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Thorpe Park 2017: DBGT: Rise of The Demon

Don't know if anyone remembers, but I'm curious to know what was posted here a few months ago that thorpe asked us to take down. Not really a problem now if people find out and I just want to know what it was about.
 
Does the Victorian carriage and rail depot tie into the story in any way other than causing the bizarre moment of contrast when entering the ride vehicle?

I find it a bit odd that the marketing material, the merchandise and promotional images focus on the decaying Victorian aesthetic and the eerie image of the carriage suspended by chains only for it to have nothing to do with the actual ride story line.

And why create such an interesting set piece if it's never going to be explained?
 
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CGM said:
Does the Victorian carriage and rail depot tie into the story in any way other than causing the bizarre moment of contrast when entering the ride vehicle?

I find it a bit odd that all of the marketing material, the merchandise and promotional images focus on the decaying Victorian aesthetic and the eerie image of the carriage suspended by chains only for it to have nothing to do with the actual ride story line.
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has nothing to do with the story. Heard that the chains were meant to drag the train through the air for the "flying" scene.

Looks good, but adds nothing to the story and only succeeds in confusing people.
 
Exactly. What ghosts!

Glitchy as hell the second ride.

Some good parts....... The staffie!
 
Just from what I'm hearing it sounds like lots of really cool concepts lacking a central premise to hold them together.

I love the idea of reimagining a Ghost Train. The Victorian train morphing into the modern underground works well with this concept. After all Victorians were the people who popularised illusions and the ageing underground fits with our modern perception. It's after that and the whole Fracking part that I don't get the link too, clearly just pandering to Fraking being a controversial subject...

On the subject of the ride system if it is a train inside what looks like another train but is actually a tunnel, that's a very cool trick!
 
Sku said:
I managed to get to Thorpe Park for a couple of goes on the Ghost Train today. I have put some of my post in spoiler tags but overall it is "spoiler lite", I don't go into real detail.

I find it quite frustrating as all the ingredients seem to be there for a great attraction, but little bits and pieces just don't seem to work properly. It seems "almost great", but like something is missing. I do suppose this is why it has been delayed so long, and why even now it is classed as a "technical rehearsal". I think with some work it could be really great, but it remains to be seen if further tweaks continue to be made.

I'll mostly talk about the ride operationally, since I'm sort of wait times/throughput geek. If we thought Sub-Terra, or Galactica required an enormous number of staff to operate, Ghost Train really takes it to a whole new level. The number of staff working on the ride was mind boggling, far too many to even count. It may be that less staff will be used after technical rehearsals, but here is what I remember:
-2 Staff at entrance to ride
-2 Staff queue line photo point 1
-2 Staff standing in queueline shop
-2 Staff queue line photo point 2
-2 Staff batching area
-2 Staff baggage storage
-1 Staff stairway after preshow
-2 Staff onload
-4 Staff in train carriage
-2 Staff offload
-3 Staff mid-show
-2 staff onload 2
-4 staff in train carriage 2
And then just the photo/shop staff

That seems to be a total of 25 minimum, up to maybe 40 staff across the entire attraction, to keep everything ticking over.

And even with this number of staff there seemed to be operational problems getting people through the attraction, though I suppose this is natural at this stage. Firstly, the 2 queue line photo points are massive bottlenecks at this point in time. The throughput of the actual ride is far quicker than the amount of time it takes to get everyone's photo taken. This means the entire queue today was held up before the first of two photo points, and spilling out the front entrance of the ride. However the entire snaking queue line after the photo point was totally empty, and a shortcut gate was even open BYPASSING the manned shop. I mean what the hell, there is an hour queue, and they are using a shortcut that bypasses an open queue line shop? I didn't even get my picture taken in either photo point the first time around because the manager came over and told them to batch through 60 guests without photos, as "our train had arrived". We proceeded directly to the front of the queue without getting to use either photo point. This seems like a massive oversight, the photos and queueline shop are in the complete wrong place in the line, and aren't able to process guests quickly enough.

When you get to the batching area, there is even more chaos, as the area is laid out poorly meaning that people waiting to board the ride, people putting their bags away, and those trying to enter the batching area are all standing in each others way. This slows down the batching process a lot, and people were still trying to put their bags away when we were being directed inside.

Once inside,
there is plenty of space in the preshow room for everyone, with 3 tiered levels so everyone can see. Personally for me, I loved the preshow. It seems to build a lot of tension, and you can tell that everyone in the room doesn't know what to expect and is nervous. This is really Derren Brown at his best, when he is just talking! I was starting to feel a little nervous which is unusual for me.

Next we moved into a small holding room but were not held, but instead persuaded to move through the room as quickly as possible, a very rushed feeling that persists throughout the ride. It's nice they care about throughput but it seemed to be at the expense of the experience a little bit. We then entered the train room which as others have mentioned is spectacular. No time to appreciate it though, as we were rushed immediately on to the train! "Go go go!"

Once on the train we had to figure out putting the headsets on without assistance. With half the train still struggling to put the headset on the ride got underway. The first section in the train is great and really builds tension, and the confusion as everyone leaves the train is a fun experience.

Into the mid-show room and the actors in here are great. This is probably the strongest part of the attraction. I had no idea we were getting straight back on the train afterwards which is a great touch. Other than being rushed the whole first train and mid show work great... Then for the finale...

The finale is a shame. It starts well, but then seems to switch to a grey screen where nothing happens for about 2 minutes. This happened both rides. I'm pretty sure something is missing, as the first time I actually took my headset off and saw others doing the same as nothing was happening which caused confusion, and for what seemed like a really long time. I thought it was an error but 3 hours later the same again, nothing happening for at least 2 minutes, just a grey smoky screen and the monster pops his head out every 30s on loop. After the bizzare 2m absence of action, the motion simulator reallly starts to show us what it can do for about 30s before the ride is over.

My main complaint is this underwhelming finale where nothing seems to happen for 2m, and the fact the simulation seems to be able to do some clever stuff which is underused in favour of nothing happening for 2 minutes! I really just have to think the finale is unfinished because it could be great without the random blank spot. And the motion simulator seems only properly used for the last 30s which is a waste considering the the finale is at least 5m long in total.

Not really a full review but those are some of my random observations. Overall I liked it but it was just missing something. I hold out hope that this can be a truly great attraction once everything is ironed out!
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Completely agree.

Did you get the glitchy seat?
 
This ride is really starting to become a bit of a PR nightmare for Thorpe.

Never actually made it into the queue today. Advertised to be open at 11, then quickly told by staff it would be opening at 3 walked past at 3.30 to find it had temporarily ceased operation, by 4 it was completely closed and we saw all the staff leaving the building....

Saw on twitter they were giving free tickets away to all visitors so headed to guest services where they poor guy on the desk was incredibly apologetic and embarrassed about it all. He said they have been having lots of issues with the ride and today part of the it had overheated causing them to loose all power and that it was incredibly embarrassing given that it only opened officially 2 days ago

At what point do they admit it's not working close it sort out all these issues and the glitches others have mentioned then launch it properly as a truly world beating rife
 
Tim said:
Just from what I'm hearing it sounds like lots of really cool concepts lacking a central premise to hold them together.

I love the idea of reimagining a Ghost Train. The Victorian train morphing into the modern underground works well with this concept. After all Victorians were the people who popularised illusions and the ageing underground fits with our modern perception. It's after that and the whole Fracking part that I don't get the link too, clearly just pandering to Fraking being a controversial subject...

On the subject of the ride system if it is a train inside what looks like another train but is actually a tunnel, that's a very cool trick!
Click to expand...

It doesn't morph. It's pretty obvious from the outside it's a shell. And then when you get aboard and see the brushes, you know.


A side note.... Had to tell so many people about queue jumping yesterday.

The clientele that go here are horrible and rude.

Told two staff members that the people behind us had pushed in. The first said she would get someone to come sort it... Nothing. And then the second said it was easier to just let them.

A staff member asked us how our day was when we were getting car parking ticket and said it was ok.

He then asked what we thought about ghost train to which we told him our problems, and they got us to stay behind and run through everything wrong with it.

Also mentioned about the staff members not doing anything about the queue jumpers... Looked pretty disgusted at what we were told.


Won't be rushing back here. It's not a patch on towers.
 
Ash123uk said:
It doesn't morph. It's pretty obvious from the outside it's a shell. And then when you get aboard and see the brushes, you know.
Click to expand...

I was talking about the theme as a concept, not how it actually turned out. I can't judge what it's actually like until I've been on it, which given it's pretty much the summer holidays now I might not get chance for a long time.
 
bluesonichd said:
Ride system. There is no ride system. The train never moves. o_Oo_O
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It does move, the Victorian train is just a shell that the modern train moves back and forth through and I'm assuming the second part is just a simulator on a track hence why you disembark in the same place you get on.

Very disappointing considering I find the actual tube more unnerving than this ride. Very glitchy, too quiet, no coherent story line and I don't appreciate being shoved by/having actors scream right in my ears.

Another thing that pissed me off is as soon as you get in you just get screamed at to put your headset on as the thing is counting down simultaneously. Yeah thanks for letting me know how to adjust it etc. Absolutely useless, and some of the live actors are way too OTT.

I actually said "surely that's not it" when we got off the first time which says it all really. Went on twice and had exactly the same experience both times. Disappointing.
 
I still dont think it moves :D
you get in then out the same side, go around back in the out and exit
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The train does move, the first time we exit it we leave from one side, when we get back on we get on from the other side.
 
Looks like someone's complained about it going down the other day on merlin's Facebook page. Given a free fastrack for their wait.
 
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