but the sound stages, and with some of the bigger productions we've hosted here in AUS in recent years, you simply couldn't offer that experience anytime a big production is in town. (Hint: Theres a reason why they don't use the sound stages for fright nights anymore). A fixed stage show hand in hand with a purpose built showcase facility that can house sets and costumes is the ideal outcome.

Youtube's ThePoolGuy has suggested that waxing and polishing slides should be done twice a year.

I know you did, i wasn't trying to ignore that - i was paraphrasing an actual quote I had heard, but the same logic applies - if you can pay-to-ride a dreamworld ride at night, why bother going during the day for much more money? ... I'd love for the rides to be open at night but the logic as explained to me I completely understand. I mean, I think thats possibly why they seem to be going with a "K&B Dreamland". If I take a step back here, we're doing that enthusiast thing where we're judging the finished product before we've even seen the artist's impression. We don't know what they plan to do, and everything is based on assumptions. If they can recycle theming elements while applying a non-ip-based theme to the rides and lands with minimal, mainly cosmetic alterations, i'm all for it. Little Wonders Land sucked because there was no 'face' of the kids rides. They were all "SmartBuy" or "No Frills" versions of the original, with little effort to tie in. Kenny and Belinda have always been the face of Dreamworld, and the brand push for the park has been using K&B with increasing regularity in the last couple of years. Tying this into the dreamworks area, and perhaps linking KFP-land's asian theme to tiger island as you suggest is also a really good idea to reuse, connect, and keep themes cohesive without sucking the soul out of the area like Wonderland did.

A little birdie explained this to me a while back, the source is very reliable, and it makes a lot of sense. When Moonlight first surfaced, lots of folk asked "why aren't you opening the rides, riding ST would be awesome" - and the logic from Dreamworld was "Who is going to visit the park for $xx day ticket \ annual pass, if you can come to a night market and ride a $30Million attraction for $2. Ok, sure you suggested an upcharge alternative, but even with the upcharge, you're still cheapening the attractions by doing so. Why visit Dreamworld when it's packed during the day if you can come after hours and get dinner too? Dreamworld has been very particular about moonlight having its own brand - staff don't wear their uniforms (or they have a moonlight themed shirt) and the only thing that identifies them is their DW staff card. This also allows them to separate the markets brand down the track and relocating it without necessarily losing something unique to the park in the process. I fear that it may be the end of Dreamworks, and a generic theme is a negative for sure (Little Wonders Land anyone?) but they did this once before when they released the Nickelodeon brand before Dreamworks was signed on. The rebranding expense should stay minimal (removing any IP related icons, while using existing themed elements to guide the new theme - aka Jungle Rush for example) and the actual IP is of minimal interest to the target demographic. Not to mention the cost of the rebrand is probably cheaper than the licence renewal. so saved them some money most likely.

Absolutely agree with you on every point - the thing is they can cater to both. I know I keep banging on, but it's my most recent experience and it feels relevant (and I'm about halfway through my TR draft so it'll get there eventually) - Far East Hospitality have one of their Village Hotels right opposite Universal in Singapore. The hotel doesn't give off any specific 'kids hotel' or 'theme park hotel' vibes in any of their facilities (except that they have many family \ adjoining rooms) - but the hotel itself catered VERY well to kids and the pool spaces reflected both of these - the sophistication of an adult's only pool with swim up bar, to a lazy river and shallow paddle pool with kiddie slides for the little guys. I'll talk more about it when I get around to posting it, but just felt it relevant to mention that you can do one hotel that can cater (well) to both crowds without excluding the others.

It is still very much a factor - one only has to read comments from regular folk on socials about where to visit. However the main reason it's still a factor is because they absolutely botched their recovery - for several years - with plans of ampitheatres, adventure rivers, return of the mine ride, rebuild of wipeout, et al. I think much of the time Osborne was CEO should be written off, just my opinion. I'm not suggesting they are now, but they did. Boiled frog syndrome at play. The thing is - people ARE starting to notice the higher prices, and the lack of ongoing investment. Thats all we've heard on social this year. Losing rides and attractions like bermuda, LTRR, PASS, studio tour - the loss of experiences has been replaced with rides that simply cannot physically offer the same capacity. That's the dichotomy at play here though - people are still paying to visit village, based on their last trip being better at village. It isn't any longer - and that's why the socials are what they are at present. The tide is turning in my opinion, and the efforts village are taking now to try to correct capacity and overselling issues are evidence that they've noticed - its a question of whether it may be too late for the folks whose annual trip in 2022 left them with a bad taste. Next years plans are based on this years trip, so we may see the tide swing over the next 6-12 months unless Village can rejig things a bit quicker (and to be perfectly honest, losing some of the attendance (at least at Movie World) would be a boon for village as it would be the easiest correction to many of their current issues - the fight will be whether those losses are diverted to Sea World or Dreamworld.... and only time will tell.

It's a chicken and egg situation, but hopefully keeping people on property past 5pm will encourage more nightlife development. A big factor in holiday planning for families can be the dreaded end of day travel. When you consider this end of the gold coast can keep a family busy for a solid 3 days and two nights, it has potential - Movie World Day Dream World Day Wet n Wild \ Paradise Country Day (season dependent) Top Golf Night AOS Night it won't take much to really make an onsite hotel attractive.

I'm all for showcase, but I think it's current position taking over showstage is an issue. Give it a spot purpose built. use intencity like they used to (especially since they don't offer the dodgem cars anymore) and return the showstage to actually host a show - shows can absorb WAY more guests than the current ride lineup. Make it something repeatable (dancing costumed characters doing corny storylines doesn't cut it) - stunt show, magic show, animal actors, special effects.... with enough audience interaction to make every show different. IMO, this is what MW needs far more than any ride. Unless they do a continuous load dark ride, not much else is going to give MW the kind of capacity boost it needs.

I'd like to see the pool a little more 'fun' than 'business conference' but the size of the kids club makes good sense. I assume this latest design is to combat the objections to the hotel being so close to the highway. They've clearly allowed for the local flooding issues by having the raised driveway, it will be interesting though when the carpark floods!

The average guest isn't counting the closure of a bakery in the exit store. (They also aren't counting the Lego Store as an added attraction either, just to be fair). Like - fair suck of the sav - The GC as a whole has had numerous ride losses without direct replacements on both sides of the fence, but including food outlets to inflate the list is exaggerating it a bit far. Many F&B outlets haven't reopened in many places simply because there isn't the crowd to sustain it (except in peak periods and hence why Rick's opened only for the school holidays). I recently visited Singapore (TR to come eventually) and the majority of food outlets around Universal were closed too. I would suggest (my own opinion) that the reason for lower crowds at DW is not because it feels gutted (because IMO, it really doesn't) but because of the stigma of the fact that they killed people, and the past years of recovery were botched horribly. Even absent the removed attractions, I've had a far more pleasant day at Dreamworld recently simply because ride wait times were reasonable, staff were pleasant, and the park was clean. Village constantly struggles to meet capacity because they've constantly given away the gate, oversold, removed high capacity attractions and replaced them with lower capacity ones that are less reliable, and then hobble their staff by imposing ridiculous arbitrary and unnecessary operational restrictions instead of encouraging them to be (safely) efficient. But as i've said repeatedly - until people vote with their wallet, nobody is going to take notice of the problems. The current flux at Dreamworld is the result of people voting with their wallet, but recovery takes time.

I mean heck - USS The Mummy has real fire... so that means it's cool, right?

Prove it.

That's a long bow to draw. They explicitly mention Leviathan. Surely marketing the one-two punch and having Trident on your presser would be a no-brainer, so not mentioning it is clearly implying it isn't necessarily guaranteed (and flip side, by naming leviathan, it would appear that they are guaranteeing it). It could be, but there is no explicit mention, so you can't conclude that it will.

No, you can't. Because even if you shoot it up the lift at the same angle, you still don't have 3 metres clearance laterally inside the lift tunnel. End. Of. Story.

Which they should absolutely be applauded for. COVID also no doubt played a part in stalling things - Atlantis originally slated to deliver in 2020, which would have launched and given them a recovery period before the next big thing most likely at MW, but everything got shit canned, and then when everything started up again, everything had mile-long delays. The overseas parks always have things in the pipeline each year whereas our parks are normally a longer game, which is more easily disrupted as they aren't buying every year.

Depends on if you count kids rides since Marvin is coming earlier than that.

100% this. this is exactly what the WWF final lift hill should be trying to be. Maybe less reliant on the smoke blasts as anything consumable is going to tap out and has the potential to be neglected \ burn dry, but the light effects themselves (perhaps with strobes at opportune moments rather than smoke) would be long lasting provided they were done right. Hopefully someone in-park sees what this could be.

Cold sparks are still a fire risk. And it isn't possible to insulate the area without enclosing it in a box (which of course then ruins the effect). No - I miss the attention to detail that they represent, but I don't want them to come back.

These are an accessory to the "plain green bushes" wraps they used to have for the temporary fencing. The bush wraps were 'per piece' so each joint had a gap. Those pieces have the same green bush print on them, and are designed to fit in between the fence panels to cover the gap \ hide the concrete foot. My guess is, since they wrapped it in loony tunes, they didn't need the green bushes accessories that were probably used in their last position.