Sorry for the delay! Internet at hotel not seeming to cooperate last few days so getting notes from my computer to here has been a challenge.
Scene 3 saw a major shift in location from Hong Kong to Las Vegas, and I imagine a bit of an unexpected one for many of you. As you know now from the prompt for Scene 4, our shooting schedule in Vegas did not involve any theme parks, but what it did provide was similar imagineering tasks that we've all seen, but with a truly unique location and challenge unto itself by being in Vegas.
Your task this week was to create both a new venue/theater and show for the Las Vegas Strip. As many of you surmised in your brainstorming and from the intro video, the shows in Vegas have run the gamut from over the top to outright insane to elegant walk up water shows. There is a bit of something for just about everyone, so you had a crowded entertainment landscape to contend with. On top of that, you did not have the attachment to a hotel/casino that most of the shows in Vegas have, so your show and venue had to stand out.
Both teams took decidedly different approaches this week to the challenge, and in the end, produced very uniquely different pitches.
CrossMagic at Disney's Wonderdome
Right away, kudos for taking on the challenge of bring a Disney venue and show to Las Vegas. Will it ever happen? Probably not, but I'm not sure that it's so farfetched. Project wise, the team heavily relied on the meat of the write ups from a couple of folks, but it was nice to see contributions at least in some form from multiple people. While there's been good interaction at times, where this team has struggled the last 2 scenes has been in getting started, or at least finalizing a decision I should say. I know this isn't news to you as it came up in your PM, but with a 7 day turnaround, will have to find ways to get a consensus earlier in the scene to really allow adequate time for fleshing out of ideas.
Presentation wise here, everything looks fine. Google slides makes this easy to follow, especially with your show structure, so was a good choice. Solid intro that gives a quick blurb about venue and show, and sets the stage for what's next. I got kind of a 60s/70s Vegas vibe from the presentation, whether intentional or not was cool.
Wonderdome
I like that you've highlighted the location and building/facade in separate pages, though reference photos/artwork would be worthy additions. Highlights of the exterior, lobby and seating area are well done and follow a natural progression as a reader walking into the theater.
I can't help but feel there's a bit of a disconnect with the name of the venue and its comparison to the New Amsterdam. NA feels a bit out of place for me in Vegas, but that aside, is there a dome over the structure or is that just in the name? The venue would have also been a great place for extra parts from the team. Is there a restaurant, experience or otherwise to help draw in guests and what kind of show schedule are we looking at? Just a few things I wanted to know more about the Wonderdome and what is occurring here throughout the day when no shows are running.
CrossMagic
The show has a bit of everything, literally. I lost count of how many show scenes got bandied about, but you eventually whittled it down. This would seem to run the risk of being too much and all over the place, but for Vegas, it's over the top in all the right ways I think. Disney signing off on the backstory would be a fun convo, but this feels like a Disney version of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure and would be a blast.
So much detail in many of these scenes, including the transition slides which were a great add to indicate how technically youd try and pull this off. Some obvious IP choices thrown here that in a Disney park could be their own show, but here it gives a huge variety for just about everyone. So many highlights, and again details, with the grand spectacle of Pirates, Star Wars, Avatar and others. Loved the inclusion of the elephants on parade laser show. Princesses was an interesting choice, but having seen Lea Kyle's AGT run, could make for a surprise segment. I don't know if there was a runtime on the show, but there's not much here that I don't think a guests attention span would drift too far. Thanks to your descriptions and images, very easy to picture everything that is happening. While something like this would not happen in a Disney park, it does make me lament the loss of the Main St theater where productions with some of these segments could be produced.
With Touchstone really leaning heavy into their show elements, Hollywood focused almost exclusively on the venue and even had me worried a bit that you might forget the show altogether. Oddly enough, the original idea for this prompt was a fun zone of sorts, so somebody had an advance copy of the script. While your ideas for the venue were all over the place, your main theme was settled on fairly early and once that happened the floodgates of ideas came pouring out.
The google site utilized organizes all your pieces nicely, and thankfully lists your show/event first. The intro also does a nice job selling why you think a Nintendo themed venue/show will work in Vegas. The video aerials and your venue image all set up the project nicely.
Nintendo Entertainment Center
With a corner location on the strip, no hotel, and a modest footprint, you made the bold decision of building up, and in the process creating a destination on the strip. Among all the towers, landmarks and brashness of Vegas, you've added one more structure that even if someone didn't go inside, would be stopping for pics.
While I hate that your vision wasn't fully realized with the venue offerings, in probably actually helped to lessen the overshadowing of the show. I think a 50/50 split came up your brainstorming of venue vs show, but for most of the process you seemingly bordered on 90/10. Everything above the arena fits and brings to mind Jungle of Pixels from the SA.
The Switch is a perfect transition and the day/night life blood of the venue with the eateries, shopping, etc. Even without much decription it's obvious this works. Great detail in Luigi's Mansion Escape. I know a few Disney escape rooms have been done before on the forums, but I don't recall a Nintendo one. This seems an ideal choice IP wise and with Universal producing a few escape rooms of their own in the not too distant future, definitely on brand with themed entertainment. I don't need to see the credits to know who worked on Metroid. Lol. Even not knowing Metroid, would I do this? Yes. Out of the missing info, Warios Casino as an experience or backstory tie-in to the Splatoon show and venue would have really helped sell the entire thing. Again, it all overshadows the show a good bit, but as far as creating a unique venue, you did that.
Goby Arena/Splatoon show
Even though I'm a bit into games, Splatoon is something I know next to nothing about. Initially I was really confused how this would would factor as a show, and at times still am, but the idea did grow on me some as the week progressed. This seems more sport than show in this setup, show though can be interpreted as many things. For Vegas, this could probably oddly work as both with live spectacle what thrives in Vegas.
The Saturday tournament style would be a hit I think with guests, especially if it was a true, competitive sporting event with bet making available. Was anything running during the week? If not, this might have been the opportunity to come up with some sort of story driven experience to utilize the space and in a more scripted manner with stunts if possible. All in all though, plenty of detail and visual here to try and convey how this could work.
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