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2016: Air - Re-theme to VR Coaster - Galactica

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Just a thought...

If VR is what's happening on Air, that may explain the mid queue photo experience.
Because obviously if Air does have VR, the on-ride photo will be useless & Picsolve need their profit...

I'm in two minds, the VR aspect seems interesting and certainly marketable, but a high quality theme is what Air needs, maybe it'll be Air: Galactica, who knows?
But between easy marketable and highly themed, I know which one Merlin/Towers will pick. :(
 
LiamT said:
If VR is what's happening on Air, that may explain the mid queue photo experience.
Because obviously if Air does have VR, the on-ride photo will be useless & Picsolve need their profit...
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I had that exact thought yesterday. If it was to be VR then clearly no-one would want to purchase and ORP. But they are building a (presumably green-screen) photo point in the queue to make up some of the lost revenue. I don't see why they would have ORP and a pre-ride photo so that could be another sign of VR.

Whether this turns out to be popular or not the queue for Air is going to be an interesting one next year. Will you still have to queue for a photo (when you don't want one) even when the ride is effectively walk on?

:)
 
LiamT said:
Because obviously if Air does have VR, the on-ride photo will be useless & Picsolve need their profit...
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Being hopeful, but laser raiders at legoland has both an ORP and a green screen opportunity. It's extra profit for those who want both, or thinks that their ORP looks bad (found most of my air photos have my hair covering my face, and at legoland I forget that there's a ORP so don't look)
 
Disaster waiting to happen. Everything good about the park is slowly being ruined. All they need to do is implement the original design and your on to a winner. Hey ho what do we know?
 
JB1985 said:
Disaster waiting to happen. Everything good about the park is slowly being ruined. All they need to do is implement the original design and your on to a winner. Hey ho what do we know?
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How to pigeon hole yourselves into a tiny sub-set of the visitor spectrum and remove yourself so far from the experience of "the GP" that you can no longer comprehend what it's like to be a normal visitor, maybe.

I think VR could be a massive hit and it'd demonstrate Alton really trying something almost unique and innovative. It's not like fans have been asking for that... is it? Oh wait, it is. I guess VR would just be the 'wrong' type of unique and innovative purchase.

"WE HATE THE AIR TUNNEL. WE HATE LOOKING AT IT".... "OH MY GOD, DON'T PUT SOMETHING IN FRONT OF MY EYES SO I CAN'T SEE IT"

Painful.
 
Rick said:
"WE HATE THE AIR TUNNEL. WE HATE LOOKING AT IT".... "OH MY GOD, DON'T PUT SOMETHING IN FRONT OF MY EYES SO I CAN'T SEE IT"

Painful.
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With respect, this is such a stupid argument, it actually hurts. It doesn't take a multi-million pound virtual reality system to tidy up a tunnel; it takes a lick of paint. Of course people want the tunnel issue solving, they just don't want motion-sickness inducing technology in its primitive stages taking over one of the most popular rides on park to solve it.
 
Harvey. said:
With respect, this is such a stupid argument, it actually hurts. It doesn't take a multi-million pound virtual reality system to tidy up a tunnel; it takes a lick of paint. Of course people want the tunnel issue solving, they just don't want motion-sickness inducing technology in its primitive stages taking over one of the most popular rides on park to solve it.
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My point entirely.....much more pressing issues to sort. It's bad management
 
Hmmm, this could be a nightmare in terms of throughput.... a mid queue photo and then the VR system itself. arggghhhhh

My pet hate are mid line queue photos. Hate them with a passion!
 
This deserves to fail, just to teach the idiots in charge a lession. Oh wait, they never learn.
 
The throughputs on Alpen Express at EP have worsened significanly since the introduction of VR with dispatches taking between 5 and 10 times longer than previously. This has to be a concern if it comes to Air as there is no way they can dispatch Air without all VR headsets fully attached, yet you cannot expect people to be wearing them all securely until after they have boarded. Can you imagine the news headlines if one came off mid-ride and hit a guest bang in the head cuasing injury?

If Towers have gone for VR you would like to think that they've tried thinking of the throughputs.

:)
 
Harvey. said:
With respect, this is such a stupid argument, it actually hurts.
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No need for respect, I was being facetious and joining in with the ridiculous melodrama.

JB1985 said:
My point entirely.....much more pressing issues to sort. It's bad management
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Is it though? Is it? You don't even know what they're building, or modifying.

GaryH said:
Hmmm, this could be a nightmare in terms of throughput.... a mid queue photo and then the VR system itself. arggghhhhh
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A mid queue photo wouldn't harm capacity unless the trains were sat empty waiting for people. With a reasonable number of people in the queue, this would be unlikely to happen, surely. The VR system, perhaps - not sure how they will deal with that, if in fact that is what they are doing. Let's wait and see.
 
Mid-queue photos don't really make the queue longer unless the ride is walk on (had this problem on zufari before where it was going with empty rows but there was a long queue to have your photo taken due to people being difficult), a problem because air is quite often walk on at the beginning and end of the day, and as the photo building is also the queue line merge point (correct me if I'm wrong) it will actually make the queue longer. Couple this with the faff of VR headsets, and a ride that already isn't fast to load, the throughput will be dire on air (or galactica) when it opens for the 2016 season.

Air doesn't need this. It needs the tunnel sorting, a little theming to be added and the god awful doubled fence to be removed. It does not need a new name or theme or gimmick. Sort out Rita first. Spend the budget fixing dark forest.
 
Won't the pre-ride video be a way of distraction, while riders are getting set up with the head sets? And also the mid photo point a delay/distraction from waiting for the pre-video?
 
Sorry for possibly being a dumb question here but...why is that we all seem to be in the know that VR is very likely to happen? Have I missed something?

And after reading through the rather, at best, lukewarm response to the whole thing, was there ever an attraction/theme job in the Merlin era that left us all satisfied?:confused1:
 
QTXAdsy said:
Sorry for possibly being a dumb question here but...why is that we all seem to be in the know that VR is very likely to happen? Have I missed something?
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It just seems very likely. Going down the "space" route for an outdoor attraction, it won't be immersive unless some kind of VR is used. You can only theme an outdoor ride so much to make it look different to where you actually are.

Think it's an educated guess really (unless I've missed something to)
 
delta79 said:
Maybe the space thing is not air, maybe catcf is being redone (we can only hope)
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Oh god, how embarrassing would it be if all this time we've been talking about the wrong ride. Still if it is CATCF then I can vouch a large chunk of us will be happy to see the end of it, speaking of which, is 2016 the end of the contract or has there been an extension now that I think about it?
 
QTXAdsy said:
Oh god, how embarrassing would it be if all this time we've been talking about the wrong ride. Still if it is CATCF then I can vouch a large chunk of us will be happy to see the end of it, speaking of which, is 2016 the end of the contract or has there been an extension now that I think about it?
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I think we're in the dark regarding the CATCF contract. It's apparently due to be up at the end of this year but I've not seen anything about a renewal. When Towers first put it on to ridetimes.co.uk the other week it was listed as "The Chocoate Factory" - pure speculation but could that have been hinting to a generic choclate factory themed ride next year?

We know for a fact however that 2016 is focusing around Air with the new theming and queue work and the new restaurant. I'd imagine Charlie will stay as it is.

:)
 
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