• ℹ️ Heads up...

    This is a popular topic that is fast moving Guest - before posting, please ensure that you check out the first post in the topic for a quick reminder of guidelines, and importantly a summary of the known facts and information so far. Thanks.

TBC: SW9 Speculation

Status
This topic has been locked. No further replies can be posted.
Connor98 said:
Whilst I agree Alton need more flat rides or something to take the crowds away from the headline rides, I always think about what John wardley said regarding them. That they need to be something different and something you don't associate with traveling fairgrounds. Myself I would prefer a high capacity top class dark ride and a refurb of all the coasters (including a big clean up around the park), than a new coaster or a load of flat rides.
Click to expand...

I think I’ve mentioned this in the past but Talocan at Phantasialand is the perfect example of a well themed flat ride. If only Ripsaw could be replaced with the floorless model.
 
Connor98 said:
Whilst I agree Alton need more flat rides or something to take the crowds away from the headline rides, I always think about what John wardley said regarding them. That they need to be something different and something you don't associate with traveling fairgrounds. Myself I would prefer a high capacity top class dark ride and a refurb of all the coasters (including a big clean up around the park), than a new coaster or a load of flat rides.
Click to expand...

Oh there is no doubt Alton Towers needs a high class dark ride as well as they lost Charlie and Choc Factory too recently.

Really the park needs to add everything except coasters. This includes shows, films, entertainment, dark rides and flat rides.

It is possible to use flat rides that can't be found at fairgrounds (such as Rush), or well-themed rides that are more interesting than a fairground can offer. Look at Talocan for example.
 
Matt878787 said:
I think I’ve mentioned this in the past but Talocan at Phantasialand is the perfect example of a well themed flat ride. If only Ripsaw could be replaced with the floorless model.
Click to expand...
Talking of which, all the HB Leisure stuff on its site has been abandoned and is not in use. A bad waste of space in my opinion. SW9 for that spot?!
 
Agree with you both, A highly themed flat can be great, the top spin at Phantasialand does look incredible. It's wether Merlin see it as a money maker or not (I'm not sure how much influence these new shareholders have though). Shows and entertainment is something I'd love to see more of too. I'm only young myself at 22 so I can't remember all the glory years of towers unfortunately, but I remember not too long ago a pirate ship that drove about mutiny bay and the bottom of towers street playing songs and interacting with crowds and their was the pirate show in the courtyard, Even little things like that again would make all the difference.
 
jon81uk said:
Well at one point SW8 was going in that spot :)
Click to expand...
Really? From what i heard Wicker Man had rumours to go near the Forbidden Valley. Still, it's a waste of space but if alton can fit the Smiler into the Black Hole place, i'm sure they'll be able to conjure up Merlin to say. "Magic, Magic, you're getting an RMC :p".
 
Pleasure Beach Valhalla said:
Really? From what i heard Wicker Man had rumours to go near the Forbidden Valley. Still, it's a waste of space but if alton can fit the Smiler into the Black Hole place, i'm sure they'll be able to conjure up Merlin to say. "Magic, Magic, you're getting an RMC :p".
Click to expand...
Have you ever seen how compact some of RMC’s Raptor coasters are? They are absolute wizards when it comes to fitting things in confined spaces!
 
Pleasure Beach Valhalla said:
Really? From what i heard Wicker Man had rumours to go near the Forbidden Valley. Still, it's a waste of space but if alton can fit the Smiler into the Black Hole place, i'm sure they'll be able to conjure up Merlin to say. "Magic, Magic, you're getting an RMC :p".
Click to expand...

Pretty certain there was a plan to use the Ripsaw and Blade areas plus some of the woodland nearby for a woodie coaster, but they went with the flume site instead.
 
As Jon81 rightly says, and as many have been saying on here for years; AT is packed with coasters, especially when you consider the location and environment that it's situated in. Flats can be good, and agree that Talocan is proof, but often they are a little repetitive and hard to fit in to the theme park experience. Dark rides, entertainment shows, fun houses, and even shops are what do provide this; which is exactly why Talbot and old Towers Street worked so well. No rushed, marketing obsessed decisions and instead an imaginative approach that focused on appealing to all guests.

Duel is an insult when you consider what it used to be, except for the new music perhaps. Complete misuse of UV blacklighting which clearly emerged from minimal consultation, aging props, and the shooting concept really isn't all that anymore; it was always a fad, but at least it gave some life to the place for a while and made it marketable. Huge work is needed, rather than the money wasting that has taken place recently over the last few years. That is more important than a new secret weapon.
A new dark ride is needed to replace Sub Terra, which could be SW9. Something substantial without actor reliance, an indoor boat ride perhaps, or even something tracked.

But the main site for SW9 would hopefully be replacing the awful Dungeon and the slab wood wall around it, which I personally will never set foot in. You could fit a nice indoor/outdoor flume there and re-purpose some large buildings in the process.

Naturally skeptical of course, as we all know Merlin and their track record, but that doesn't mean we can't idealize what we think should happen.
 
Sauron97 said:
As Jon81 rightly says, and as many have been saying on here for years; AT is packed with coasters, especially when you consider the location and environment that it's situated in. Flats can be good, and agree that Talocan is proof, but often they are a little repetitive and hard to fit in to the theme park experience. Dark rides, entertainment shows, fun houses, and even shops are what do provide this; which is exactly why Talbot and old Towers Street worked so well. No rushed, marketing obsessed decisions and instead an imaginative approach that focused on appealing to all guests.
Click to expand...

I agree flat rides are harder to fit into a theme park and Alton Towers needs a more all-round Funhouse and to really make what was Talbot street fully realised again.
Using the example of Phantasialand again, they have the hotel funhouse on the main street area and Maus au Chocolat as well as other older dark rides, plus four shows across the park.
A new building on the old coasters corner site for a new state of the art dark ride, a family boat ride back in the dungeon building, a show in the theatre and a fun house in the old nickelodeon building. Plus gangster granny offering a low tech dark ride. This would really round out that corner of the park to a proper family offering.
 
jon81uk said:
Pretty certain there was a plan to use the Ripsaw and Blade areas plus some of the woodland nearby for a woodie coaster, but they went with the flume site instead.
Click to expand...
I think blade and ripsaw were meant to be closed during 2015 but they back tracked and both opened from the start.and then June came along and the whole thing was put n hold.
 
Sauron97 said:
As Jon81 rightly says, and as many have been saying on here for years; AT is packed with coasters, especially when you consider the location and environment that it's situated in. Flats can be good, and agree that Talocan is proof, but often they are a little repetitive and hard to fit in to the theme park experience. Dark rides, entertainment shows, fun houses, and even shops are what do provide this; which is exactly why Talbot and old Towers Street worked so well. No rushed, marketing obsessed decisions and instead an imaginative approach that focused on appealing to all guests.

Duel is an insult when you consider what it used to be, except for the new music perhaps. Complete misuse of UV blacklighting which clearly emerged from minimal consultation, aging props, and the shooting concept really isn't all that anymore; it was always a fad, but at least it gave some life to the place for a while and made it marketable. Huge work is needed, rather than the money wasting that has taken place recently over the last few years. That is more important than a new secret weapon.
A new dark ride is needed to replace Sub Terra, which could be SW9. Something substantial without actor reliance, an indoor boat ride perhaps, or even something tracked.

But the main site for SW9 would hopefully be replacing the awful Dungeon and the slab wood wall around it, which I personally will never set foot in. You could fit a nice indoor/outdoor flume there and re-purpose some large buildings in the process.

Naturally skeptical of course, as we all know Merlin and their track record, but that doesn't mean we can't idealize what we think should happen.
Click to expand...

I’ve been banging the indoor boat ride drum for a while as a Sub-Terra replacement - you could have a Jurassic Park esque ride but with the Nemesis alien instead of Dinosaurs - could be absolutely epic if done properly.
 
Josh555 said:
I’ve been banging the indoor boat ride drum for a while as a Sub-Terra replacement - you could have a Jurassic Park esque ride but with the Nemesis alien instead of Dinosaurs - could be absolutely epic if done properly.
Click to expand...

Yes! Maybe not the Nemesis alien itself because that's in the pit but a general Lovecraftian theme water coaster would be amazing and, realistically, because these things are meant to be beyond comprehension, it could be done with relatively minimal resources. I always liked that part of the story where people were drawn toward the valley to worship and be fed upon.

That being said, Wicker Man has the cult theme too so I think it is unlikely. It would be very cool though.
 
well, SW9 i think will replace nemesis as it's almost 28 years old and my prediction is we'll get a dark ride as it was said in there plans in they're past. if SW3 does get replaced with a dark ride then i would love it if they based it on another creature theme.
 
blindaccess said:
well, SW9 i think will replace nemesis as it's almost 28 years old and my prediction is we'll get a dark ride as it was said in there plans in they're past. if SW3 does get replaced with a dark ride then i would love it if they based it on another creature theme.
Click to expand...
I'd be interested to know why you think a dark ride would be a good fit for the Nemesis plot, because I'd personally argue that Nemesis' plot would be one of the hardest and most costly plots of land in the entire park to place a dark ride upon, for various reasons.

You'd surely have to do a lot of groundwork and infilling of land, and I can't imagine Nemesis being an easy coaster to deconstruct, so I'd certainly imagine that there are many other areas of Alton Towers where a dark ride could be built far more easily and without removing one of the park's biggest icons in the process (as much as Nemesis is only my 4th favourite of the big 7, a lot of people absolutely adore it, and most still laud it as their favourite Alton Towers ride). I could reel off parts of the park like Spinball's plot of land, some of the woods near Duel and Sub-Terra's plot of land, amongst others, which could arguably fit a dark ride in far more easily.

But each to their own, I suppose!
 
Status
This topic has been locked. No further replies can be posted.
Top