I'm multitasking by watching basketball, so sorry for this dumb question - has it been changed or not? Your post confused me.
The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Hogsmeade (Orlando): Part 2
- Thread starter Drew
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First visit to IOA for 5 years and my take on Wizarding World and FJ. Disappointed to be honest. Maybe that’s due to all the amazing things I had read and heard before travelling so my expectations were to high or the fact the films don’t really do it for me either. The whole area seemed really small and shoe horned into the space. The best part for me is entering from The Lost Continent as the theme and detailing is amazing from that view with Hogwarts towering in the back ground over Hogsmead but from then it’s down hill.
Hogwarts Express just magically appears from a hole that leads to Dragon Challenge which doesn’t look good or make sense. Again while nicely themed the whole are is just too small and the forced prospective of Hogwarts just doesn’t work when you get any where close to it.
FJ the ride = Good but no way is it the best the ride in Florida, its not even the best ride in IOA. First off what’s with the queuing system? When we were there 60 min posted wait and 40 mins of that were queuing for lockers that we didn’t need. Why am I in a queue that goes at a snail pace due to where the lockers are located? Bad design!!!! Also every where I read goes on about amazing immersive theme!!! Really? So queuing in the greenhouse for the best part of 30 minuets (waiting for lockers) I am looking at a white show build whilst hearing the sound track for Jurassic Park, hardly setting up the ride experience. Once inside Hogwarts things are much better and this part of the ride is fantastic but now the queue picks up pace so the place where there is incredible detail we miss a lot of it. Again a real shame and bad design.
The ride its self is good but the transition between screens and real life sets are very poor and the floo effect is lame. Also on all my rides the dementor face effect failed as did the whopping willow. There is a lot of stick on this forum about Disney operating signature attractions with effects missing or broken, Uni is also failing to deliver on its most important attraction.
But the biggest thing for me is how Wizarding World as effect the rest of IOA. JP is now dominated by it with a lot of sight lines having Hogwarts or worse a big white box in view. JP used to be my favourite part of IOA as it captured the feel of the film that’s now been destroyed. Lost Continent another beautiful part of the park as also been nearly obliterated by it and again was such a great area and for this we have one new ride which whilst use cutting edge technology is a patchy experience and two rebrands one of which as made a great attraction worse.
I expect to get flamed but these are my genuine thoughts and feel that this land could have been much better pulled off if Uni had the land space to do it fully. Disappointed :down:
Hogwarts Express just magically appears from a hole that leads to Dragon Challenge which doesn’t look good or make sense. Again while nicely themed the whole are is just too small and the forced prospective of Hogwarts just doesn’t work when you get any where close to it.
FJ the ride = Good but no way is it the best the ride in Florida, its not even the best ride in IOA. First off what’s with the queuing system? When we were there 60 min posted wait and 40 mins of that were queuing for lockers that we didn’t need. Why am I in a queue that goes at a snail pace due to where the lockers are located? Bad design!!!! Also every where I read goes on about amazing immersive theme!!! Really? So queuing in the greenhouse for the best part of 30 minuets (waiting for lockers) I am looking at a white show build whilst hearing the sound track for Jurassic Park, hardly setting up the ride experience. Once inside Hogwarts things are much better and this part of the ride is fantastic but now the queue picks up pace so the place where there is incredible detail we miss a lot of it. Again a real shame and bad design.
The ride its self is good but the transition between screens and real life sets are very poor and the floo effect is lame. Also on all my rides the dementor face effect failed as did the whopping willow. There is a lot of stick on this forum about Disney operating signature attractions with effects missing or broken, Uni is also failing to deliver on its most important attraction.
But the biggest thing for me is how Wizarding World as effect the rest of IOA. JP is now dominated by it with a lot of sight lines having Hogwarts or worse a big white box in view. JP used to be my favourite part of IOA as it captured the feel of the film that’s now been destroyed. Lost Continent another beautiful part of the park as also been nearly obliterated by it and again was such a great area and for this we have one new ride which whilst use cutting edge technology is a patchy experience and two rebrands one of which as made a great attraction worse.
I expect to get flamed but these are my genuine thoughts and feel that this land could have been much better pulled off if Uni had the land space to do it fully. Disappointed :down:
^I can see where you're coming from, especially about the destruction of Merlinwood and some of the sight lines in Jurassic Park being ruined. However, I think it's time to move on. WWoHP is honestly beautiful and the things that it has done for the park are just astounding. And you're analysis of Forbidden Journey is a bit odd... I find the transition from screen to real set to be flawless? :shrug:
While I will agree with you on some points, you're clearly biased to Disney (which is fine). I just re-read your Fantasyland expansion review and you pretty much praised everything about the new land. For the Wizarding World however, you left out some of the greatest attributes. You didn't mention butterbeer, the window displays, or Ollivanders - the highlights for a lot of guests.
- Jun 30, 2012
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- Mar 23, 2013
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Too bad each bench couldn't just select from 3 profiles (slow and safe, status quo, boneshaker). I bet it would be too much risk that someone went on the wrong profile. And it might make the queue unmanageable. You might put a 3-way selector switch on each chair and use the minimum selection from all 4 chairs for the bench. While these things seem simple to me, I've never had to herd people through at the rate of hundreds per hour.
Maybe the simplest thing would be to schedule specific times for profiles, like last hour before close is boneshaker. Good thing I'm not in charge there, eh?
- Jun 30, 2012
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If you run a "voting" method, you have a family of three and one older man who did single rider, family selects the roughest profile and the older man ends up with back problems because of that.
If you run it on a per bench method and separate people out at the que, you'll send out potentially empty benches/half capacity benches because a group doesn't want to ride that particular profile.
It's just a lot easier to have a single ride profile.
I don’t feel I am that Disney biased (but do have a young child) just on the FLE forum it is always so negative so just giving my counter balance where on here it’s the opposite.
There were many things I didn’t like at FLE such as the building site in the middle, fast past not at attraction entrance ect. I do love IOA its one of the most amazing parks in the world and I did like a lot of WW especially all the things you mentioned. In fact the best part of WW for me was seeing people who love Potter been really excited by it. I love park that immerse there guest in the experience and WW doest that I just think I went with to higher expectations and may be upset that it seems to have spoilt my other favourite areas. I am not saying that it’s not a good expansion just came away a little disappointed
Also this troll thing seems silly to me. Yes I have listed mainly negatives here not all the amazing things that can be found but most posts here rave about WW just giving my HONEST point of view in a constructive way of the things that were off for ME.
I'm not sure how practical this would be from an operations viewpoint, but around the point with the sorting hat, the queue could split into 4, for each house with Hufflepuff being the mildest and Slytherin being the wildest. I wonder how easy it would be to set up a system which could change which benches were on which profiles depending on the demand at the time?
- Jan 30, 2013
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Im a big WWOHP and HP fan in general, but I do agree with nmu on one account, the transitions between screen and practical effects in FJ are poor. I dunno if its too bright in certain areas, but I dont like being able to see edges/floors. IMO, Spiderman deals with these issues better. Realistically, theres probably 2 reasons: 1. Its easier to ignore the screens when they are cartoons. When they are "live action" I look for realism more. 2. The 3D glasses are great tools for creating the transition between practical and screen. Thats why I'm actually excited by their usage in Gringotts.
- Jun 30, 2012
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This would require a complete re-do of the attraction, and either multiple tracks to keep every line moving (also increasing capacity to insane levels) or forgoing a "magic carpet" loading system for a standard load and launch method.
Either way, at this point we're talking about a brand new attraction.
- Feb 21, 2013
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My question is what are the going to add to the IOA side of HP world.....I mean it will seem pathetic compared to Universal Studios. My hope is for the impossible......somehow figure out a way to add more off Hogwarts, but I would realistically I would like them to expand Hosmede into LC. Does anyone have any insight?
- Jan 30, 2013
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- Feb 21, 2013
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Because the Universal Studios side will triple it in size. I just think the 3rd (and final) phase should be a small scale add-on to the IOA side.
- Jan 30, 2013
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I hope the new station and entrance will help command a new, grander appearance. But of course Id love a 3rd phase. The options just have been picked apart so many times, nothing really makes sense. I would love for an azkaban/villain centric addition, but its not plausible due to the size and its location in the middle of black sea.
That's an important point. The Hogsmeade train station will expand the IOA HP area, in essence giving it anoother E ticket shared with the Studios' Diagon side.
- Jul 14, 2010
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Hogsmead is small because Hogsmead is a small village. The size of most things is a JK/WB story thing not a UO thing. This keeps it true to the story.
The lockers as much as people don't like their placement are there for a reason. They needed to be accessible from both the entrance and the exit. They needed to not cause the people exiting to interfere with the people entering (crossing over the path) and they needed to be hidden from view when outside.
I will admit I've never really stood in the garden queue for long periods of time, but I've only ever heard the JP music before there are people in the queue.
Based on the fact that the willow was out of show I'm assuming you rode recently, as this was due to the new profile that was talked about (the willow motions were switched to fit the new profile, issue for the old profile)
The whole JP site line thing has been beaten to death. Regular tourists just plain don't care, and they bring in the bulk of the money. There aren't a stack of negative comments at guest services about it. It's a non issue.
The rebranding of the rides didn't change either ride. Very public issues (that would have happened with or without the rebrand) did.
And just to be clear about the queue, you feel the outside queue is bad design because it's slow, and you feel the inside queue is bad design because it's fast..... You see the issue here, right?
The simplest thing would be to say this is the ride we are offering, if it's not for you that's a shame.
This isn't the first test of a new profile and it won't be the last. They are trying out a few different things just to see what works and what does not.
The ride isn't shut down for now while they change the profile is it? I'm going in early April and I ride this thing 5 times in a row back to back via single rider.
