Guardians of the Galaxy Mission Breakout announced for Disney California Adventure

nevol

Well-Known Member
Then I don't know what you are trying to say I'm wrong in.

And since I don't really feel like searching 186 pages to find what you are saying is a good post on current strategy, why don't you please copy it to a post.


And I believe there will be original IP created in the parks again someday. As some have said in this very thread, things are cyclical. Right now its the era of the IP push into the parks. The pendulum will swing back the other way someday.

This I do agree with/anticipate, but it'll have to get ugly first. They are motivated to invest when it becomes necessary; either the parks get too crowded or too empty; if things are going just well enough, they can take a nap. So for this to happen, enough of these projects will have to fail to attract new guests for the public to slowly lose interest and warrant a different approach.
 

nevol

Well-Known Member
I'll reread that, but that I took that as a design critique not as a critique of the strategy to use IP vs non-IP.

The issue isn't THAT attractions are IP-based, its how. What if a star wars episode 8 premiered, and you sat down with your popcorn and were watching a teletubbies episode instead? Whether or not an IP is used in an attraction is almost irrelevant. The quality of that experience and how it relates to and affects the theme park experience is.
 

nevol

Well-Known Member
Looks cool! And no more out of theme from Main Street USA than a 1930's Mission Deco hotel, with half its side blown off and elevator doors opening and closing, did from 2004 to 2016.

And slightly more in theme for Main Street USA than the views from the west side of Town Square of an icy Swiss mountain.

Because Walt.

Disneyland%2B05%2B0482%2B_.jpg

Design > Design Techniques>Conceits

"A conceit is a deliberate breaking of the diegesis for dramatic effect, and will typically be found in two forms; conceits that reaffirm you're in an otherworldly place (such as a European castle at the end of a turn-of-the-century American Main Street) and conceits that reaffirm you're in a theme park (such as an iron ride roller coaster forming the backdrop of a park). THe former is best exemplified by Sleeping Beauty Castle in Disneyland (1955), of which designer John Hench explains:

"There are a couple of contradictions that occur on a rational level. Like having a castle at the end of Main Street. But here we're calling back the old image of a secured point, a strong place [similarly, churchs central to a small town]. It doesn't belong on Main Street, but it does belong at the end of a vista like this. The old cities of the earth clustered around a strong point - in fact, in early colonies you were fined if you lived too far from the center. They figured that if you couldn't run to the meeting house in time to help defend the group, you were a menace to the community, so you were fined for living out too far. And I suppose there's enough left in our blood, we who come from Europe, to know that the castle is the strong point- and a home as well. You know the expression "A man's home is his castle.' So in the end, this castle is Everyman's home."

...

"Without the castle, this is just another Greenfield Village. With the addition of the castle, it becomes magical." Karal Ann Marling, Designing Disney's Theme Parks: The Architecture of Reassurance, 1988.

Conceits recognize that the theme park typically entails the creation of a place more otherworldly than reality, and the inclusions of conceits that play with that fact can keep the experience interesting and entertaining. It is important that the conceit is something that will be accepted by the guests: it can't just be an excuse for a convenient design decision but should add something to the park, such as a novelty, history, or style, as it otherwise risks breaking the immersion of the park."

David Younger, Theme Park Design & The Art of Themed Entertainment, 2016 pg 189-190
 

Disney Irish

Premium Member
The issue isn't THAT attractions are IP-based, its how. What if a star wars episode 8 premiered, and you sat down with your popcorn and were watching a teletubbies episode instead? Whether or not an IP is used in an attraction is almost irrelevant. The quality of that experience and how it relates to and affects the theme park experience is.

Well speaking of Star Wars, with SWL it appears they are putting in the quality. So there is no Teletubbies being created there. I understand this statement is more directed to GotG, but there are current projects where quality is being put in. So I don't see it as an all or nothing game.

But I get your point, and appreciate your opinion. I hope you can appreciate those of us that just see it differently than you.
 

nevol

Well-Known Member
I went for a walk in DCA late yesterday afternoon. The sun was hitting Guardians in spectacular fashion. It looked bold and colorful and very noticeable. And it looked really cool, very unique and unusual. Lots of people around me were talking about it, all in interested or impressed tones. It's eye catching already, and it's still half behind tarps.
disney-california-adventure.jpg


In short, it makes no sense. But it looks cool, and the kids are going to love it. Something tells me many of the folks complaining about it here will be in the three hour long lines for it this summer. While Bob Chapek and Michael Colglazier laugh all the way to the bank.

The hotel made sense because it was set in California. What is yet to be seen is if the Marvel story-world they create will be set in california or not. I think they can get away with a story world that doesn't mention its real-world location (even though marvel is known over DC for setting its characters in our contemporary world/context/real locations), and one set in California, but if they make it too deliberately NYC, people will be upset. Not everybody, but certainly that will happen.

The new colors are fun, exciting, and in a more cartoon-style that works well with the style of DCA, so they have that going for them.
 

nevol

Well-Known Member
Well speaking of Star Wars, with SWL it appears they are putting in the quality. So there is no Teletubbies being created there. I understand this statement is more directed to GotG, but there are current projects where quality is being put in. So I don't see it as an all or nothing game.

But I get your point, and appreciate your opinion. I hope you can appreciate those of us that just see it differently than you.

I do and I entirely agree that it isn't an all or nothing game. Therefore, using IP isn't immediately problematic, nor does it guarantee a project's success. The project has to be successful in its own right.
 

Disney Irish

Premium Member
I do and I entirely agree that it isn't an all or nothing game. Therefore, using IP isn't immediately problematic, nor does it guarantee a project's success. The project has to be successful in its own right.

Agreed, so time will tell if GotG (and Marvel projects at large) will be successful in its own right despite the complaints some have lodged.
 

nevol

Well-Known Member
I know what to cover the show building with:

vantablack

It would be funny watching them try to take pictures of that building.
That would actually be an incredible story-application of technology and make it one of the most haunting, iconic, photographed, visited buildings in the world. For guardians OR Twilight zone... it would play up the secrecy aspect of the fortress, and though it would make the hotel "go away," it would be incredibly creepy representation of the 5th dimension, bringing the entire hotel into the twilight zone, not just the elevator guests! Otherworldly for sure! They could also paint Space Mountain's interior and structure with it! Since the paint doesn't reflect any light, they could turn the stars up/introduce dangling LEDs into the space at the maximum brightness, and turn the lights on that are pointed at the asteroid atop the lift hill without having to worry about any light pollution ruining the ride. Nice find!
 
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Californian Elitist

Well-Known Member
Odd that you would care enough to be a member of this forum, but not enough to want to learn anything or think critically about the subject. What is your threshold for being interested? Do you similarly watch post-game interviews with coaches and athletes and then change the channel as soon as an answer becomes too rich with detail? Why block yourself out of a discussion or learning opportunity? When you're at a party, and the conversation starts to go over your head, do you walk away, listen, take interest/ask questions, or do you attempt to insult everybody for talking about something you can't keep up with, thereby offending nobody but making yourself out to be a complete jack?

However, point taken. I'll remember moving forward, as a designer, not to engage the audience; that you just eat stuff up and can't decipher what meticulous strategies are deployed in the creation of experiences that give you pleasure. Designers and critics will stop sharing and preserving our body of knowledge with you, if you agree to stop sharing your opinions with us; when you understand that ultimately there are standards that must be maintained and details at depths you don't care to explore; when you let us do our work and protect the body of knowledge associated with the craft. What happens when you and others like you on a macro scale demonstrate to park operators that you will be just as happy if they invest minimal money and effort into the standards and quality of the attractions they pay the imagineers to build, is they start to listen. What you and they will involuntarily find out together, is that you don't like things as much when they let standards slip in every which direction.

It's like there is a restaurant you really love, but you don't know why. So you say you don't mind if they swap out the chef, start cooking with low-quality sourced and nitrate-soaked cuts of meat, pesticide soaked vegetables, swap out the music, change the wallpaper, transition from a service restaurant to a buffet. You walk in one evening and think "I don't know what's changed, but I don't really like this place anymore." Let the chefs cook.

I could write you a comprehensive list with every design technique involved in themed entertainment and how GOTG:MB! fails or succeeds on every individual technique. It would surely save you a ton of time in the long run because you wouldn't need to keep coming back here day in and day out to argue with other low-information, high-passion strangers, a process you seem to be gaining nothing from. But you aren't interested in that, and frankly neither am I, so after a week with WDWMagic, I'll go back to letting you all be.

"Interestingly, for all its success, the Disney theme show is quite a fragile thing. It just takes one contradiction, one out of place stimulus to negate a particular moment's experience." John Hench

I enjoy your posts, however short or long they are. I hope you don't stop for the sake of others who don't like them.
 

SSG

Well-Known Member
Lol!!! I saved the picture, now every time I have to take someone to school and throw down a little construction knowledge, I'll put my hard hat on. Safety first!!!!
Construction Constance!
Can we fix it?
Construction Constance!
Yes, we can!
Hey!
Time to get busy, such a lot to do
Building and fixing till it's good as new
Constance and the gang have so much fun
Working together, they get the job done
 

Practical Pig

Well-Known Member
They could also paint Space Mountain's interior and structure with it! Since the paint doesn't reflect any light, they could turn the stars up/introduce dangling LEDs into the space at the maximum brightness, and turn the lights on that are pointed at the asteroid atop the lift hill without having to worry about any light pollution ruining the ride. Nice find!

That. Would. Be. Awesome!
 

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