AVATAR land - the specifics

[Bairstow]

I'm not that familiar with the specifics of the Na'vi, but do we even know what they need to breath? It's entirely possible that there could be some combination of gases that would be hospitable to both humans and Na'vi -- the Baja Tickler might simply filter out something in the air that is toxic to humans (but not essential to Na'vi) and replace it with oxygen making the air reasonable for both species.

The lore is that the atmosphere on Pandora is 20% thicker than on Earth and has too much carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide for us. Pandoran critters, the Na'vi included, need Oxygen to live, but for whatever reason the hydrogen sulfide is harmless to them.

Supposedly the Ticklers scrub the H²S and excess CO² out of the air which doesn't seem to bother the other lifeforms.

 

[CosmicPrincess]

There is no such thing as an avatar and you are not riding a dragon. You are riding a bike on a motion base in front of a screen with no control over it. You don't even get to see the dragon you riding. WDI could have taken it up a notch and done as I suggested above.

You must be TONS of fun on Disney vacations

 

[Club34]

i think its ok if some of us just fall into the camp that feels these simulator rides, even if they're "supped up", are a bit underwhelming. the fact that pandora's main attraction has one and seemingly there will be 2 in star wars land [star tours and whatever that new one is]; some of us are longing for something a bit more conventional to go along with innovative. i think the tron coaster fits that bill. how cool would it have been to have an indoor tron coaster [but think "banshee mount"] over a bio-luminescent forest. disney could have really went all out and had the boat ride going through the very same forest. so you have boaters getting up close and personal through the river and then in the canopy, you have the hoots and hollers of those on their banshees. tell me you wouldn't enjoy that more than your simulator?

 

[FigmentJedi]

I wonder if Windtraders will sell a "Pandora Field Guide" type of thing, which would be a nice compliment to the land and fit in with the entire ecotourism vibe. Ironically, something like that could actually be somewhat similar to Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (the book, not the movie) from Potter.

They printed those back when the movie came out.

http://james-camerons-avatar.wikia.com/wiki/James_Cameron's_Avatar:_An_Activist_Survival_Guide

 

[Jeremy P]

I think maybe we should all just wait to judge until we have a chance to experience it ourselves. Maybe a physical attraction would have been better, who knows? .

I saw on Twitter just a bit ago a tweet that was something I think we all should remember, the Imagineers worked incredibly hard on this experience. Do they always get it perfect? No, not always. Will someone always be able to come up with a "shoulda, coulda, woulda" after it's all said and done? Absolutely. The thing to remember is they're incredibly proud of what they've done and I think they have every right to be. We're allowed to have differing opinions and we don't have to drink the Disney punch every time they roll something out but I do think it's incredibly unfair to be critiquing what they could have done better when we haven't experienced it yet for ourselves.

 

[Figment2005]

The lore is that the atmosphere on Pandora is 20% thicker than on Earth and has too much carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide for us. Pandoran critters, the Na'vi included, need Oxygen to live, but for whatever reason the hydrogen sulfide is harmless to them.

Supposedly the Ticklers scrub the H²S and excess CO² out of the air which doesn't seem to bother the other lifeforms.

So essentially the higher oxygen content put in for us means the other native creatures are running around feeling high on life?

 

[Magic Feather]

Any word if this problem, if they even consider it a problem, has been worked out?

By blogger reactions, it seems like the major kinks have been worked out, but, even the more mild simulators will get people sick like Star Tours.

 

[Club34]

i want to make clear that i am not 'hating' on pandora or anything else that they're doing. i am, by most accounts, a disney apologist. i am simply chiming in that i do not care for simulators as attractions. point blank, they make me sick. i can handle soarin' because its basically just a big tv and you're in a chair. but as soon as you put in motion and such then i'm out. so with all the expansion going on, i was really hoping for a conventional ride experience, especially if we're talking about E ticket attractions. i struck out on the HP worlds which is fine as i'm not really a uni lover. but i am a little disappointed with the abundance of simulators coming into disney.

 

[BrianLo]

i think its ok if some of us just fall into the camp that feels these simulator rides, even if they're "supped up", are a bit underwhelming. the fact that pandora's main attraction has one and seemingly there will be 2 in star wars land [star tours and whatever that new one is]; some of us are longing for something a bit more conventional to go along with innovative. i think the tron coaster fits that bill. how cool would it have been to have an indoor tron coaster [but think "banshee mount"] over a bio-luminescent forest. disney could have really went all out and had the boat ride going through the very same forest. so you have boaters getting up close and personal through the river and then in the canopy, you have the hoots and hollers of those on their banshees. tell me you wouldn't enjoy that more than your simulator?

I wouldn't enjoy that more. The Tron bike coaster is nonsensical to this universe and is why it was thrown out very early in the process. But WDI has and will continue to suggest the Bike concept for any and every project for the next decade, so don't worry it will slip in somewhere.

It would have never lived up to honour the world. Look, Tron was fun, Hyperspace Mountain was fun, the coasters are fun, but they distract from the fact the set design itself is pretty half assed because you are speeding past it.

As someone decidedly in the I'm sick of the Universal run on simulators, Disney has yet to overdo it for the menu. There is no simulator in AK. Alcatraz is not a simulator. There were/are 8 new rides this decade and 6 were not simulators. There should have been more rides, but that's a different point.

 

[Bairstow]

So essentially the higher oxygen content put in for us means the other native creatures are running around feeling high on life?

Oxygen content may be the same when you figure in the higher ambient pressure at Sea level. Also, the original concentration of hydrogen sulfide present in the atmosphere is rather miniscule (>0.1%) so removing it would not significantly change the oxygen/xenon balance in the remaining air.


http://james-camerons-avatar.wikia.com/wiki/Pandora

 

[Casper Gutman]

I wouldn't enjoy that more. The Tron bike coaster is nonsensical to this universe and is why it was thrown out very early in the process. But WDI has and will continue to suggest the Bike concept for any and every project for the next decade, so don't worry it will slip in somewhere.

It would have never lived up to honour the world. Look, Tron was fun, Hyperspace Mountain was fun, the coasters are fun, but they distract from the fact the set design itself is pretty half assed because you are speeding past it.

As someone decidedly in the I'm sick of the Universal run on simulators, Disney has yet to overdo it for the menu. There is no simulator in AK. Alcatraz is not a simulator. There were/are 8 new rides this decade and 6 were not simulators. There should have been more rides, but that's a different point.

Universal Studios has 3 simulators, IoA has none. Epcot has 2 and, in a few years, MGM will have 2, both tied to the same IP. In fact, Fallon is the first simulator Universal has built since BttF in '91 - they just keep changing the IP in the 2 they had.

I'd love to see an end to new simulator construction entirely, honestly. I don't think a simulator will ever result in a truly GREAT ride on the level of Radiator Springs Racers, PoC, or ToT. Honestly, the best in Orlando is probably the oldest, Star Tours - being confined to a single room gives the experience more immediacy and allows for the integration of AAs and more elaborate effects. If theme parks had to keep building simulators, I wish they had further developed that approach. I really don't like the more open approach that every other Orlando simulator uses - they always seem too akin to a run-of-the-mill cinema going experience to offer a truly immersive experience.

 

[sedati]

TPR has posted a full write up and makes a lot of points people here have been speculating on including:
-Land works even if you haven't seen the film as opposed to Potter which can be confusing/overwhelming if you are unfamiliar.
-FOP is compared to Soarin meets Star Tours meets Tower of Terror. That last part is new. The ride has some airtime (just like those Sega motorcyles I'm sure.)

 

[Rteetz]

TPR?
sorry.

Theme Park Review

 

[No Name]

Universal Studios has 3 simulators

Universal Studios Florida:
Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem
Shrek 4-D
The Simpsons Ride
Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon.

That's 4. I think the greater issue is that four simulators, combined with other screen-heavy rides, makes the park risk feeling like screen overload.

There is no simulator in AK.

Disney's Animal Kingdom:
Flight of Passage

That's 1. But I agree that they haven't overdone it yet. Though I'd personally rather see none.

 

[Jabbas]

TPR has posted a full write up and makes a lot of points people here have been speculating on. Here's some bullet points for the lazy:
-Land works even if you haven't seen the film as opposed to Potter which can be confusing/overwhelming if you are unfamiliar.
-FOP is compared to Soarin meets Star Tours meets Tower of Terror. That last part is new. The ride has some airtime (just like those Sega motorcyles I'm sure.)

I can relate to this. I've seen Avatar (not a fan of the movie but Pandora is stunning) . It's true that you don't need to see the movie to understand the land. Harry Potter, I've never seen the movie. I think the land is gorgeous but I can't even understand my friends when they talk about Potter so I definitely need to see at least one movie before I go.

I did laugh at the comment about the "dead corpse floating avatar" in the qeue area. Just funny because obviously whoever said that didn't see the movie, lol.

 

[MisterPenguin]

From Theme Park Review who attended the media preview on Apr 29...

The rides were both great. Full disclosure: I am not a fan of media-based attractions, but the "Flight of Passage" (Banshee ride) was amazing! For those of you who find Soarin' too tame and wished it was more thrilling, this ride is for you! It's like a combination of the giant screen of Soarin' with the mild short drops of Tower of Terror that actually give you that "airtime" feeling in your stomach. When you look behind you and watch the ride vehicle you can see it moves quite a bit and jumps quite far and at a good pace. And them added fact that you can feel your Banshee "breathing" or heart beating or whatever is also a ridiculous attention to detail. I absolutely LOVED this ride!

 

[Incomudro]

Ignoring all the rest of the complaining, how exactly do you know "you don't even get to see the dragon you are riding"? We haven't seen any ride footage to date. It's entirely possible, even probably, that the video will show the head/body/wings of the banshee we are riding in the foreground and do so combined the physical effects in the seat to create a feeling of actually riding on the animal.

On the same note, especially since we were talking about an early protocol of an "actual" banshee as a ride vehicle versus the conceit they went with using a technological basis.... you can make a strong argument IMHO that the direct they have gone will be a more impressive effect if they can pull it off than putting a guest on a fake banshee. If you can go from a situation where you are sitting in a (motorcycle style) chair and locked in and then the ride starts -- the lights go out, the wall in front of you moves, whatever -- and you go from being obviously on a ride into a situation where you are convincingly feel like you are riding an animal both in terms of the flying but also having tactile 4D effects mimicking being on the banshee. That would actually be a true act of ride development.

Putting you on a physical banshee for a ride vehicle and having that move isn't anything groundbreaking -- it's having you in a spaceship like Star Tours or on a flying bench like Forbidden Journey. Not to mention that going and sitting on a vehicle that obviously isn't a living creature actually takes you out of the story. But if they can make it convincing that you are going from a piece of machinery to really feeling like you are in the body of an Avatar and first hand experiencing the flying, that would be a step forward in ride execution.

This is what I was trying to say - you did a much better job.
Unless imagineers were able to craft first rate looking animatronic Banshees for guests to sit on - obviously out of the question for durability, cost, ingress/egress etc., then another method would be required.
Having us sit on merry -go-round style critters would be less realistic and take us further out of the story then the system the imagineers chose.

 

[Incomudro]

i think its ok if some of us just fall into the camp that feels these simulator rides, even if they're "supped up", are a bit underwhelming. the fact that pandora's main attraction has one and seemingly there will be 2 in star wars land [star tours and whatever that new one is]; some of us are longing for something a bit more conventional to go along with innovative. i think the tron coaster fits that bill. how cool would it have been to have an indoor tron coaster [but think "banshee mount"] over a bio-luminescent forest. disney could have really went all out and had the boat ride going through the very same forest. so you have boaters getting up close and personal through the river and then in the canopy, you have the hoots and hollers of those on their banshees. tell me you wouldn't enjoy that more than your simulator?

No, it wouldn't.
The thing about the movie Avatar was the incredible visuals.
A coaster could never simulate the movie anywhere near as accurately as a screen and tech system.
I love coasters, love EE, RnR, Space Mountain, but in this case it had to be done this way.

 

[Club34]

No, it wouldn't.
The thing about the movie Avatar was the incredible visuals.
A coaster could never simulate the movie anywhere near as accurately as a screen and tech system.
I love coasters, love EE, RnR, Space Mountain, but in this case it had to be done this way.

i agree, but WDI seemed to have pulled it off everywhere else in the land without the use of a simulator. did they not?

 

[Matt Stevens]

i agree, but WDI seemed to have pulled it off everywhere else in the land without the use of a simulator. did they not?

It's much different creating an environment that you move slowly through vs creating an environment that not only do you move quickly through but also have to make it look like you've traveled a long distance.... the best and most effective way to do this is through the use of a simulator attraction