A Spirited Valentine ...

[VJ]

I've watched three different versions of the ride, with three different CMs, and I can't figure out if they're in on Rocket's plan or not.

They are. They're planning to revolt against the Collector which is why they're selling off all his stuff in the gift shop.

 

[the.dreamfinder]

Hey look, everyone, I found two shills that are on Universal's payroll that are here to say bad stuff about Disney!

Sure... Except those times I've criticized UNI.

Woodbury is hated in UNI Creative as much as Bruce Vaughn was at WDI.

The placement of that park at the southernmost point of their property still baffles me. This park should have been built on the land Sapphire Falls sits on so guests could see Krakatau on their way to the other parks.

 

[Princess Leia]

Lose the "s" on Edgar's last name or put an apostrophe in there - please

Fixed

 

[SJN1279]

Loved Pirates, super fun and a fitting end to the series. Loved the shorter run time as well.

 

[Kman101]

I doubt there's an end. I have no doubts we see Pirates 6.

 

[UpAllNight]

Ok I'll try be as rational as possible regarding Volcano Bay, given its 2 days old.

The Good

- It's pleasant

- The best collection of slides in Orlando

- The Water Coaster is great

- The noise from the parallel roads aren't an issue in the park

The Bad

- Tapu Tapu was an absolute shambles. 300 odd minutes for a slide. And you can only queue for one slide at a time. There were tons of employees in the park doing counts of guests/surveys/looking important, so this will change probably.

The Ugly

- There's absolutely nothing here that is revolutionary in any way. They've overhyped and under delivered.

- It's worse than both Typhoon Lagoon and Blizard Beach which are 20/30 years older.

- There were large areas unfinished.

- The theming on the 2 rivers was dreadful and also incomplete. The fast one goes under the metal volcano structure and it looks ugly as sin.

- The line at guest relations was huge all day

- Tapu Tapu has major major flaws. When a ride breaks down and you're through the touch point your options are to a) stay in the queue b) leave and have to find someone to clear your Tapu tapu...an absolute pain

- They will always have the issue of explaining to people that 'Ride Now' doesn't infact mean 'Ride Now' but 'Join the physical ride queue for ages now'

- I've never heard of so many slides breaking in 1 day. It took them 40 minutes to fix a conveyor belt on one of them. It's a conveyor belt, how much can go wrong?!

- At one point 8 slides were down at once

- It was sold as no waiting in line. I've never waited in line so much at a waterpark (I know it's early doors)

-Stress free was also a big selling point. Nope.

- It shouldn't have opened given all of the above. It was a complete joke, I'd be furious if I paid the 1 day ticket price.

 

[Goob]

Thanks for giving us this unbiased, honest review.

I can let them slide a little bit for all the hiccups a new park has, at least for the first week or so. But if they don't get this Tapu Tapu figured out, it's a deal breaker for me. It's the main draw.

The volcano looks absolutely badass with all the water gushing out of it.

 

[Soarin' Over Pgh]

Ok I'll try be as rational as possible regarding Volcano Bay, given its 2 days old.

The Good

- It's pleasant

- The best collection of slides in Orlando

- The Water Coaster is great

- The noise from the parallel roads aren't an issue in the park

The Bad

- Tapu Tapu was an absolute shambles. 300 odd minutes for a slide. And you can only queue for one slide at a time. There were tons of employees in the park doing counts of guests/surveys/looking important, so this will change probably.

The Ugly

- There's absolutely nothing here that is revolutionary in any way. They've overhyped and under delivered.

- It's worse than both Typhoon Lagoon and Blizard Beach which are 20/30 years older.

- There were large areas unfinished.

- The theming on the 2 rivers was dreadful and also incomplete. The fast one goes under the metal volcano structure and it looks ugly as sin.

- The line at guest relations was huge all day

- Tapu Tapu has major major flaws. When a ride breaks down and you're through the touch point your options are to a) stay in the queue b) leave and have to find someone to clear your Tapu tapu...an absolute pain

- They will always have the issue of explaining to people that 'Ride Now' doesn't infact mean 'Ride Now' but 'Join the physical ride queue for ages now'

- I've never heard of so many slides breaking in 1 day. It took them 40 minutes to fix a conveyor belt on one of them. It's a conveyor belt, how much can go wrong?!

- At one point 8 slides were down at once

- It was sold as no waiting in line. I've never waited in line so much at a waterpark (I know it's early doors)

-Stress free was also a big selling point. Nope.

- It shouldn't have opened given all of the above. It was a complete joke, I'd be furious if I paid the 1 day ticket price.

Ouch!

Well at least it ...uh, looks pretty?

 

[monothingie]

Ok I'll try be as rational as possible regarding Volcano Bay, given its 2 days old.

The Good

- It's pleasant

- The best collection of slides in Orlando

- The Water Coaster is great

- The noise from the parallel roads aren't an issue in the park

The Bad

- Tapu Tapu was an absolute shambles. 300 odd minutes for a slide. And you can only queue for one slide at a time. There were tons of employees in the park doing counts of guests/surveys/looking important, so this will change probably.

The Ugly

- There's absolutely nothing here that is revolutionary in any way. They've overhyped and under delivered.

- It's worse than both Typhoon Lagoon and Blizard Beach which are 20/30 years older.

- There were large areas unfinished.

- The theming on the 2 rivers was dreadful and also incomplete. The fast one goes under the metal volcano structure and it looks ugly as sin.

- The line at guest relations was huge all day

- Tapu Tapu has major major flaws. When a ride breaks down and you're through the touch point your options are to a) stay in the queue b) leave and have to find someone to clear your Tapu tapu...an absolute pain

- They will always have the issue of explaining to people that 'Ride Now' doesn't infact mean 'Ride Now' but 'Join the physical ride queue for ages now'

- I've never heard of so many slides breaking in 1 day. It took them 40 minutes to fix a conveyor belt on one of them. It's a conveyor belt, how much can go wrong?!

- At one point 8 slides were down at once

- It was sold as no waiting in line. I've never waited in line so much at a waterpark (I know it's early doors)

-Stress free was also a big selling point. Nope.

- It shouldn't have opened given all of the above. It was a complete joke, I'd be furious if I paid the 1 day ticket price.

Wow! So I guess the takeaway is that USO sh*t stinks too. Whoda thunk it?

 

[Rodan75]

Ok I'll try be as rational as possible regarding Volcano Bay, given its 2 days old.

The Good

- It's pleasant

- The best collection of slides in Orlando

- The Water Coaster is great

- The noise from the parallel roads aren't an issue in the park

The Bad

- Tapu Tapu was an absolute shambles. 300 odd minutes for a slide. And you can only queue for one slide at a time. There were tons of employees in the park doing counts of guests/surveys/looking important, so this will change probably.

The Ugly

- There's absolutely nothing here that is revolutionary in any way. They've overhyped and under delivered.

- It's worse than both Typhoon Lagoon and Blizard Beach which are 20/30 years older.

- There were large areas unfinished.

- The theming on the 2 rivers was dreadful and also incomplete. The fast one goes under the metal volcano structure and it looks ugly as sin.

- The line at guest relations was huge all day

- Tapu Tapu has major major flaws. When a ride breaks down and you're through the touch point your options are to a) stay in the queue b) leave and have to find someone to clear your Tapu tapu...an absolute pain

- They will always have the issue of explaining to people that 'Ride Now' doesn't infact mean 'Ride Now' but 'Join the physical ride queue for ages now'

- I've never heard of so many slides breaking in 1 day. It took them 40 minutes to fix a conveyor belt on one of them. It's a conveyor belt, how much can go wrong?!

- At one point 8 slides were down at once

- It was sold as no waiting in line. I've never waited in line so much at a waterpark (I know it's early doors)

-Stress free was also a big selling point. Nope.

- It shouldn't have opened given all of the above. It was a complete joke, I'd be furious if I paid the 1 day ticket price.

Wow. It looked behind and I guess this proves it. They rushed without thinking things thru. Sounds like the disaster that was the USF original opening.

 

[Mike S]

Wow! So I guess the takeaway is that UOR sh*t stinks too. Whoda thunk it?

 

[Rodan75]

I also think they are advanced enough now to have most of the issues fixed by next week at the latest.

But in the new theme park wars, Disney gets a point for a well structured launch. Assuming social media doesn't go crazy tomorrow with FoP seating issues.

 

[Mike S]

I also think they are advanced enough now to have most of the issues fixed by next week at the latest.

But in the new theme park wars, Disney gets a point for a well structured launch. Assuming social media doesn't go crazy tomorrow with FoP seating issues.

The Theme Park Wars saga:

2010: A New Hope (WWoHP)
2017: The Empire Strikes Back (Avatar)

It all lines up. VB will surely get fixed over time but this is just a disaster. I'll be waiting a while before I go. Avatar is June 3rd though since I cannot wait. Seeing as how I have the big DL trip coming up in July I downgraded to the silver WDW pass this year and the cutoff for blackout is June 5th.

 

[UpAllNight]

I should have added they were dishing out refunds left right and center for many very irate people who'd purchased express. The express pass basically means you can bypass the need to wait in the virtual line...but as the park was sold as not having any physical lines, when someone were to go into the express line they'd be met with a massive physical queue, making the whole thing rather pointless.

Today there were loads of people working to help people out, but I don't see this as being something that they'll be able to change. A lot of people just couldn't grasp the concept.

Uni absolutely did themselves no favours here though. They also handed out absolutely nothing to explain how it all worked, there was no info boards anywhere...no explanation you can only wait in 1 queue plus the water coaster.

The Tapu tapu tells you how long until you ride, but as it monitors the live situation in terms of guest flow you could look one time and it would say 90 minutes then look again and it's up to 125.

 

[Cesar R M]

There are two pre-show rooms, each with its own Rocket AA.

Thank you!
I had no idea they built more than one!

Wishing they could have put more love in Cosmo.

 

[Cesar R M]

Yeesh, folks, are we really going to play the "you can't trust anybody in news media" game? That's a deep, dark, paranoid road to get lost in. Consider the source, of course, but this is a surefire way to get into the "ignore anybody who says something I don't like" mindset.

I'm sure the ride is fun. The music, the lights, the characters, I'm sure it's a good time. I also think it's entirely fair to point out all the pre-existing critiques of the entire idea and Disneys current IP over-reliance. Things can have multiple aspects to them.

Nah, you just have to get your news from many different sources and then make your own opinion by comparing them to balance them out.

If you go to Foxnews you should expect it to defend some camp at all costs.. same with the opposite on NBC for example.

So I think going for multiple sources is the way to go than actually ignoring.
But if you see a constant trend (like when someone ignores the bad reviews and flaws of something and gives good ones at all costs) you know who to cut from your source list

 

[flynnibus]

Considering seeing potc? Don't

 

[BrianLo]

I should have added they were dishing out refunds left right and center for many very irate people who'd purchased express. The express pass basically means you can bypass the need to wait in the virtual line...but as the park was sold as not having any physical lines, when someone were to go into the express line they'd be met with a massive physical queue, making the whole thing rather pointless.

Today there were loads of people working to help people out, but I don't see this as being something that they'll be able to change. A lot of people just couldn't grasp the concept.

Uni absolutely did themselves no favours here though. They also handed out absolutely nothing to explain how it all worked, there was no info boards anywhere...no explanation you can only wait in 1 queue plus the water coaster.

The Tapu tapu tells you how long until you ride, but as it monitors the live situation in terms of guest flow you could look one time and it would say 90 minutes then look again and it's up to 125.

So, who'd have thought 6 months ago the reception to Guardians of the Tower would go smoother than Volcano Bay? I really think Universal overcalled this one trying to co-launch against pretty much the biggest US Disney rollout since DCA 2.0 (including Pandora and Happily Ever After obviously). They absolutely rushed this in an attempt to grab the lime light, the park should have opened in June following proper softs.

Both companies have a serious fanbase issues, in my opinion. The Disney fanbase is critically irate and the Universal one too pixie dust fuelled, expectations for both would be better served somewhere in the middle.

I know forgiveness need always be applied to grand openings, but it sounds like this was a cluster, whereas Disney's near disaster Shanghai launched almost too smoothly. The park does look quite good, but the opening is bad PR. I guess we'll see how Pandora goes with the public...

 

[MinnieWaffles]

-plays a sad trombone for Volcano Bay's launch day-

 

[Nubs70]

How was the rest of the audience in your theater? Could you tell from their reactions if they liked it or not?

The only reason I'm seeing it is because Young Jack Sparrow went to my church and high school, and I'm friends with his brother, so I feel like I need to support the local (even though I know Johnny's face is CGI'd over his).

Owensboro?