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2018: Wicker Man - General Discussion - SPOILERS! - Part One

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Brilliant recreation! The ride seems longer than I thought it would be, which is good. I just don't understand the need for the 'launch' section on the lift hill when it's pretty much the same speed as the chain lift before it.
 
Am I the only person who watched that thinking that there must be a secret element or dark ride section (I can dream, right?) In that first building?

Brilliant recreation, shame the ride looks quite boring (should work fine as a family ride, but it's not somthing to challenge nemesis). Could be decent with a faster launch though, maybe a few more air time hills?
 
Leah said:
Am I the only person who watched that thinking that there must be a secret element or dark ride section (I can dream, right?) In that first building?
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I'm pretty sure that the plans actually say that there will be some sort of dark ride section before the launched lift hill.
 
Fingers crossed that will be further establishing some kind of storyline/theme.
Not heard about a dark ride section only a pre-show.
 
Maybe it's about time Merlin/Towers grew a pair and had a good sit down with Staffordshire Moorlands Council and suggested that they should give them a bit more 'leg-room' with regards to planning for certain new attractions. Towers are still going out and spending a lot of money on rides that are 'so-so' instead of being brilliant, due to strict planning rules. It's obvious that the downturn in visitors following the Smiler incident had a serious negative knock-on effect to local business in the region. Staffordshire Moorlands should obviously want Towers to be as popular with tourists as possible to enhance the local economy. Having severe restrictions on every single thing that Towers try to do is just not helpful for either party. Would this ride potentially have not been much greater (and potentially attracting more guests) utilising the extra space taken up originally by the flume? Would it have been such a disaster for either party if Towers had used that space for the new attraction? How would Staffordshire Moorlands like it if Merlin decided that the budget spent in this region was better utilised elsewhere at some point down the line? The plans don't lie. The next 'big thing' at Alton Towers looks pretty mediocre. Congratulations everyone.
 
That recreation is really cool so kudos for that!

Can't help but think that a lot of the ride looks quite dull based off the current plans though. Particularly the lift/first drop section.

Of course there could still be plenty of tricks up the parks sleeve (I mean who is really expecting a SW without some kind of world first element to it?) but currently it's a bit bland based off that recreation.


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Sku said:
I'm a bit surprised at all the comments about how a huge cross valley coaster would have been better. Well... We know that. Alton knows that. Everyone knows that.

But we also all know that it is an impossibility. Due to many many restrictions placed on the park which have been discussed to death on here already, a huge monster of a wooden rollercoaster simply cannot be built at Alton Towers. It seems utterly futile to me to compare this plan to coasters which cannot actually be built.

Alton Towers never have and never will build giant rollercoasters because they can't. They have always tried to build compact rollercoasters which pack a punch in a small footprint. So the whole reaction from the community that it's "small" seems pretty ridiculous coming from a community which knows the challenges the park faces in building new attractions.

The final outcome remains to be seen, but as far as I can tell it was always going to small. Let's just hope it does pack a punch in a small footprint!
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SW8 as it stands currently is going to be small, but the original SW8 plans weren't cross valley, and were going ahead until this time last year in forbidden valley, the cross valley was an impossibility, but if it weren't for towers pulling out themselves due to cost it would have been a thrill ride, most likely an RMC, it would have gone ahead, and most likely passed the plans (was heading that way with the EIA before it was pulled). It was due to exessive Rock removal (I believe around the overgrown nemesis extended queue). That increased the cost, and if it wasn't for that cost and other knock on effects of the smiler incident, it would have gone ahead on the council planning side of things. Still find it funny how Towers have started to advertise on posters already, surely Merlin would'nt make the same mistake they made with "new for 2016" at chessington?

I'm sure this will be a solid coaster, but I hope we get a thrill wooden/hybrid in a few years, and with these plans going in at a time when we are uncertain about visitor numbers, I feel like Merlin will use the low ridership excuse to get out of building one again, it looks good, but even for a family coaster it doesn't look great.
 
Great recreation there, thanks for that! Got to admit it doesn't look great, admittedly the length looks fine but that's probably because of how slow it is around parts of the layout.

Saying that, if a launch is utilised at some point it could be a lot better! I still feel there is a lot we don't know.

:)
 
Ryan B said:
surely Merlin would'nt make the same mistake they made with "new for 2016" at chessington?
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I understand what you're saying, but I think the two cases are completely different. Chessington were looking at getting an awful splash battle type thing, that would probably be a bad investmentfor the park.

Towers on the other hand, have just had the worst season in the parks history. Surely advertising now at least tells guests that investments are being made and encourages them to keep visiting. And even though major projects have been pulled in the past, i doubt this will be - towers need a major investment in the next few years to recover. At worst, this plan is dropped, and a different sw8 will apear in forbidden valley eventually. I have no doubt that sw8 will happen, what it is and where it is, we won't know until construction starts.
 
Yeah, I'm in the camp of looking forward to SW8, but getting an idea of that layout, it doesn't look like it'll be the best woodie around. So I can see why people would find this so boring. But if the plans change then I'll think it'll do the ride go and if they don't then ride experiences are usually different to watching a POV.

As others have said though, great recreation from the plans we have at the moment! :)
 
I like the way it picks up a bit of speed into the corners, could be a decent little bit of Airtime on it.

Perhaps this is their way of bringing back Air...
 
MattyH said:
Non TPR video.
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Much appreciated. Robb Alvey is one truly obnoxious man who doesn't deserve our views!

Regardless of how the plans look, the POV makes it seem like it will be quite the coaster, even if it isn't the biggest in the world! I've never understood everyone having problems with how small it is, even though doing a site size comparison of other rides (at Alton) it's quite large. I'm all for something completely new, rather than just another generic steel ride that's not remarkable in any way. I don't know how many more 'unique' rides they can actually get, so a generally solid ride with all restrictions taken into account would be great. Please no more gimmicks and rides fully dedicated to ruining old ones.
 
How do people know that the original SW8 plan for FV was a bigger thrill based wooden coaster? As far as I know no plans where ever released . So it might have been a short family/thrill coaster just like SW8.

I am not sure how true it was but I did hear that the FW coaster wasn't an RMC and it was possibly going to be GCI with a launched lift hill and wasn't going yo be particularly long. Also I heard at the time Merlin finally agreed on a wooden coaster as a manufacture had come up with a unique proposition for them, so I imagine the manufacture GCI and the key feature of the this version is the same as the FV plan just with a different layout.
 
TomLad said:
I'm all for something completely new, rather than just another generic steel ride that's not remarkable in any way. I don't know how many more 'unique' rides they can actually get, so a generally solid ride with all restrictions taken into account would be great. Please no more gimmicks and rides fully dedicated to ruining old ones.
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That's the problem... From the plans and the PoV it's not a solid ride. I thought it was going to change my opinion when looking at the PoV but made it even worse.

And where are these steep drops people are talking about?
 
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