Team Next Gen
It was truly a pleasure and thrill to see so many new faces become a collective powerhouse this time around, and really speaks volumes to how much potential this season has. That being said, I wasn't a big fan of the chosen IP just because of how obvious it was. There were a lot of other ideas floating around I would have rather seen you go with. Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge Lord of the Rings fan, it's just a bit of an overplayed concept for Armchair Imagineering.
All that being said however, I think this was as much of a homerun as a somewhat over-used IP possibly could be. The obvious thing to praise here is the presentation. It felt so authentic I could almost feel the magazine pages flipping in my hands. It really felt like a piece of actual theme park promotional material. Top to bottom with the in-jokes, gags, concept art, placement of the photos and layout of the pages, I was impressed with every single page.
I'll admit I was pretty skeptical about the idea of breaking this up into three sub-lands. Middle Earth is a HUGE environment, and to essentially take all the major set pieces from the first two acts of Fellowship was a risky venture indeed. All that being said, it definitely paid off. After experiencing Galaxy's Edge, I think there's a level of authenticity at theme parks when it comes to recreating fictional environments that's really hitting a renaissance. You were able to take a giant swath of Middle Earth and condense it down into a grand but realistically scaled theme park land.
Hobbiton was actually my favorite part of the project just because of how lived in it felt, even it was the most modest. The festival vibe going on, the rolling hills, all the different stands and the placement of the flat rides were just perfect. Rivendell is easily the most immersive of the three lands in the way you describe it, and I think Tolkien himself would be blown away with this level of detail in a theme park setting. The raft ride has some awesome technology at play, but felt a little disjointed from the rest of the land with how it directly retold scenes from the trilogy as opposed to weaving the iconography into a post-war storyline. Still a fantastic attraction with some really cool tech.
The Moria attraction was definitely the highlight here, and I loved the idea of Gandalf the White having a rematch with the Balrog and helping the dwarfs reclaim their kingdom. This felt legitimately lived-in and was by far the coolest part of the land from a post-war storytelling point of view. I'd really like to see some of these ideas explored in the Amazon series. My only nitpick, though it certainly adds to the realism, is that I felt with both the tentpole attractions there was a little bit too heavy of a use of screens.
Overall this is a fantastic proposal of a predictable IP, and it's fascinating to see the other team's counter-balance to this.
Creativity: 8/10
Realism: 9/10
Detail: 10/10
Presentation: 10/10
Group Work: 10/10
Total: 47/50
Team Old School
I was definitely nervous about the divide in the number of brainstorming pages between the two teams, but in the end you guys took the slow and steady approach and came out with a project that...while not as flashy or overly ambitious as the other team, I felt was even more creative and well realized. You wanna talked about lived in, this project is the dictionary definition of this term. I LOVE the atmosphere here and how it all comes together in such a kinetic way. Having Road to Valhalla end with an outdoor section just gives the land such a sense of flow to it and I can so easily envision where everything goes and how all the individual pieces fit together.
One of the BIG strengths of this project is how you took the challenges of adapting Mad Max into a theme park environment and ran with them. The burnt out neon sign spelling the name of the store with the lit up letters? Ingenious! The gift shop at the exit of the E ticket being raided and in shambles? Inspired! The Mechanic being a role-played character throughout the land in an experience that's right in between the levels building a droid and a lightsaber? *chef's kiss* So many creative details and decisions that had me simply nodding in approval every step of the way. I love, love, LOVE that you saved the Doof Warrior as an impressive AA and didn't waste him as streetmosphere or a screen. The pace of the E Ticket in general is absolutely wonderful and really calls to mind why Fury Road is so exhilarating and one of my top five movies of the past decade.
The ropes course and Thunderdome were equally impressive, with the rope course adding a TON of variety to the offerings at play in the land and Thunderdome being a brilliant callback to both the original trilogy and the mad genius that is Waterworld. Big shoutout to
@AceAstro for his first major contribution to the season and definitely showing us that he's here to play! Even the bumper cars were an ingenious addition with the scoring system. A simple yet innovative idea to plus a timeless classic of a carnival ride.
While you guys didn't score as high numbers wise, I think conceptually I actually really preferred pretty much everything about this project. You were just going up against a juggernaut of a presentation format with one of the most well oiled machines of an initial team I've ever seen in the first project. Overall you all should be very proud of this one. It's one of my personal favorite and most memorable projects I've seen in the game in the past couple seasons and were just getting started!
Creativity: 10/10
Realism: 9/10
Detail: 9/10
Presentation: 8/10
Group Work: 8/10
Total: 34/40
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