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Chessington World of Adventures Resort

Good news if it is The Gruffalo, one of the few genuinely timeless characters from the past decade, and from what I can tell, an IP with a very protective estate behind it.
 
Plus, someone who knew about Bubblework's closure first, also posted a video showing the gruffalo logo placed on Bubbleworks. Unfortunately, the video has been removed.
 
I have no affiliation with Chessington in anyway, but I am very certain the ride will be rethemed to the Grufallo, due to the strong rumours of it bouncing around besides other media.

As for the ride, I think the ride system will survive but remain the only fundamental thing of what's left of the ride as we currently know it. I don't even know if the fountain finale will survive and if it doesn't, what would replace it? Screens? Scenery? Who knows?
 
I've quickly re-read the Gruffalo just so I can remember what happens, and I'm not sure how you would able to make a ride out of it using Bubblework's transit system.
 
Pretty sure the transit system is staying (which would explain all the work done on the lift), and I hope the fountain finale stays too, as they'd surely need to alter the route slightly if it's replaced. Gruffalo sounds more likely now that merlin are having issues with dreamworks IPs.

Why am I expecting a repeat of Charlie with poor animatronics and low budget characters?
 
SWSmiler said:
I've quickly re-read the Gruffalo just so I can remember what happens, and I'm not sure how you would able to make a ride out of it using Bubblework's transit system.
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If it was the Gruffalo it could potentially be an original story for the ride.

There's no way the transit system will go though - they thoroughly refurbished it last closed season.


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Seems to be yet another example of Merlin's obsessive focus on creating individual marketable products rather than proper theme park development.
 
For a company that took over the running of three (at the time very good/ good parks), with fairly good themed areas somehow manage to turn them into a confused state. Merlin need to decide weather to create theme parks or six flags/cedar fair esc parks.

Why Merlin will not follow a story of an already themed area is beyond me. What will this gruffalo ride be??? Will he have fangs and a cape??????
 
Off the subject of the bubbleworks retheme, tomb blaster looked in no better state the other day. The train didn't stop in any scene but the last, and even then it was just a few seconds. Daylight was visible through the sides of the fire exits, and the emergency evacuation signs were bright. The music was unbearably loud in some scenes, and too quiet in others, and some of the sound effects (noticeably the axe sound) were painfully loud. More effects were working in bubbleworks, 90% of them were off or broken.

Still don't think much of the new targets either. They are far to big/bright and one was hanging off the face of the jackal. Quite a few were off, and there wasn't a single light on the snake.


Other than that, some positives. I like the new smokehouse, Quite excited to see towers get one. Just hope the menu doesn't get cut like most restaurants do. Scorpion was running long cycles in the morning's, train went round four times and the priority/disabled queue (of five people) was longer than the normal queue. They've removed the annoying "wise Dragon" announcement from Dragon falls, replacing it with a much quieter one. The New pandamonium show isn't bad for kids, very good animatronics.
 
At least it's not a tacky Dreamworks IP, I know nothing about The Gruffalo so this may be a farfetched idea but could they use that IP and tie it into a Transylvania theme? I was fully expecting something like Kung Fu Panda!

Anyway, my interest in this is almost nil.

:)
 
Rob said:
To be fair, the whole Bubbleworks theme (at present, I never rode the original version so cannot comment at all on that) doesn't exactly fit in with Transylvania!

:)
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Well it was themed as a European brewery that was really a pop factory.

shawnoc said:
The bubbleworks redevelopment is the perfect opportunity to bring the transilvanier theme back to its glory days
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I wouldn't count on it. At the moment, I have no faith in the retheme as I'm imagining it's just going have still models (because Merlin thinks animatronics are so last-gen) and lack any love and imagination found in Tussaud's golden ages. We all saw what happened when Toyland Tours turned into Charlie, and I feel it's going to be the same thing here.
 
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