Here’s my issue with this line of thinking. We always say this about Universal. Don’t worry, the next thing will for sure be great…
Occasionally it is, often it isn’t. I find cynicism on Disney is so high on these forums my expectations are in the basement. Universal has the opposite problem around these parts.
I have my ticket for the hype train, but I’m refusing to board this time. I’d be very, very surprised if one of Ministry or Monsters doesn’t hit. But it’s becoming clear why they feel so pressured to add another attraction for Nintendo. It was clearly miscalculated. As charming and as cute I find it, because I actually do like it, apparent flaws and all.
You can find flaws and enjoy something at the same time. You don't have to justify it.
Hagrids and Velocicoaster back to back were great and Minions is good enough for what it is. DreamWorks for me as a replacement is a meh.
So the last 8 years certainly have more wins then fails in consistency right? Not sure I follow you.
An entirely new theme park has three big scale Dark Rides, two Spiderman/FJ level of efforts with subjectivity aside.
I know people tend not to love Mario here but it is definitely is a winner overall. Think Frozen Forever After or Gringotts more than Forbidden Journey if it helps you feel better for comparison.
I guess it comes down to expectation.
To me this park has a split personality. It’s half anmusement and half Theme park. To me Universal is starting to lean too heavy on partially themed outdoor coasters. They also are leaning on a few amusement park attractions to heavily. From what I’ve heard and seen a lot of the dollars in this park were spent in 2 areas but Potter is on another level from a budgetary perspective. And since people look critically at Disney parks I’ll do the same here. Universal and IOA are starting to feel like they need lots of loving. I mean Jesus what’s going on at universal. It’s as if Epic is eating up the maintenance budget of the rest of the parks. Just got back from Universal and underwhelmed is an understatement .
This is fair to say but not limited to EPIC. It is an industry shift. Many parks want to please the people who want themed environments as well as the thrills. The trend is to theme coasters now. You even see it at Disney with Seven Dwarfs' Mine Train, Guardians, Tron, Slinky, Monsters Inc, etc... Most rides at Disney now are more thrill-based than ever. Even the dark rides are rarely slow movers for big additions.
New builds are mostly coasters. Some are still themed, and some certainly more than others, but very few by Disney's past standards. They are typically coasters in the dark or around oversized props. There is a constant way back and forth it seems now instead of just dark rides and immersive venues, as much as I want that. And the new attractions that Disney does build few and far inbetween are odd placemaking rushed choices, which is against their speciality.
Even Sea World and Busch Gardens parks have suffered under this balance to thrill to a degree. Those parks were never Disney or Universal but they did have much better showmanship and scale than they typically build now. Kraken was a fun Sea World Thrill coaster, but Journey to Atlantis and Bermuda Triangle/Wild Artic and Questor,/Akbar's Adventure Tours at Busch Gardens Tampa were very ambitious and elevated it from just being a coaster thrill park.
Your second point is very evident. Upkeep at Uni is slipping up again in operations, and I imagine EPIC is a bit to blame for that neglect. Some good news is that Kong's outdoor portion is finally getting the attention to bring that scene back.
There are plenty of people who have founded companies older than that who are still alive today. The founder passing away is not because it was founded in 1989.
