• 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.

Thorpe Park: General Discussion

I’m not protective about any theme park branding whatsoever other than Towers (I’m on a Towers forum, duh) but which ever way I look at it this is truly dreadful! Does not shout out escapism/fun/family/theme park etc.

Funnily enough I have a graphic designer friend on facebook who has picked up on this who is not an enthusiast at all… a sample of replies on his original sharing of the logo “very corporate looking ”:-

- its giving wordart
- Ew I could make this on Paint
- MagicFM logo
- Loose Women logo


Oh dear.

Its reaaaaally ironic that this logo looks more suited to the previous marketing angle they have publicly derided than their previous one!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
Really not keen on this logo / word mark...It's like they went to a middling graphic design company and had three requirements...

1. Retro and a call back to our heritage - COOL, OLD FONT FOR 'THORPE' IT IS
2. Connection to our previous logo - OK, A WEIRD 'O' SHAPE TAKEN FROM THE INFINITY SYMBOL
3. Modern and forward looking - GOT IT, A MODERN, CLEAN FONT FOR 'PARK'

It smacks of design by committee - lots of voices all chipping in with ideas and they all have to be able to show their bit was included, rather than committing behind one specific design style.
 
Dave said:
Name one area.

Thorpe has no great themed areas, it almost did a few times but not at the moment.
Click to expand...
I would say Amity is still one of the better themed areas amongst UK theme and amusement parks. Although it’s now filthy, Lost City is still pretty good.

I didn’t say it was great, just that it has some of the better themed areas. Individually those spaces still hold up against some of Alton Towers and Chessington. Also better than BPB which is definitely an amusement park not a theme park. The post I was replying to was stating Thorpe is an amusement park not a theme park, which is not true, it’s a theme park that needs better maintenance, a theme that is similar at Alton and Chessington too! There is definitely still more themed areas at the Merlin parks compared to BPB, Adventure Island, Lightwater Valley and other amusement parks. Only the Merlin parks, Drayton and Paulton can really be described as theme parks in the UK.
 
Last edited:
I in think it might be a good time to say jacksilkstone had no involvement in making it. He said so. He’s just a kind of in-house guy. Biggest gig in the logos front is stitches
 
Oh my...
This new logo is an absolute stinker. Looks like it was designed in word by a kid. Looks like they've typed in logo maker onto Google and gone with the first one that comes up. No originality, it's boring and it doesn't have any character in the slightest. Abysmal to the highest degree. All the hype and build up on Thorpes socials just for this absolute garbage. Not to mention they've just copied Drayton and haven't thought of a new idea themself
 
Dave said:
Name one area.

Thorpe has no great themed areas, it almost did a few times but not at the moment.
Click to expand...
“Themed areas” might be a stretch, as Thorpe Park have never really prioritised area theming, as far as I can tell. I’d certainly say that the themed areas aren’t as strong at Thorpe overall as they are at other parks, but it’s not really something they seem to prioritise.

However, I think it would absolutely be fair to say that Thorpe Park could be in the running for having some of the country’s best themed rides, dependent on your thoughts.

I personally feel that Swarm in particular could definitely be in the running for the UK’s best themed coaster. I think it’s really detailed, with lots of awesome set pieces, and I love the whole environment of Swarm Island! I would personally argue that Swarm is better themed than, or at very least as well themed as, any coaster at Alton.

I also think that Saw: The Ride is really well themed, with a very good indoor queue and dark ride section. The dark ride section in particular is really cool!

While I haven’t done The Walking Dead: The Ride, I’ve also heard some very good things about the theming of that.
 
Matt N said:
I also think that Saw: The Ride is really well themed, with a very good indoor queue and dark ride section. The dark ride section in particular is really cool!

While I haven’t done The Walking Dead: The Ride, I’ve also heard some very good things about the theming of that.
Click to expand...
Saw: The Ride is well-themed only until the Immelmann, which prevents it from being truly well-themed.
I would say that the theming for Walking Dead is mostly good, but some of the props are low-quality.
 
Last edited:
Moving away from the new logo for a sec, Thorpe have jumped on the band wagon of sharing their ‘2023 wrapped’, which gleans some semi-interesting info.

1.5 million guests in 2023 puts them back on pre-covid visitor numbers, matching the gate figure from 2019 that Merlin published as part of various planning applications for their parks.

Refill vessel revenue for new and reactivations pulls in £570k a year. I must admit 42,000 total sales out of 1.5million guests is lower than I would have thought.

Rider ship wise, despite Ghost Train being the new attraction for 2023 it only pulled in 250,000 riders, versus 400,000 for tidal wave and 1,000,000 for Swarm. So even the promise of a revamp didn’t get big numbers wanting to join the queue.


From: https://x.com/thorpepark/status/1730489644343849327?s=46&t=zG_i8R9vX93ZZU0RljfzWA
 
Some of those social media interactions are incredibly cringey.

Very poor form when most of the criticism is fairly constructive. But I guess it suits the current direction Twitter has taken since Musk took over.
 
AT86 said:
Moving away from the new logo for a sec, Thorpe have jumped on the band wagon of sharing their ‘2023 wrapped’, which gleans some semi-interesting info.

1.5 million guests in 2023 puts them back on pre-covid visitor numbers, matching the gate figure from 2019 that Merlin published as part of various planning applications for their parks.

Refill vessel revenue for new and reactivations pulls in £570k a year. I must admit 42,000 total sales out of 1.5million guests is lower than I would have thought.

Rider ship wise, despite Ghost Train being the new attraction for 2023 it only pulled in 250,000 riders, versus 400,000 for tidal wave and 1,000,000 for Swarm. So even the promise of a revamp didn’t get big numbers wanting to join the queue.


From: https://x.com/thorpepark/status/1730489644343849327?s=46&t=zG_i8R9vX93ZZU0RljfzWA
Click to expand...

I'll give Thorpe credit with this one it's a great idea and some interesting facts. Want to see Towers do the same would love to know rider numbers for the coasters and the 2 dark rides
 
Wow, where to start with this one!

As others have already pointed out (as well as Thorpe Park), the new logo is a wordmark. I can understand why they thought taking this direction for the logo was a good idea, as it can allow for the logo to be very easily applied to all sorts of backgrounds etc. And I actually think the logo looks pretty decent when it is sitting in front of a graphic or design pattern, as seen on that example hoodie. However, I think it looks poor on a plain background, whether that be in one their new brand colours or the navy blue on white. It's just lacking something. Also when the logo is shrunk down to fit a social media profile image it's actually quite difficult to read.

Going back to the wordmark concept, I see that they said yesterday that other successful brands like Disney, Google and Coca-Cola have a wordmark. The difference here is that these wordmark logos have been in existence since almost day one of each company. They are instantly recognisable because it is all we know from these brands. So it is going to take time for Thorpe Park to achieve the same brand recognition with their new logo.

I do really like the new brand colours and six dynamic patterns they have. They are vibrant and have a bit of a retro but still modern feel to them. I also like they they're dropping 'Resort' from the name; Thorpe Park is clearly not a resort and it is good that the new leadership at Merlin are allowing them to move away from this. This almost certainly would not have been allowed under the previous leadership who wanted resort plastered everywhere on all of their theme parks.

The new honest/authentic approach is something I like as well. Although I think they should ease off with some of the sarcastic/defensive replies regarding the logo on social media. They must have known that whatever the logo was going to be, there would be a negative reaction to some degree as naturally humans do not like change.
 
I think the Thorpe logo needed updating and most people I've seen comment seem to agree but expectations didn't match reality.

The whole branding of the logo and colours etc look like it's been designed to stand out as an app on your phone rather than something that represents the park. Now they have the UKs tallest coaster they also have the worst park logo.

It's also weird as the Hyperia logo is pretty decent
 
AT86 said:
Rider ship wise, despite Ghost Train being the new attraction for 2023 it only pulled in 250,000 riders, versus 400,000 for tidal wave and 1,000,000 for Swarm. So even the promise of a revamp didn’t get big numbers wanting to join the queue.
Click to expand...
Capacity of Ghost Train is also an issue, it just wouldn't get through the same number of people per hour as the coasters anyway.
 
AT86 said:
Rider ship wise, despite Ghost Train being the new attraction for 2023 it only pulled in 250,000 riders, versus 400,000 for tidal wave and 1,000,000 for Swarm. So even the promise of a revamp didn’t get big numbers wanting to join the queue.
Click to expand...
Wish they would've shown the figures for all 5 coasters that would've been interesting. Colossus didn't open until end of May so that will be the lowest by far. Wonder how Saw compares to Stealth, which was the 3rd most popular
 
AT86 said:
Moving away from the new logo for a sec, Thorpe have jumped on the band wagon of sharing their ‘2023 wrapped’, which gleans some semi-interesting info.

1.5 million guests in 2023 puts them back on pre-covid visitor numbers, matching the gate figure from 2019 that Merlin published as part of various planning applications for their parks.

Refill vessel revenue for new and reactivations pulls in £570k a year. I must admit 42,000 total sales out of 1.5million guests is lower than I would have thought.

Rider ship wise, despite Ghost Train being the new attraction for 2023 it only pulled in 250,000 riders, versus 400,000 for tidal wave and 1,000,000 for Swarm. So even the promise of a revamp didn’t get big numbers wanting to join the queue.


From: https://x.com/thorpepark/status/1730489644343849327?s=46&t=zG_i8R9vX93ZZU0RljfzWA
Click to expand...

Interesting stats!

1.5 million in 2023 is promising, and it would imply that the park has perhaps managed to reverse or at very least stop the visitor number decline of the 2010s. With a figure of only around 1.2 million in 2021 (the most recent year for which Thorpe has reported guest figures in the Merlin graph), I was worried that the park was still declining, but it would seem as though this was just down to the lingering after effects of COVID, as it did still loom large in 2021.

I’m hoping that the figure is at least a little bit higher in 2024, though!

I’d argue that the ridership figures show that it is ultimately Thorpe Park’s coasters that are their biggest draw. Throughput may admittedly be a variable to consider, but having all three of their top 3 most popular attractions being coasters and having such a large ridership discrepancy between The Swarm and things like Ghost Train and Tidal Wave would suggest that it is the coasters that ultimately win out in the eyes of the average Thorpe Park visitor.

I’d also argue that the ridership of Ghost Train partially reinforces my personal view that some of the stuff they were doing in the mid to late 2010s, Ghost Train included, perhaps had overly niche appeal to be hugely successful and popular with the public.

I feel that their grand re-entry into the world of coasters with Hyperia is a good thing and I think it will really pay off for them.
 
Ghost Train could have been an absolutely fantastic concept if it had been executed correctly, the reason it’s been a failure is because it wasn’t executed correctly and was instead a confused mess of some very good stuff but mostly incoherent rubbish.

Real shame to be honest as I’m convinced it could have been a massive success had it been designed intelligently.
 
Going back to the themed areas discussion. Amity Cove was incredible when it first opened and well up there with the very best we've seen in the UK.

They've butchered it over the years with the sponsorships and things like Amity Kebabs. But it's still got a 3 hour themed radio loop and a massive Shark smashed into the KFC.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top