2023: General Discussion

[NuttySquirrel]

I just had a quick look and to be honest can't see much wrong with it. It appeals greatly to this generation of internet users, little or no attention span, or ability to think or solve problems for themselves.
I saw a post once a women had turned up at the "resort" and her child had ear ache so she messaged AT on facebook asking if they sold calpol. That's what they're up against.

I don't think that's an unreasonable question personally. If you are travelling to the park and need medical supplies it's reasonable to enquire whether they sell them - I needed antihistamines at Chessington once and was able to find them in a small section of the main shop. And it seems to me the social media team should be able to assist with those sorts of enquiries. Otherwise what are they for exactly?

 

[RIPCorky]

I don't think that's an unreasonable question personally. If you are travelling to the park and need medical supplies it's reasonable to enquire whether they sell them - I needed antihistamines at Chessington once and was able to find them in a small section of the main shop. And it seems to me the social media team should be able to assist with those sorts of enquiries. Otherwise what are they for exactly?

My point was she was already there and like you she should have used initiative and looked for them or asked a member of staff, who are more likely to know than someone sat behind a screen. Far too many people can't think for themselves

 

[Plastic Person]

My point was she was already there and like you she should have used initiative and looked for them or asked a member of staff, who are more likely to know than someone sat behind a screen. Far too many people can't think for themselves

Is this not just more to do with how you perceive the world? I wouldn't expect the park's social media team to know just how many orange Callippos are left in the Rita queue snack shop at any one time, but "Do you sell this medicine I unexpectedly need?" is a perfectly reasonable question to direct towards a team who are literally employed to answer questions.

 

[RIPCorky]

Is this not just more to do with how you perceive the world? I wouldn't expect the park's social media team to know just how many orange Callippos are left in the Rita queue snack shop at any one time, but "Do you sell this medicine I unexpectedly need?" is a perfectly reasonable question to direct towards a team who are literally employed to answer questions.

So you don't think you'll get a quicker answer by asking someone face to face? I suppose you believe a virtual doctors appointment is just as good as seeing one in person?

 

[AT86]

Closed season has started off strong this year.

 

[Shaggy_Dog_]

I saw a post once a women had turned up at the "resort" and her child had ear ache…

Thank God the woman hadn’t taken her child to Pleasure Beach to ride Infusion that day.

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

So you don't think you'll get a quicker answer by asking someone face to face? I suppose you believe a virtual doctors appointment is just as good as seeing one in person?

They might not actually be in the park yet, they could be in the car park, monorail, making the walk, in a queue. Plenty of places where talking to someone directly isn't optimal.

Virtual doctors appointments are different to in person, not better or worse as such. If you've got a viral infection and need to see a doctor, but don't want to potentially pass the illness on to someone else, a virtual appointment is a good alternative. The same as if you can't leave where you are, for whatever reason. Just as there are scenarios in which a virtual appointment isn't optimal, there are some in which it is.

 

[rob666]

Thank God the woman hadn’t taken her child to Pleasure Beach to ride Infusion that day.

Crevettes is close to Infusion.
They sell eight mixed plasters for a quid, in a nice little clip bag.

 

[Craig]

I know it's day one of closed season, but I would have expected at least a month or two before we started going into such minute discussion about...Calpol(?!).

If we could get back to some actual constructive general discussion that'd be great - thanks

 

[Jb85]

Overall, how do we rate this season? For me it's a 7. Some improvements but not enough. Could write a huge post but this summarises it nicely.

 

[Hazza]

Overall, how do we rate this season? For me it's a 7. Some improvements but not enough. Could write a huge post but this summarises it nicely.

I think that season was a more filler season. I still had a new ride however a lot of the season was about building hype for the reopening of nemesis. 2024 is looking like a big year for the park.

 

[MellowPasta]

I only visited once this season for The Curse at Alton Manor. Nemesis has always been the main draw for me and without it I couldn't be bothered again with all the expense of the place, poor ride availability you see reported every other day, shoddy food and lack of the Sky Ride topped it off.

 

[Ethan]

Overall, how do we rate this season? For me it's a 7. Some improvements but not enough. Could write a huge post but this summarises it nicely.

Operations- Not great (4/10)
Park presentation- Deteriating drastically (4/10)
Ride lineup- Nemesis big loss but Curse and Sub-terra much needed quality dark rides (6/10)
Queue times- Honestly not too bad. Park has seemed quieter this year. Some really bad days in scarefest but overall ok (6/10)
Events:
Festival of thrills- random theming around the park with repetitive annoying announcements (2/10)
Mardi gras- Solid event and I enjoy it every year (7/10)
Oktoberfest- Seems like a worse version of Mardi gras (5/10)
Scarefest- Another meh year if I'm honest (5/10). I'll do a break down of the individual scare attractions. Will just give them a rating based on my experience.
Darkest depths 7/10
Attic 6/10
Altonville 6/10
Invitation 1/10
Daz games 3/10
Burial grounds 10/10 one of the best scare zones ever at Towers and easily the highlight of the event.
Fireworks- Didn't go but the show looked as impressive as always. My personal favourite event Towers do (8/10)

 

[richr87]

Overall, how do we rate this season? For me it's a 7. Some improvements but not enough. Could write a huge post but this summarises it nicely.

Season started out with promise but then end up getting progressively worse. Managed 6 visits this year with the merlin pass, I fear the Merlin pass maybe getting scrapped for me. I love towers don't get me wrong and I have a great time mostly when I visit but they have got a long way to go to be of a standard of a European park.

I managed to do 2 trips to dlp this year and my personal experience is night and day. I no towers haven't got the budget of Disney but neither have other European parks and they seem to be better themed, have a good verity of rides ( not just coasters) and seem to be managed in a better way( events, maintenance etc).

I just hope that the end of nemesis construction is a start to getting the park back to where it should be

 

[Craig]

Season started out with promise but then end up getting progressively worse. Managed 6 visits this year with the merlin pass, I fear the Merlin pass maybe getting scrapped for me. I love towers don't get me wrong and I have a great time mostly when I visit but they have got a long way to go to be of a standard of a European park.

I managed to do 2 trips to dlp this year and my personal experience is night and day. I no towers haven't got the budget of Disney but neither have other European parks and they seem to be better themed, have a good verity of rides ( not just coasters) and seem to be managed in a better way( events, maintenance etc).

I just hope that the end of nemesis construction is a start to getting the park back to where it should be

I had a similar view of things starting out with promise, until I had a good think about it over the weekend. Sure, the likes of Alton Manor has been a great addition that has shown that Merlin are capable of doing some really polished decent stuff. Oktoberfest and Mardi Gras were both decent, seeing the progress to Nemesis as the season has gone on has been great too.

However, take away those shiny things and what are we left with? No Hex, no Skyride, no Sub Terra until later in the season, rides opening hideously late and others up and down like a yo-yo throughout the course of the day on a daily basis. So some nice sticking plasters over the top, but ultimately the park is still a mess underneath.

Of course, all of this doesn't fall on the current management. They're not going to be able to unwind well over a decade of neglect over the course of one season and things like availability of parts isn't helping either. But, I'd by lying if I said I wasn't disappointed that we didn't see a little bit more from them this season.

2024 is a crucial year for them, but I again don't expect to see things completely fixed but I really want to see some proper progress by this time next year. I'm actually glad they don't have an expansive Christmas event to deal with and we see some real tangible progress to stopping the rot.

 

[AT86]

I feel like this closed season, and the progress made (or not, as the case may be) with park presentation will be a good indicator of the way things are heading with the new management at various levels of Merlin now in place.

 

[Matt N]

It’s a weird one.

In my view, 2023 has been a very, very mixed year for Alton Towers. It’s been a year of great promise and excitement in some regards and one of the weaker years I’ve seen in a while in others.

In terms of some highlights; while I personally don’t revere it quite as much as some do, I do think that The Curse at Alton Manor was an overall decent addition and the touch ups to Gloomy Wood were welcomed. The most exciting part of the year for me has probably been seeing Nemesis 2.0 take shape; I know it’s a coaster I’ve ridden before, but seeing the retrack project take shape has been phenomenally exciting for me! I do also think that Sub-Terra’s return is a potentially promising sign, and some of the other things we’ve seen happening at the park, such as the arrival of Bianca and co, show promise.

However, the year has certainly not been without its lowlights either. In general, availability and queue times have seemed quite hit and miss, having Hex and the Skyride out for pretty much the whole year has been disappointing (even if possibly unavoidable), and as much as I don’t rate it quite as highly as most, I do feel like the park was missing something without Nemesis being open. It’s a great ride, and its absence was certainly noticed; Forbidden Valley in particular felt like it was missing quite a bit of its essence on my 2023 visit. In terms of operations, availability and such, this season did feel like a step down from 2021 and 2022.

I perhaps cannot be the fairest judge of Alton Towers 2023 based on my own personal experiences; I only went on 25th and 26th March, and 25th March is a day that I’m led to believe was one of the rockiest days of the season operationally. However, I do feel that 2023 has been a very odd season for the park overall. It’s been a season of notable ups and downs, for sure.

 

[MellowPasta]

With the end of the 2023 season that also means no more of hearing Bon Jovi tracks blaring around FV and X Sector... 2024 is already promising to be a better one with that one fact alone.

 

[Zeock]

In my opinion, 2023 was a decent year.
Alton Manor was a good new addition in my opinion and NST reopening was welcome.
The Congo River Rapids waterfalls being turned on for the first time since 2017 was also a positive part of this season.
However, the loss of Nemesis for the year overshadowed everything for me.

 

[Matt.GC]

Visited pretty much every season for the last 30 years and this is in one the 3 worst. It sits there with the awful hollowing out seasons of 2016 and 2017.

If I think of it on balance, the only positives were Alton Manor and the associated improvements to the ice cream kiosk and the shop. In fact, I liked Alton Manor the more I rode it and I think the whole project is a job very well done. Plus Sub Terra, which although still a flawed attraction, is very welcome and much needed.

But almost everything else either stayed the same or got worse. I'm including the rapids in that, as although the waterfalls made a welcome return, I'm not deluded enough to think this now makes it an acceptable ride. It's still tame, has no theming and is boring. Only this year it also incorporates some boring and pointless new music and an incredibly annoying Australian voiceover.

Upkeep - Worse. Everything is either another year of rot older or now painted job lot purple.
Events - Can't comment as only did Scarefest and it was better than last year.
Accommodation - Worse, with half the season carrying a laughable higher price tag to boot until people stopped booking. Tablets replacing desks. Last ditch attempt to save face later in the season. "Free" squash on a warm day whilst discounting heavily inflated initial prices doesn't make up for any of this.
Food and retail - Much much much worse. Other than Gloomy Wood, nothing else reopened, yet the quality of what remained declined significantly. Little choice, crap capacity and the basics now inedible.
Operations - Worse. Breakdowns galore. Still not allowed to wait for the monorail on the platform for no good reason whatsoever. Slow despatches. Out of control RAP. More guest services outlets only softens the blow slightly.
Hours - Worse
Lineup - Worse. Best coaster closed is a massive blow. Enterprise gone. No Hex. No Sky Ride. A late NST opening does not make up for this. Nemesis to reopen next year but no RS will make places like X Sector feel worse than ever next season.

Like 16 and 17, 23 will be a season to forget. That said, I genuinely believe that next season can't really be any worse. A new divisional director actually went onto YouTube to admit in politician terms that things were grim which does give some hope. The parks best attraction will be open again next year, NST will return and FV looks like it's having a proper makeover. If the excellent Alton Manor and Gloomy Wood work is anything to go by, we could be in for a treat. I think they also know where the accommodation breaking point is having reached it this season so I don't expect that to get any worse. We may strike gold and even get the fire back on Wicker Man. Poor operations may be masked by the fact it's highest capacity coaster will open again so there will at least be something to do when Galactica breaks down.

But I can't see anything else getting better. The rapids and Walliams World will likely be just as depressing as this season, although I hope the latter gets the FV/GW makeover for Horizon. I can see no changes to the awful Dark Forest area. X Sector will likely worsen with only two 1.4 MTR height restriction coasters in it and nothing else to do. Everything else will likely be another year older, dirtier and more dilapidated, safe for the odd vinyl and purple paint covered paint brush being slopped around here and there.

Merlin has been private now for 4 years. Some of the more minor stuff should have been dealt with a long time ago, up to and including before the 2023 season even started. What have they been doing in all this time? Who looked at what was being offered at the beginning of the season and thought it was OK? If we are to believe that the good things that came out of 2023 are the standard we are to expect in the future, then they certainly haven't made it easy on themselves.