Volcano Bay: General Discussion

[RonaldsModernLife]

^^I don't think you're gonna win anyone over telling the vast majority of the guests about "what they don't understand". Perhaps we need a lesson in cognitive science 101. I present to you...

"It's not just you, bad doors are everywhere"

I've seen that video before and I have no idea what it has to do with what I said. If you're suggesting that operations wasn't prepared because they didn't predict these crowds, than I don't know what to tell you. I think they were compared as much as anyone would be for opening up a theme park. However, things break. Things go wrong. No testing will solve 100% of the problems that will occur with a project of this scale. If they didn't prepare, we would see even MORE issues with the park than what we're seeing now. I think people need to take a step back and realize that this park has been open for 2 days. Not 2 months. Not 2 years. If we still have these issues in 2 months, then that's a totally different story, but it's extremely early to be demanding perfection. And again, I'm not sorry if you get tickets to a day old theme park and you feel the need to complain that everything wasn't working. You paid your admission fee for the park this early to be "one of the first", if you wanted to experience the best it could be, you should have got your tickets after they ironed out the kinks. Expecting perfection at this point is ridiculous.

 

[epcyclopedia]

No sign of capacity closures, right?

So that means something is going seriously awry at the park in terms of operations.

A water park with 5 hour waits and not at capacity is just not doing something right.

 

[epcyclopedia]

I've seen that video before and I have no idea what it has to do with what I said. If you're suggesting that operations wasn't prepared because they didn't predict these crowds, than I don't know what to tell you. I think they were compared as much as anyone would be for opening up a theme park. However, things break. Things go wrong. No testing will solve 100% of the problems that will occur with a project of this scale. If they didn't prepare, we would see even MORE issues with the park than what we're seeing now. I think people need to take a step back and realize that this park has been open for 2 days. Not 2 months. Not 2 years. If we still have these issues in 2 months, then that's a totally different story, but it's extremely early to be demanding perfection. And again, I'm not sorry if you get tickets to a day old theme park and you feel the need to complain that everything wasn't working. You paid your admission fee for the park this early to be "one of the first", if you wanted to experience the best it could be, you should have got your tickets after they ironed out the kinks. Expecting perfection at this point is ridiculous.

No one is expecting perfection - but Disney kept guests out of Pandora until things were working. Universal isn't limiting entry to the park for god knows what reason.

 

[SeventyOne]

I think the problem is, it's a sloppy launch but people are trying to reflect that to the park's overall quality which the first couple of days aren't really the best way to gage that. Especially in terms of stuff like lines, certain functions not working as well as hoped and crowd control at the opening gate. That is stuff that will be fixed.

If there's something that's poorly designed, that is the kind of thing that would more be fair to reflect on the whole park. However as many have said and pointed out, they're still working on the park. I'm going to give them a chance to turn my opinion around.

If a park's opening dictated how good it was permanently none of the parks in Orlando, whether they be Uni's, Disney's or SeaWorld's would be anywhere near as good as they are now.

Was waiting on a second visit to write a full review, but let me say this: yes, some things will improve. I assume the wires all over the beach are temporary. Tapu Tapu will get better at least as a payment method. Lazy river will eventually open, maybe they'll even trust people to go without lifejackets on wild river (maybe).

But there are still fundamental infrastructure flaws. I had TMs tell me months ago general consensus was queueless wouldn't work--the big but less than capacity crowd yesterday suggests that's true. Maybe we get a more professional looking transfer station in the garage, but not going to change the fact it's a 10-15 minute bus ride each way to get there. Sapphire Falls and Cabana Tower aren't going anywhere, and doubtful the ubiquitous cabanas are either. This is a nice regional water park with a hell of a weenie at its center--unfortunately it has to compete with (and was overhyped as superior to) three of the best water parks in the world right down the street.

 

[SeventyOne]

No sign of capacity closures, right?

So that means something is going seriously awry at the park in terms of operations.

A water park with 5 hour waits and not at capacity is just not doing something right.

Busy yesterday, but still plenty of open chairs--the surest sign a water park is not at its anticipated capacity. Try finding an empty chair the days Aquatica used to close at 10.

 

[epcyclopedia]

A similar parallel at Pandora - that wonky designed Single Rider line isn't open and won't be open during the opening mayhem. They might try it out later to appease WDI but ops will not subject opening day and preview guests to the hot mess of an idea that is putting singles and FP in the same line and expecting them to self sort later on.

Universal should shut tapu tapu off at all but a few attractions.

 

[Parkscope Joe]

I've seen a dozen variations on this here and on Twitter. What if it's not kinks, what if it's a fundamentally flawed idea?

I'm working on an article on this, but I'm also waiting a few weeks.

 

[ArchieAndrews]

Was waiting on a second visit to write a full review, but let me say this: yes, some things will improve. I assume the wires all over the beach are temporary. Tapu Tapu will get better at least as a payment method. Lazy river will eventually open, maybe they'll even trust people to go without lifejackets on wild river (maybe).

But there are still fundamental infrastructure flaws. I had TMs tell me months ago general consensus was queueless wouldn't work--the big but less than capacity crowd yesterday suggests that's true. Maybe we get a more professional looking transfer station in the garage, but not going to change the fact it's a 10-15 minute bus ride each way to get there. Sapphire Falls and Cabana Tower aren't going anywhere, and doubtful the ubiquitous cabanas are either. This is a nice regional water park with a hell of a weenie at its center--unfortunately it has to compete with (and was overhyped as superior to) three of the best water parks in the world right down the street.

There have also been reports of the bands not functioning correctly and they can always find ways to fix the system if it's not working to their expectations. I would think when Universal advertised the 45 minute return time in their one little animation, they didn't anticipate it to reach a 4-5 hour back up.

Things like supports being clearly visible over the action river is a bad design choice, the queue system not handling crowds like they hoped is just an unforeseen problem. We all know this park was really tight to hit its opening, was it really a surprise that some stuff didn't work out best? I've been very optimistic about this park, but also skeptical about certain features. However I have no doubt they will fix up this waiting system.

 

[tuttis93]

Universal should shut tapu tapu off at all but a few attractions.

+1, I always thought this is how it should work anyways. Putting taputapu on EVERYTHING just completely limits the spontaneity of a waterpark trip, and especially if you can only use it for one at a time and not ride anything else? Use taputapu for the body plunges, aqua coaster, honu, and maybe some other big ones, but at least 10-12 should just be standard lines imo

As a side note to other comments on this thread that are hyper-defensive, yes there are kinks to iron out on opening weekend obviously as there would be for any park, but waiting times of 4-5 hours and people only having ridden 1-2 rides in an entire day is far off from a minor "kink". no one is expecting perfection, but i think its fair to say people didnt expect this either, especially based on its marketing of minimal queue's.

 

[ArchieAndrews]

Universal should shut tapu tapu off at all but a few attractions.

I honestly thought Tapu Tapu was going to only be a thing on the Aqua Coasters and Krakatau Body Slides. Maybe a couple more attractions outside of that?

It makes more sense to me personally and I think would be vital to the system working better. It would result in the lines for those rides being astronomical, but it'd let people do more while they're waiting. Unless they specifically feel the wait will sky rocket too high if you can only wait for those attractions with it.

 

[Teebin]

So, when your tapu tapu alerts you that it is time to ride, then you should end up standing in a 5-10 minute line at the most. Is this not happening? Are people just complaining about the tapu wait time?

 

[Mr. EPCOT]

Who is the guy in the floral shirt? Is it bill Davies?

Bill Davis, yes.

 

[WAJAS]

I think the problem is, it's a sloppy launch but people are trying to reflect that to the park's overall quality which the first couple of days aren't really the best way to gage that. Especially in terms of stuff like lines, certain functions not working as well as hoped and crowd control at the opening gate. That is stuff that will be fixed.

If there's something that's poorly designed, that is the kind of thing that would more be fair to reflect on the whole park. However as many have said and pointed out, they're still working on the park. I'm going to give them a chance to turn my opinion around.

If a park's opening dictated how good it was permanently none of the parks in Orlando, whether they be Uni's, Disney's or SeaWorld's would be anywhere near as good as they are now.

Except Discovery Cove. That place is and always has been a flawless park worth every penny.

 

[shiekra38]

At least there aren't any screens

 

[ArchieAndrews]

So, when your tapu tapu alerts you that it is time to ride, then you should end up standing in a 5-10 minute line at the most. Is this not happening? Are people just complaining about the tapu wait time?

I think actually I read in this thread once somebody got a notification and after they were still waiting in a rather long line. However for the most part the biggest complaints seem to be the long tapu wait times. It could use fixing, but once again not broken. I think the most important thing they need to do though is make it so while you're waiting for a major attraction you can both leave the park and either ride smaller rides by not using the device on them or have the device allow you to use your tapu tapu to wait for smaller rides too.

Except Discovery Cove. That place is and always has been a flawless park worth every penny.

lol, I still haven't been there actually. I've only read good things though.

 

[Andysol]

Who is the guy in the floral shirt? Is it bill Davies?

Ya- that's Bill Davis.
While there are valid complaints on everything- I did want to give him a quick shout out.
We are so lucky as Universal fans that we have Mr Davis at the helm vs a guy like Bob Chapek. Never have I encountered a park president that cared so much personally about each and every employee and guest. He is an amazing guy.

 

[P@n!K_Sw1tC#]

I've seen that video before and I have no idea what it has to do with what I said. If you're suggesting that operations wasn't prepared because they didn't predict these crowds, than I don't know what to tell you. I think they were compared as much as anyone would be for opening up a theme park. However, things break. Things go wrong. No testing will solve 100% of the problems that will occur with a project of this scale. If they didn't prepare, we would see even MORE issues with the park than what we're seeing now. I think people need to take a step back and realize that this park has been open for 2 days. Not 2 months. Not 2 years. If we still have these issues in 2 months, then that's a totally different story, but it's extremely early to be demanding perfection. And again, I'm not sorry if you get tickets to a day old theme park and you feel the need to complain that everything wasn't working. You paid your admission fee for the park this early to be "one of the first", if you wanted to experience the best it could be, you should have got your tickets after they ironed out the kinks. Expecting perfection at this point is ridiculous.

And it's a really good thing people like you aren't in charge. If the attitude is to place blame on the *paying*customer for showing up to opening day, then I don't know what to tell you. It's unfortunate that there are really people out there with this kind of mentality.

 

[RonaldsModernLife]

And it's a really good thing people like you aren't in charge. If the attitude is to place blame on the *paying*customer for showing up to opening day, then I don't know what to tell you. It's sad that there are really people out there with this kind of mentality.

I'm not saying that people paying to get into the park don't deserve the best. I'm saying people paying to enter the park this early need to understand what they are signing up for. You need to set your expectations low. Complaints about things not being finished is one thing, but complaining about wait times is another. New park that doesn't have it's kinks ironed out yet+holiday weekend=you're gonna be waiting a long time! It's gonna be crowded! This isn't a new phenomenon. Gringotts, Frozen, and Kong had epically long waits in the beginning (and Frozen still does on busy days). Nothing is going to change the fact that when something new opens, the crowds come and it gets out of control. If you expected walk ons, come in March.

 

[JoeCamel]

I know we all know that visiting a ride or new park on opening weekend, let alone the first few months can be ludicrous... but this isn't 1955 with no social media, and limited technology.

Now a days if you say a new park is opening or a new ride is opening on this day, and you are charging full price, people are going to expect a full experience. If you are only able to ride one thing in 5 hours out of 18 attractions then I'm sorry... the systems failing. I hope they can get it all working fast, a lot of once in a lifetime vacations are starting to happen.

And as we know, social media and going viral can be unforgiving. It took Disneyland a while to recover in 1955, I sincerely hope word doesn't spread. I think we all want universal to be successful here.

Lets archive this for after Saturday, I want to see if the 4 hour queue ends up filled with limited access to the land.

 

[Brian G.]

I've seen a dozen variations on this here and on Twitter. What if it's not kinks, what if it's a fundamentally flawed idea?

It's possible, but I don't want to rush into that thought process 1 day after a Grand Opening. Now if 3-4 weeks we're still seeing some big issues, then we can talk about how to fix it. It may even be as easy as stacking 2 rides instead of 1.