Something has been bugging me about the ticket release strategy that Universal is doing for this year. It just feels completely dishonest. And I realized it's a situation very similar with their inflation of queue times. Don't go this way, go this way instead.
Basically, they'll call a night sold out. Then hours later, tickets will be on sale. Sold out again. Sold out all week. Oh no, no tickets. Except in random pockets of time where they decide, hey, let's randomly sell tickets again for like two hours. Back to sold out. Day of, tickets are back on sale. I wouldn't question it if this happened once or twice, but they've done it for every single night that I can tell so far. Just yesterday, today was sold out for a while. Today? Tickets available in almost every type. Last night, tix were sold out for most of the night. But randomly check to see if tickets are available at 10pm? And boom, they were, just to squeeze out a random premium dollar on someone who is deciding to show up late. And then the next day, just for marketing sake, oh wow, what another wonderful sold out night it was last night!
But was it really?
Totally understand guest capacity is in constant flux. I have no idea what the strategy is or what they're trying to achieve, but again, I will just say it feels dishonest. That's the best word to describe it. A lot of other events this year will say "selling fast" or "best available" next to their dates -- which feels genuine. With Universal though, you truly have zero idea what the situation actually is.
And maybe I've just been avoiding the crowds in the right way this year, but I honestly can't say it feels as crowded as the event used to be, in say...2016-2019.