Thorpe Park: General Discussion

[Robinsonhtid]

Must admit whilst I don't care about the themeing, the splashdown area does look absolutely awful.

They probably should have scrapped it when they cancelled the viewing area. You can't see it from 95% of the area, only the ride exit. And even then you still can't see it properly because of the fencing.

I do have to agree the splashdown area looks awful and pointless.

 

[Alphe86]

I do have to agree the splashdown area looks awful and pointless.

Maybe it’s just me but when riding you have 0 perception of the water spraying anyway. Looks like more of something for the queue to look at then an on ride element. And the general presentation is terrible. Lots of work to do

 

[Manchester1894]

I'm defintely in the don't care about theming bracket, but understand people in this forum are really passionate about great theme parks. I get it. Nemesis shows what really great design can do, but also I think theme parks are still great value for a day out and the upshot of a whole themepark styled like Phantasialand would be £100 a day tickets. If that was the trade-off would you take the current Hyperia at £30-60 a day or pay £100 for a whole park styled with themed worlds?

 

[Alastair]

I'm defintely in the don't care about theming bracket, but understand people in this forum are really passionate about great theme parks. I get it. Nemesis shows what really great design can do, but also I think theme parks are still great value for a day out and the upshot of a whole themepark styled like Phantasialand would be £100 a day tickets. If that was the trade-off would you take the current Hyperia at £30-60 a day or pay £100 for a whole park styled with themed worlds?

Pay more for the superior experience, if that's what it came to...

I'm sure that's what the majority of us are anticipating Universal to offer. Once Universal turn up, I will probably never visit Thorpe again (as a visitor travelling from the Staffs region) barring some Merlin miracle turnaround in the meanwhile.

 

[rob666]

I'm defintely in the don't care about theming bracket, but understand people in this forum are really passionate about great theme parks. I get it. Nemesis shows what really great design can do, but also I think theme parks are still great value for a day out and the upshot of a whole themepark styled like Phantasialand would be £100 a day tickets. If that was the trade-off would you take the current Hyperia at £30-60 a day or pay £100 for a whole park styled with themed worlds?

Phantasialand isn't an easy day out for a great many, massively expensive, and often needs planes to fit in the travel.
Thorpe has half a dozen decentish coasters, close to that entertaining London...at about a tenth of the cost

 

[Shaggy_Dog_]

I'm defintely in the don't care about theming bracket, but understand people in this forum are really passionate about great theme parks. I get it. Nemesis shows what really great design can do, but also I think theme parks are still great value for a day out and the upshot of a whole themepark styled like Phantasialand would be £100 a day tickets. If that was the trade-off would you take the current Hyperia at £30-60 a day or pay £100 for a whole park styled with themed worlds?

But Phantasialand manages to have an entire highly themed park for much less than £100. I think their standard ticket price is the equivalent of £55.

 

[Poisson]

Right now, a Saturday in September is £28.90 at Phantasia and £37 at Thorpe Park. Even standard pricing is £54.40 at Phantasialand with no prebook discount.

Build it well, look after it and the costs will be lower than having to rebuild themeing after 5 years when it falls apart. I don't abide by one or the other when it can easily be both themeing and quality hardware.

 

[Craig]

I'm defintely in the don't care about theming bracket, but understand people in this forum are really passionate about great theme parks. I get it. Nemesis shows what really great design can do, but also I think theme parks are still great value for a day out and the upshot of a whole themepark styled like Phantasialand would be £100 a day tickets. If that was the trade-off would you take the current Hyperia at £30-60 a day or pay £100 for a whole park styled with themed worlds?

I do get what you're saying to an extent. Personally, I'm not expecting Florida level theming. However, it'd be nice to see a ride having a "grand opening" and actually being finished as intended.

I have no doubt that the ride experience itself is great, and unfinished theming doesn't necessarily detract from that. But it does add that finishing touch, the cherry on top that makes a proper memorable experience - and it's just annoying to see multiple Merlin attractions open this year where either landscaping has just not been done, or where theming has been chucked in quickly and on the cheap/in a rush. So it's not a one off, it's a systemic issue Merlin seem to have.

That's my main issue, we've seen so many where it's just a work in progress. Just budget the time, consideration and cost to complete the theming in full and on time for an announced full opening date.

 

[dave___]

I feel like there _should_ be an expectation of Florida-level theming, it costs buttons in the grand scheme of things and leaves a much nicer taste in the mouth than the crab-bucket race to the bottom that Merlin are having with themselves at the moment.

 

[Jb85]

I'd actually argue time isn't the issue, it's a cultural shift that's needed to consider what is a new attraction.

Sure, extra time helps but it doesn't stop what appears to be a mindset that a new attraction is mainly the ride hardware itself. At present it's almost a case of "when will the ride be ready?". A date is set according to that and the "fit and finish" of theming is squeezed in as much as possible before opening. Not finished by then? Ah it's fine, just tidy it up in the weeks/months/closed season afterwards.

A park should avoid announcing an official opening date until the sum of all it's parts - theming and ride hardware are on track to be finished. Knock yourself out with soft openings/technical rehearsals or whatever else, but many people visit an attraction once a year, for a considerable amount of money. They don't want to see a work in progress.

It’s a UK thing then doesn’t seem to happen elsewhere

 

[Josh555]

I do get what you're saying to an extent. Personally, I'm not expecting Florida level theming. However, it'd be nice to see a ride having a "grand opening" and actually being finished as intended.

I have no doubt that the ride experience itself is great, and unfinished theming doesn't necessarily detract from that. But it does add that finishing touch, the cherry on top that makes a proper memorable experience - and it's just annoying to see multiple Merlin attractions open this year where either landscaping has just not been done, or where theming has been chucked in quickly and on the cheap/in a rush. So it's not a one off, it's a systemic issue Merlin seem to have.

That's my main issue, we've seen so many where it's just a work in progress. Just budget the time, consideration and cost to complete the theming in full and on time for an announced full opening date.

Totally agree and it winds me up.

Little finishing touches are fine, I’d actually encourage them as you’re only ever going to see what maybe needs to be added when you see it running in the flesh but blatantly not bothering to deal with gaping areas of landscaping really bothers me.

For all the good work done on Nemesis, you get to the top of that queue by the car park and just see gaping areas of in landscaped terrain which clearly needs to be sorted but hasn’t been as the park is clearly happy to present it in that state.

I’d be more willing to accept it if they were operating on really tight turnarounds but both nemesis and Hyperia were a good 18 months, probably not too far off something like Velocicoaster, although I accept that the budgets would be.

 

[Call_um]

I'm gutted for Thorpe it had to close after a day. After such a successful opening and running flawlessly pretty much all day Friday this is a big blow for the park.

I got told by an operator the shutdowns on Friday were mainly due to issues with the gates which were tripping the ride out, hence why they could get it back up very quickly most of the time.

Its incredibly unlucky for them, I mean look at Swarm, it didn't have a full day closed in years. I know its not something that merlin ever do, but soft openings could be a good idea in the future. Something like this could've happened and been ironed out before official opening.


Anyway, here are my thoughts from opening day:

Got to the park for about 1:30ish and first ride I got really lucky and only waited 1.5 hours. I waited in the main queue until the Hyperia toilets. The host asked me if I was a single and put me in the single rider queue which was overflowing. I waited in this queue for around 20 minutes, and realized how long it was and it wasn't moving, and I also just read on the AP group how people were waiting 7 hours in the single queue. So, I asked the host if I could switch to the main queue instead as I knew that would be around 90 mins - 120 from this point. I believe there was some miss-communication and the manager didn't want to put me in the main queue for some reason, so they put me in Fasttrack instead and got straight on, row 9.

Second ride I got in the queue at 7:45 got off around 10:15 so 2.5 hours, row 2.

- I came of my first ride thinking that is easily the best air time I've experienced in the UK. I came off my second ride saying quite comfortably that is my favorite ride in the UK.
- The outer-bank turn was easily my favorite element. Chucked out of your seat, especially on my second ride on row 2.
- Actually quite liked the queueline. I was initially worried when we saw the prison style fences, but the queue is nice and none of the cattlepens are particularly long. You get some nice views of the ride.
- The station does look pretty bare during the day, but looks so much better at night. I love the dispatch lighting/audio, and as well when the train returns to the station.
- The trims were much more noticeable on my second ride towards the front of the train, but still took the last 2 elements with good speed.
- Ride team were doing a great job at sending the trains out all day. The train does return to the station very slowly though, and I do wonder if they could get a higher throughput if this was sped up?
- An op told me it warms up big time throughout the day. When he'd been operating it, the run time ranged from 39 seconds to 31 seconds (from the lift hill to hitting the breaks)

I was initially quite disappointed when the layout got revealed, and even seeing the ride testing. Yes the ride is on the short side, but I really didn't expect to enjoy this as much as I did. I'm so glad they went for something different here, and we finally have an airtime machine in the UK. This is exactly what Thorpe needed. I can't wait for a September weekday when I can ride this thing all day.

This was my first time going on a coasters opening day and was easily one of the best days I've had at Thorpe, great atmosphere all day right up until leaving the park at 10:30. They did a great job organisation wise, being asked in the queue if everyones okay and need water filling up etc.. Didn't queue more than 10 minutes for anything else on park, Stealth in particular was running great as always, both times I went on they were running down the platform checking restraints, beating the countdown timer on the platform every dispatch.

 

[Benzin]

Does the themeing need to be "Florida level"?

There are small independent parks in Europe that put in far more effort. Granted the values are smaller, but that's not the point.

 

[QTXAdsy]

The moment you try and compare yourself to a Disney or Universal in terms of theming, you're already setting yourself up for failure. Try and be your own thing as it helps create an identity for the park and yes, even for all the jokes about Merlin regarding dark themes and black coasters that is pretty much a trademark identity with them as much many might hate it.

Yes, the theming could be better on Hyperia but honestly what could they had done? Given how many on here were mocking the whole Goddess theme of the ride (ironically the exact idea I had in mind for a returning Air retheme) then I'm not sure as others claimed less is more with themes or stories which is true but it seems Thorpe have gone to the extreme on the latter idea of less is more than some asked for much like how many complaint how Nemesis reborn was going too far the other way adding in so much lore and backstory that some felt wasn't needed.

Just seems that Merlin can't seem to find a middle ground regarding a theme.

 

[Alphe86]

There’s nothing wrong with the hyperia theme. It’s tidy. But to get away with tidy you need the loose ends to be finished up (surely there’s more to do with the splash down element.. atm it’s just concrete and a puddle) otherwise it starts to look sloppy

 

[Poisson]

The idea isn't the best, but serviceable. The execution is poor.

Maintenance shed looks awful, the station not great and the spashdown looks odd, which covers the major pieces of the ride. Coupled with the random changing of colours on the track and supports without a pattern or set level and the ride feels messy.

 

[Gumbo_B]

The not quite ready project management is a new thing creeping in across a lot of industries. It works in some places, but not in theme parks. And also not in most places it is used. In fact it is just a method used by industry that they hope won't lose them too many customers.

 

[AndyG]

The other thing about theming that sometimes isn't covered is the talent required to think up, design, create, manufacture and deliver theming elements. The more bespoke, the greater the time and cost involved and people need to be available.

In Hyperia's case clearly cuts and compromises have been made from the planning stage which have resulted in subpar theming (the splashdown and viewing plaza, I'm looking at you).

Ultimately if there isn't commitment to the vision, and with limited budgets, the details, the 'nice to have's' get junked and the overall scheme gets watered down.

We don't know if the queue, station internals and landscaping have been pared back or if they are as originally planned, but from what has changed some parts are disappointing and half hearted.

Hopefully future projects don't suffer this or at least to such an extent.

The ride is still amazing though...!

 

[Islander]

The other thing about theming that sometimes isn't covered is the talent required to think up, design, create, manufacture and deliver theming elements.

But… with the great artist Imagineer John behind it, how can it have possibly have failed to deliver?!

 

[Alphe86]

I’m not sure I would lump the station in with the non finished category. It’s not mind blowing but does a good job. Lighting is good, music is good. It’s a bit basic but looks complete and fits the package.
Unlike other stuff which just looks.. air tunnel