Gardaland

[DiogoJ42]

True, but with the our Oblivion's queue, ducking under a fence only gets you in to the fastrack queue (or the parallel queue in the original design), so there is no advantage to doing so. With this, it will be easy to jump whole sections.

 

[James]

Love the van, messes with your mind quite a bit. The theming on the whole looks pretty good, only thing I'm not a fan of is cameras everywhere. It comes off as pretty unnecessary to the theme. It's almost like Merlin Studios purposely place the same theming as some kind of signature.

The queue design is awful, although not a surprise.

 

[Rose Of Dawn]

As unoriginal as the cameras are, I've gotta hand it to Gardaland/Merlin for the van. It looks great!

 

[Dave]

Testing video:

 

[Rob]

POV:



Final inversion looks awfully slow. Theming is pretty good though!

 

[toofpikk]

I wouldnt say awfully slow... It's only slow through the roll, otherwise it looks nicely paced. You also have to bare in mind they have been testing it only half full so it would probably go round a bit quicker when full, but yeah the theming looks alot better then what I first thought.

 

[AstroDan]

Hmm, I was pretty excited on this but it looks a bit pants. I am sure it'll pick up a bit mind you.

The 'airtime' hill (if you can even use the word airtime) looks slower even than Krake's... and that is saying something. Why are B&M so concerned about decent airtime hills on these things!?

 

[GeorgeT]

Dan, I totally second that. I`m okay with B&M playing it somewhat safe, but I think not just this one but LOTS of their coasters could be a lot more fun by putting some decent, if not "ejector" air, into them...

 

[DiogoJ42]

I, for one, think this looks amazing. It's even better than Baron. Well done Merlin, you have raised the bar.

 

[Dar]

I, for one, think this looks amazing. It's even better than Baron. Well done Merlin, you have raised the bar.

Your bot's malfunctioning, you should probably have a look at it.

I think I prefer the look of Baron, but that comes from knowing Efteling will have gone all out on the queue, and pre-shows, along with the already amazing theming!

 

[Benzin]

Well it opened today, wee video has popped up:



Looks like it was slow during the testing then, one day people will stop being surprised when that happens...

 

[AstroDan]

Given that the "testing" was just 2-3 days ago...

I still think the "airtime" hill looks rubbish - although the helix looks pretty good.

At the end of the day, the ride looks well packaged but it isn't doing anything that hasn't been done before several times..

 

[siralgenon]

From what I've seen of the ride today on Facebook, the queue-line, station and even exit for that matter look amazing. Far better than anything we have here in the UK. Definitely an improvement on the effects found in and around The Smilers queue-line, station and exit.

As you can see from this video:

 

[Ketz]

I think it look pretty impressive, immersive, and a good experience. Think this is probably the second large investment after the Merlin strategy compared Gardaland with Europa, wanting to massively increase attendance and make the theme park into a destination resort. With both Raptor and now this they probably have the 2 best coaster Merlin have created.

 

[AstroDan]

They are clearly not the 2 best coasters. 2 best packaged possibly, but not best coasters.

Mammut is also very well put together.

Gardaland do well out of theming that is for sure. I was very impressed with Raptor - but you have to remember the park really is a terrible mish mash of themes with no real cohesion.

I guess you can't have it all.



(I do hope al the Efteling apologists are now looking at this and eating a little piece of humble pie - Merlin do get it right sometimes...!)

 

[siralgenon]

Raptor is definitely one of Merlin's finest with layout and theming.

 

[Rob]

What's there looks good. I fail to get excited by the coaster, sure it looks nice but there's no way one of these mini dive coasters is going to live up to Griffon.

Very impressed with the theming and queue line effects. Will be interesting to see how it is all maintained as you can't help but feel a lot of upkeep will be required.

 

[Danny]

That warped van looks stunning.

 

[Ketz]

What's there looks good. I fail to get excited by the coaster, sure it looks nice but there's no way one of these mini dive coasters is going to live up to Griffon.

Very impressed with the theming and queue line effects. Will be interesting to see how it is all maintained as you can't help but feel a lot of upkeep will be required.

You said it yourself, the theming and the queue line, which plays a very important role in whether the coaster is 'good' or not. The layout itself is no means groundbreaking or world beating but it still look fun and will no doubt be popular with the general public, whom probably wouldn't know what Oblivion is let alone what Griffon is.

I'm personally happy Merlin have tried to come up with a rollercoaster that offers an experience, not simply a worlds first gimmick with little to no substance.

 

[Dave]

If The Smiler had even half the theming this ride we would be absolute bumming it. The sad thing is this proves Merlin can do good theming, i just wish they would maybe try and do this in the UK!