Here you go again.The easiest way to avoid the bear is stay out of its lane
The subject is years of terrible management now bearing its “fruit”…and it applies to pretty much every topic these days…
There is a way to fix it though.
I think one of the largest factors was that this was an interactive (touchy-touchy) experience that did not make it into a post pandemic world. Another is probably something that everyone said from day one, experiences like this are outdated before they even open. They need to make a meaningful use of the space.
There’s one way to get me to lose interest…
The decision to cancel Play was made after NBA Experience closed, but before the permanent closure announcement was made. There's not much correlation, aside from them both being interactive experiences and a large amount of the project team having been part of both projects. I think the decision for NBA was more "This had poor attendance pre-COVID, it absolutely couldn't survive post-COVID and we can just blame the closure on the pandemic" and Play was more "Interactive experiences post pandemic? That could be a bad idea, let's press pause." Then when the conversation was held on when/how to unpause it, they realized it just wasn't worth finishing for a variety of factors.
This was a big thing. Creative on Play was done over five years ago. I spoke to some people on the project team, they openly admitted that much of the tech they were working with was already somewhat dated even then. Opening Play as it was originally envisioned just isn't feasible today, if they were sticking with the same basic concept they would need to start over on a lot of it.
Yup. Attendance aint soft tonight. Heck lines for the food booths are overflowing.You should be here now on a Friday night with the candlelight procession, the new fireworks, and the new hub, and all the Friday night drinkers here.
Another point (IMO) is that these “video game”-esque attractions were really innovative and cool before the masses had 85” TVs and PS5s at home. It doesn’t make any sense to continue to build similar attractions. That being said, they did build Smugglers Run, which is just a bad video game. Soooooo I guess who knows?
Can confirm. Chilling in the gardens now
I think you could probably salvage the infrastructure. Fundamentally, I don't think there's an issue with the idea of the entire interior of the dome being screens or projections that can shift and change even if the imagined interactivity is bunk. The issue is that the screens can't be the attraction on their own; they need to resurrect the adjacent theaters to whatever extent they can to have something that the dome builds toward.
It was rough last nightYou should be here now on a Friday night with the candlelight procession, the new fireworks, and the new hub, and all the Friday night drinkers here.
That's true, and part of the design was so that things could be easily interchanged as time goes on. The problem is they barely installed anything in there, and if they go back to the drawing board I think it would make more sense to build from the ground up instead of around the bones of a half finished project.
I heard the technology being outdated too. Another thing that was a huge blow to this project and still cripples the company was the decision to let go their seasonal entertainment cast members. Lots went on to better things and there’s still a struggle to fill those spots.
Do you know if there was ever a consideration to linking the pavilion to M:S and making it a post-mission experience?
They made the pavilion even more hidden when Cosmic Rewind opened by building a curb in front of it with landscaping. The winding walkway up to the pavilion used to be there just blocked off by a rope, now it is totally in-accessible.
I’m unaware of that ever being actually considered. Hopefully it wasn’t too, the park already has two space themed pavilions as it is. Wonders should be something different.
