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Hex [2024 Refurb]: General Discussion

pluk said:
That's true, but hex is a fancy petrol mower we already own. Its not a Zamperla.
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Fancy petrol mower at the end of its economic life...written off by depreciation so long ago it deserves to be dumped in a fellow thoosies shed for occasional use when the real gardener has cleared off to the Beach instead.
Possibly.
That could be the mower or Hex, I may add.
 
I don’t think it’s coming to the end of its life, I just think they’ve been rather unfortunate with it. There’s a possibility it will be closed for a few months again, as it’s perhaps a different issue to what it was previously. I just think different parts of the ride have broken at different times (speculating here)
 
If the Nemesis retrack is successful and this encourages the park to do the same for the rest of the park or the other Merlin parks, a Hex like-for-like replacement isn't exactly far fetched in which I would've doubted with Merlin's previous board but with new leadership that has yet to really take full effect anything is possible I suppose.

Plus I wonder how different the technology for Madhouse attractions are now since Hex opened? Surely the technology had been improved since then unless someone knows better. My only concern is that if Hex were to get the heavy overhaul it needs is that in order to market it as a 'new' attraction they might change the storyline a bit like what they are doing with Nemesis which leaves you in a dilemma in which you either close a damn good dark ride or refurbished it into a less grander dark ride that some would say is ruined. Then again suppose the latter would be better than nowt.
 
QTXAdsy said:
If the Nemesis retrack is successful and this encourages the park to do the same for the rest of the park or the other Merlin parks, a Hex like-for-like replacement isn't exactly far fetched in which I would've doubted with Merlin's previous board but with new leadership that has yet to really take full effect anything is possible I suppose.
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I think the difference is that Nemesis is a headline coaster, and a rather popular one at that, while Hex is a filler attraction.

Justifying the spend of rebuilding a headline coaster like-for-like does not mean that the cost vs business value analysis would come to the same conclusion for every other ride on park, and with it being more of a filler ride, I do believe that that type of treatment for Hex might be harder to justify than it was for Nemesis.

I hope it doesn’t go any time soon, but if it does, it’s had a very good life for a non-coaster attraction. 23 years is quite a long lifespan for a filler attraction at Alton Towers, particularly when you consider that Hex has not really changed an awful lot in that timeframe.
 
Wasn't Hex originally slated to only last 14 years? If so, it must be near the end of its life.
 
I have a vague memory maybe someone can clarify, did Hex basically come about to warrant spending money on restoring the octagon rooms roof and central column?
 
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Matt N said:
The fact that nothing else can be done with that space rides-wise definitely works in its favour, but in my opinion it is only a filler attraction rather than a headliner, and I don’t see a replacement of it making business sense from Alton Towers’ standpoint like a replacement of Nemesis or another of the park’s major coasters does.
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Fixed this for you.

I think it is arguable to say that Hex remains Alton Towers' headline dark ride. The Curse has the potential to take that title, but this won't become apparent for at least another season or two once the initial hype has died down. Outside the rollercoasters, the park's 'headliners' work in a rather different way, which means rides like Hex and the Congo River Rapids also remain headliners many years after their addition.
zeock said:
Wasn't Hex originally slated to only last 14 years? If so, it must be near the end of its life.
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When I read those documents, I read it more that it was intended to be in place for at least a certain number of years (I think the number was actually 20). i.e. The reason this lifespan was included in the planning document was to indicate that the development would be a long-term addition to the Towers, rather than a short term addition like Crux. This would have been important, as they would have been unlikely to get permission for so much disruption to the Towers if they had only intended for the attraction to last 5 years, for example.
 
Squiggs said:
Fixed this for you.

I think it is arguable to say that Hex remains Alton Towers' headline dark ride. The Curse has the potential to take that title, but this won't become apparent for at least another season or two once the initial hype has died down. Outside the rollercoasters, the park's 'headliners' work in a rather different way, which means rides like Hex and the Congo River Rapids also remain headliners many years after their addition.
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My mistake; I think I phrased that badly. My point was that from my experience, I don't think Hex is a headline attraction for the bulk of visitors to the park, so I'm not sure that Merlin would view a full replacement as viable relative to the amount of money it would cost.

Out of interest, what metric are you using to classify Hex as the park's headline dark ride? If it's based on presence, I'd argue that Curse now has a very legitimate claim to the title seeing as it's the one that's currently plastered all over ad campaigns and widely talked about within the public conscious.

From what I can tell, I would struggle to argue that anything that's not a roller coaster, with the exception of CBeebies Land, is a headline attraction of Alton Towers these days (in my view, of course). Rightly or wrongly, I think the park is mainly known for its roller coasters among the wider populace, and it is perceived as a roller coaster park first and foremost. If we were talking about Disney or Universal, or to a lesser degree somewhere like Europa Park, my view would be different. But at Alton Towers, I would personally struggle to argue that anything non-coaster, bar CBeebies Land, is a headline attraction at the park these days.

With this in mind, I am unsure whether Merlin would view a like-for-like refurbishment of Hex as viable in the context of modern day Alton Towers. For the money it would cost, would Merlin deem it to have satisfactory returns? I'm not so sure.
 
Quite literally irreplaceable. The ride building must go with the ride as part of the planning permission and they won't get permission again. It's a bit like Vampire at Chesvegas in that sense.
 
Poisson said:
I suppose the big change in madhouses is powering with slew rings vs a long cable, theoretically allowing limitless rotation in either direction.

Hex is an indoor ride with a potentially huge throughput. It needs to be protected at all costs.
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I’ve always thought it could make a fantastic “pre-show” to another or larger ride, rise of the resistance style. Such as a trackless dark ride or flying theatre perhaps. Remove the old buildings behind the driving school and there’s a decent space there for something from Garmendale. Making it possibly one of the most immersive and impressive dark rides in Europe if not the world.

On a much smaller scale it could also lead into a museum type exhibition in Crux or inside the towers.

It could also support to re-roofing the other side of the armory that could be used as an expansion of the story, which doesn’t end “there” or “there…”

The attraction could get the nemesis treatment and replaced like for like, then enhanced with refreshing the theming/effects and adding some 3D projections in the octagon & vault.

Loads of options with this ride, and again an opportunity to do something a bit special. But I’ll wait and see what happens with Nemesis Reborn…first
 
It is unfair to compare any work on this to a restrack of a coaster.

Even if they did the highly unlikely and un needed and replaced the vault, the cost difference between a re track and this would be huge.

I would also say that unless the vault is physically warped, they would not need to replace the whole thing. Certain bits of machiney would probably suffice. Depending on what the actual issue is.
 
Yeah, also we don't actually know for sure what the issue is. It could just be one small part that needs replacing (again) that's going to take a while to source.
 
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