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Universal Studios Beijing (Now Open)

I'm pretty sure the Time Warner park might be a hoax. The source article (which seems to be down) from Orlando Parks News talks about Transformers and Pirates of the Caribbean in the park. That's not happening.

As for the other park, "DreamWorks is responsible for project planning, design and construction. Shimao Group is in charge of investment and operation" (source: Must-visit : 6 large amusement parks in Nanjing_理财_微信公众号大全 That seems really suspicious. If it's true, that means that DWA is trying to be like WDI, despite having no experience doing so. That would make this park really easy to kill.
 
Some words from Steve Burke; CEO of NBCUniversal..

"We'll own 30 or 40 percent of the park. Our partners are on the same schedule to get the park open by 2020," Burke said. "We have full models and drawings. We know what attractions will be there. We've got complete agreement on sort of the way the structure of our arrangement's going to work…We have hundreds of people currently working on the project and look forward to getting it open in a few years."
 
Per Spirit, there are major issues. All the unique attractions were cut and replaced with clones, and JW ride got downsized.

More details next week.

I take any word from WDWMagic with heavy salt.

It's not that they're wrong, as some of them are rather good disney insiders; but there have been a lot of instances that those with Universal information have been very much misses as opposed to the amount of times of hits.
 
Per Spirit, there are major issues. All the unique attractions were cut and replaced with clones, and JW ride got downsized.

More details next week.

Giant eyeroll. This better not be a park full of clones.
 
not for long if everything is a clone of something at another park.
Soon to be 3 theme parks plus Volcano Bay. It's the best pretty much by default since everything else would just have clones so you might as well go to the biggest one with everything the others have and more. Easier on me too since I'm not missing much. I bet that JW ride makes it here. Also the 3rd park is pretty much guaranteed several unique attractions at least at opening.
 
You don't have the largest creative team on the books for a park full of clones. will there be clones of course, but this park will be YHUGE. It's going to have some amazing unique attractions that will dazzle but this park will set itself apart with its scale, tech, and theming.

There are issues, as there always will be in building a brand new park of this size. Factor in its in China and boom logistical nightmare. Disney Shanghai went through numerous challenges forcing Disney to throw loads of money and more importantly resources at it. This caused numerous issues with their domestic parks and slowing down several projects and straining their teams.

Universal isn't willing to slow down its domestic park growth nor is it willing to overpay millions upon millions of labor dollars to do this. Universal knows what they want to do and in their eyes they'd rather delay the park a year like they already have vs rush in and threaten their business plan for the next decade.
 
Even if the park is full of mostly clones, who cares? For 99% of the guests who go to the park they will have no idea they are cloned rides and they will all be new to them.

And, this park (like any park owned partially by outside investors) also gets used as a proving ground for new rides/concepts financed on someone else's dime that can then be cloned (or improved) for the US market.
 
Wow, I didn't realize there was a whole resort complex on deck like this for Beijing! That looks like two theme parks, a water park, a CityWalk, at least six resorts... and I don't know exactly what that is in the upper right corner there. Looks like maybe something like Disney's Hotel Plaza merged with another CityWalk-type complex and maybe a transit center.

It's fascinating how much of this almost perfectly parallels Universal Orlando, from the sweep of Universal Blvd. to the general flow of the river. The two theme parks, CityWalk, and most of the resorts are all in similar positions, although the Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure-style parks seem to be switched, and a water park (looks like it could even be Volcano Bay if you compare the layout of the wave pool to ours!) wedged in between CityWalk and what would be Royal Pacific here. The hotel roughly in the same position as Cabana Bay even has a main building with a similar layout! Some additional thoughts:

-The layout of the Studios park matches Universal Studios Florida nearly EXACTLY, except flipped horizontally, and, well, a certain area on the south side of the park... But the fact that it matches so perfectly makes me wonder if it's is some kind of placeholder image for an eventual second park, because it even has the show building for Kings Cross even though there doesn't seem to be a friendly route for the Hogwarts Express over to the other park. The only thing that makes me go "hmmmmmmm" is that there are a few extra big show buildings where KidZone would be...

-Still looks like they're not going for any resorts integrated into their parks like the Grand Californian or Hotel MiraCosta, and that really bums me out. It's great from a guest perspective feeling like you're staying inside the park, and it's great from a business perspective getting to charge premium room rates for the premium experience. I feel like there's so much untapped potential for the idea, too, just look at the way MiraCosta is integrated so naturally into the Mediterranean Harbor of DisneySea. Imagine staying at the Leaky Cauldron in Diagon Alley, or an Atlantis-themed resort in the Lost Continent, or the Hilton Isla Nublar in Jurassic World, or a cluster of high-rises integrated into New York or a Fisherman's Wharf-themed hotel in San Francisco. This drives me nuts about the UOR resorts. The Hard Rock Hotel is SO. CLOSE. to USF, it's even right next to the Hollywood section of the park! The Royal Pacific, Sapphire Falls, and Cabana Bay are feet away from IoA. And Cabana Bay doesn't even appear to have a special gate into Volcano Bay, much less be integrated into the park. Cabana Bay could have easily slanted more towards a tiki-theme and they could have really done something special there. This plan doesn't even to seem to have much in the way of hotels with great views of the parks, just the one next to the water park. It's just kind of a strange design philosophy to me.

-Looks to me like the water park is built right up to the river, that's a really cool feature, especially if there is a dock for the water taxi. I also wonder if they'd do anything with that island in the middle of the river right by there.

-I'm very intrigued by the garden-like area wedged in between CityWalk, the Studios park, and the water park. That would be quite a nice, refreshing departure to walk through a more natural park/garden-type space to get to a couple of the parks, instead of just straight endless shops and restaurants.

-Super curious about that complex in the upper right. Looks like the type of place where a local train might come in, but then it doesn't like there'd be anything beyond buses connecting it to the rest of Universal. The colors and shading also doesn't quite match the rest of the plan, and some of it just doesn't really line up, so that makes me wonder if it's from another document just edited in.

Overall, looks like a great evolution of the Universal Orlando plan!
 
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