Universal Epic Universe (South Expansion Complex) - Now Open!

[mkt]

Here's my tier ratings


S-Tier:
Harry Potter and the Battle at the Ministry
Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment
Stardust Racers

A-Tier:
Hiccup’s Wing Gliders
The Untrainable Dragon – Surprisingly emotional show. Puppetry and effects are next level.
Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge – Augmented reality plus chaos. Not everyone’s cup of tea but wildly impressive.

B-Tier:
Mine-Cart Madness
Le Cirque Arcanus
Curse of the Werewolf

C-Tier:
Yoshi’s Adventure
Dragon Racer’s Rally
Fyre Drill
Constellation Carousel

D-Tier:
Astronomica (it's a splash pad)
Darkmoor Monster Makeup Experience (It's a gift shop/experience pretending to be an attraction)
Viking Training Camp (it's a playround)

F-Tier
Nothing here earns an F. Even the D-Tier stuff is well themed and can be fun.

 

[lewisc]

Your D Tier attractions are geared to kids who don't meet the height requirements for many rides.

A guest tall enough to ride Stardust isn't going to love a splash pad or playground

 

[Agent H]

I’m still surprised that people rank yoshi’s adventure and Mario kart so low. Yoshi’s adventure is a really cute people mover ride and Mario kart is chaotic and fun in the same way runaway railway is. I think it definitely deserves to be considered an e-ticket and will definitely function that way for the general public.

 

[Purduevian]

That’s a really fair breakdown of the rides, in my opinion. I certainly have some disagreements regarding the rankings of the rides, and I would not put Epic as high as number three, but overall I can see where you are coming from and, like I said, that’s a really good list.

Yeah, I'm sure everyone's list is a little different, but looking at EPIC, vs DHS, vs AK attraction line up my personal rankings

Attraction Rank	EPIC	DHS	AK
1	BATM	ROTR	FOP
2	Monsters	ToT	Everest
3	Stardust	MMRR	Safari
4	Mario Kart	SDD	Dinosaur
5	Hiccups	RNRC	FotLK
6	Minecart	MFSR	Na'vi
7	Untrainable Dragon	Toy Story Mania	Nemo
8	Circus	Indy	Gorilla falls
9	COTWW	Mermaid	Jungle Trek
10	Yoshi	Frozen	Kali
11	Fyre Drill	BATB	Feathered Friends
12	Dragon Racer's	Villains	Animation class
13	Constellation Carousel	Vacation fun	Affection section
14	Viking Training camp	Walt Disney Presents	Boneyard
15	Astronomica	Launch Bay	Conservation Station

 

[mkt]

Your D Tier attractions are geared to kids who don't meet the height requirements for many rides.

A guest tall enough to ride Stardust isn't going to love a splash pad or playground

I've got a kid who doesn't meet the height requirement for many rides.

I still stand by the D rating.

 

[ThemeParkTraveller]

I think Epic is the best theme park that has opened in the last 25 years or so.

It's not better than Tokyo DisneySea—but for me, nothing is. That said, I agree otherwise. I do think Epic Universe has the best opening-day attraction roster of any theme park in recent memory—not in terms of quantity, of course, but in quality. Monsters and Ministry alone are worth the price of admission for me.

 

[JusticeDisney]

No way.

Stardust Racers
Monsters Unchained
Hiccups Wing Gliders
Mario Kart
Battle at the Ministry
Fyre Drill

Werewolf is decent, and so is Donkey Kong…
And I actually liked Dragon Racers Rally too…

It’s the Carousel and Yoshi I could skip.

To each their own, but absolutely nothing special at all about anything other than the big 3, in my opinion anyway.

 

[CntrlFlPete]

I think what is missing (when one just looks at Epic) from an attraction stand point is the emersion/entertainment aspect of what Epic captures well.

'Theme park' fans might not rate Mario Kart high but families are spending time in Nintendo land, they are buying power up bands and playing games throughout the land, eating themed food, buying themed merchandise. One thing that SHOULD worry other area destinations, is I hear families saying that the kids don't won't to leave Epic at the end of the day.

When I hear a term like 'Disney Adult' and then I see how adults seem to like to dress in theme to things like Vikings and Monsters and then they Harry Potter folks -- Epic seems to give this crowd a wonderful play ground as much as the kids -- the kids, the adults, they all seem to enjoy meeting dragons and Vikings.

There are many stories one can learn speaking to the villagers of Darkmore.

Anyway, I think there is a lot more to Epic than just the rides that make it tough (for me) to experience it all in a day.

 

[MrPromey]

I think what is missing (when one just looks at Epic) from an attraction stand point is the emersion/entertainment aspect of what Epic captures well.

'Theme park' fans might not rate Mario Kart high but families are spending time in Nintendo land, they are buying power up bands and playing games throughout the land, eating themed food, buying themed merchandise. One thing that SHOULD worry other area destinations, is I hear families saying that the kids don't won't to leave Epic at the end of the day.

When I hear a term like 'Disney Adult' and then I see how adults seem to like to dress in theme to things like Vikings and Monsters and then they Harry Potter folks -- Epic seems to give this crowd a wonderful play ground as much as the kids -- the kids, the adults, they all seem to enjoy meeting dragons and Vikings.

There are many stories one can learn speaking to the villagers of Darkmore.

Anyway, I think there is a lot more to Epic than just the rides that make it tough (for me) to experience it all in a day.

For the younger "Disney Adults" who never got to meet Jack Diamond or any of the other Citizens of Hollywood at HWS, this is going to be a difficult concept to grasp because they see a character interaction as that 30 second photo op you wait in line 45-60 minutes for.

The idea of coming across a trio of girls from different wizard schools in different uniforms and completely in character wandering around the potter area marveling at what they see in the store windows without a handler and who will stop and have complete conversations with people who walk up to them, basically until the natural end of their conversation is going to be a difficult thing for them to imagine.

Similar to those characters sprinkled around isle of Burk who again, will basically improv with anyone who talks to them.

Interactions with the monsters are a little less personal but it's pretty obvious that as monsters, they're a bit less approachable in general.

The Mario characters you wait in line for but with everything else in that land, I basically had to drag my son out of it both days we were there. He'd have been content spending hours doing the mini games and collecting stamps around the land if left to his own devices.

 

[DarkMetroid567]

I don’t think “best park in 25 years” is a particularly bold take. Your competition there is DCA and parks that are the first in their respective market.

 

[lazyboy97o]

I don’t think “best park in 25 years” is a particularly bold take. Your competition there is DCA and parks that are the first in their respective market.

It also includes the previous three world’s most expensive theme parks: Universal Studios Beijing, Shanghai Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySEA.

 

[simon9454]

Yeah, I'm sure everyone's list is a little different, but looking at EPIC, vs DHS, vs AK attraction line up my personal rankings

Attraction Rank	EPIC	DHS	AK
1	BATM	ROTR	FOP
2	Monsters	ToT	Everest
3	Stardust	MMRR	Safari
4	Mario Kart	SDD	Dinosaur
5	Hiccups	RNRC	FotLK
6	Minecart	MFSR	Na'vi
7	Untrainable Dragon	Toy Story Mania	Nemo
8	Circus	Indy	Gorilla falls
9	COTWW	Mermaid	Jungle Trek
10	Yoshi	Frozen	Kali
11	Fyre Drill	BATB	Feathered Friends
12	Dragon Racer's	Villains	Animation class
13	Constellation Carousel	Vacation fun	Affection section
14	Viking Training camp	Walt Disney Presents	Boneyard
15	Astronomica	Launch Bay	Conservation Station

How does the Tower of Terror beat Unchained and Dragon Racers Is better than the Villain? I mean I respect own opinions but I don't get it.

 

[JusticeDisney]

How does the Tower of Terror beats Unchained?

It’s subjective. I prefer TOT as well.

 

[wdwfan4ver]

I’m still surprised that people rank yoshi’s adventure and Mario kart so low. Yoshi’s adventure is a really cute people mover ride and Mario kart is chaotic and fun in the same way runaway railway is. I think it definitely deserves to be considered an e-ticket and will definitely function that way for the general public.

While I didn't go to Epic yet, I understand why Yoshi's Adventure so low.

The problem is people complain about the length of the ride itself based on what I heard. Those opinions though don't affect me wanting to try the ride in the fall.

 

[CoastalElite64]

 

[mkt]

Similar to those characters sprinkled around isle of Burk who again, will basically improv with anyone who talks to them.

Interactions with the monsters are a little less personal but it's pretty obvious that as monsters, they're a bit less approachable in general.

That’s one of the big differences between Disney and Universal.

At Walt Disney World, with a few exceptions, face characters who do meet-and-greets are typically drawn from the general character performer pool. They passed a face character audition, but that’s mostly to confirm they match the physical look of the role. The same performer playing Cinderella on Monday might be suited up as Pluto on Tuesday. They basically get paid the same hospitality industry wages as Pluto or Goofy, with a slight differential for face character that day.

At Universal Orlando, face characters are actors. They audition specifically for those roles, often performing monologues and participating in improv exercises. They’re expected to stay in character and improvise on the spot. They have contracts and earn fairly decent salaries. Many also act in local theater productions, and outside of their non-union work at Universal, some are active members of SAG-AFTRA or AEA.

 

[MrPromey]

That’s one of the big differences between Disney and Universal.

At Walt Disney World, with a few exceptions, face characters who do meet-and-greets are typically drawn from the general character performer pool. They passed a face character audition, but that’s mostly to confirm they match the physical look of the role. The same performer playing Cinderella on Monday might be suited up as Pluto on Tuesday. They basically get paid the same hospitality industry wages as Pluto or Goofy, with a slight differential for face character that day.

At Universal Orlando, face characters are actors. They audition specifically for those roles, often performing monologues and participating in improv exercises. They’re expected to stay in character and improvise on the spot. They have contracts and earn fairly decent salaries. Many also act in local theater productions, and outside of their non-union work at Universal, some are active members of SAG-AFTRA or AEA.

To be fair to Disney face characters where the longer the interaction, the greater the chances of them saying/doing something that would contradict their established character, most of Universal's face walkarounds are not a-lister characters. That's why I liken them to Citizens of Hollywood. They're more like background characters you'd imagine being in their respective things. They can make up their own back-story to stick to and own rather than memorize the one from half a dozen movies.

You'll occasionally run into the exception like a Doc Brown wandering around World Expo at Studios but we came across an older couple in the Potter area of Epic and weren't at first certain they weren't just really elaborately dressed fans. They were looking in the windows, he pulled out a wand to do one of the activations. She was seriously reading something on a wall and then people walked up and asked if they could take pictures and - boom, they were on, starting with wanting to know why these strangers would want that and going into a whole conversation about where everyone was from, how it was uncharacteristically warm that day (since, you know, it's not Florida)... and then doing the picture at the end.

Obviously, if it was a Harry or Hermione or Dumbledore, that wouldn't have worked and there would have been a mob or a handler managing a line and it would have been just a photo op.

 

[freediverdude]

I agree, from the several videos I’ve watched I’m sticking by my original prediction that US and HS will take the biggest hits, AK and EP should be equal or down slightly and IOA and MK should see equal or slightly up demand. (Relatively speaking, hard to know what’s going to happen with tourism as a whole due to world events)

I still think it’s going to change the Orlando vacation plan for a lot of people though, it’s gotten nearly impossible for Disneys fanboys (like me) who formerly did 4–6 days at Disney and zero at Uni to ignore what’s down the street now, our last FL trip was primarily DCL (with 3 days at WDW) but the prior, parks centered, trip we did 4 days at WDW and 2 at Uni, with Epic down the street I can’t envision a scenario where Uni doesn’t continue to get at least 2 days from us while Disney continues to get at least 2 but most likely 3.

Orlando will likely never again be a WDW only trip for us, or most our friends, though, whether it’s Uni, cruising, other parks, or just other FL has really expanded its overall vacation options.

I think that's the big takeaway from this, is that a lot of vacations that were historically only Disney, or took 1 day to visit Universal as an add-on, are now going to be more split between the two destinations.

I don't know how much it will affect Disney's parks, but I think it could affect Disney's hotels more so, as people could find it more convenient to stay at an offsite hotel somewhere in between if they're visiting both.

 

[JusticeDisney]

I think that's the big takeaway from this, is that a lot of vacations that were historically only Disney, or took 1 day to visit Universal as an add-on, are now going to be more split between the two destinations.

I don't know how much it will affect Disney's parks, but I think it could affect Disney's hotels more so, as people could find it more convenient to stay at an offsite hotel somewhere in between if they're visiting both.

My guess is Epic will hurt the 2 other Universal parks just as much as it will hurt any Disney park.

 

[Purduevian]

How does the Tower of Terror beat Unchained and Dragon Racers Is better than the Villain? I mean I respect own opinions but I don't get it.

Like I said, never been to epic yet, but TOT is such a complete experience and includes an actual physical thrill. Maybe once I ride it monsters will be better. Regarding villains, the show just doesn't look great to me. Rally looks fum but short, villains looks like I would actively avoid