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Islands of Adventure Preview Center

OK the Islands preview center took over the space when the "Star Trek Video Adventure" attraction/shop closed up. This space is now the first part of the Mummy queue. You could pick up a passport at the entrance and each Island's room had a stamper machine to stamp your passport. I wish I still had mine. http://thumbs4.ebaystatic.com/d/l225/m/mLi0SzpK4RT2T7Xlpzi5r2w.jpg
well if i can remember.first in the preview center was the Jurassic park behind the scenes. followed by the mummy then came the islands preview.
 
Wow, it was still there til 2001? Definitely shows off how nerve-wracked they were about selling this as a Disney-esque resort. This is before Cali, Tokyo and Paris all got 2 parks so the concept was pretty foreign outside WDW.

The video is certainly cheesy, but cute. You can tell that they're really going for Toontown in Toon Lagoon and the Seuss room looks, appropriately, downright incomprehensible. Marvel definitely has that 90s edgy comics idea down, which was a little toned down to the actual island itself. (it reminds me almost more of the USH Marvel Mania restaurant) Jurassic Park easily seems like the most confident land and it shows.

They seem to be showcasing a slightly lesser product than what actually appeared and was done. I remember vividly a Travel Channel special in 1999 talking about just how technically advanced and gorgeously themed IOA was for the time, which of course used the actual park. That was 100% closer to what the park is than this preview center. Still, it got the idea across and was cute.

Even now when I think of IOA, 'The world's most technologically advanced them park' still rings in my head.
 
Honestly, with streaming video being so easy to produce online now, there's no reason to build a physical preview center anymore. More people from all over will see online previews of a park than would ever come through a preview center. Much more cost effective too...
 
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