Six Flags America First time!! 8/12/09
This was my first ever trip to Six Flags America and my first park visit of the year. The plan was for me and my friend to visit this park and Great Adventure the next day. I am still planning on going to my home park of SFNE this year so it was worth getting the season passes. It costs 49.99 at America and 99.99 at Great Adventure for the same Season pass! ( minus the small differences in the coupon book) How ridiculous is that discrepancy!! So as any half intelligent person would do, we were going to America before Great Adventure for obvious reasons! My friend lives about 2 hours from SFA and 90 minutes from SFGADV so things worked out nicely, once I got down to his house the day before.
The arrival Wednesday 8/12/09.
We arrived at the park around 1pm. This park must have a small parking lot or something because it was full, or at least all the spots before the additional ones had to be used were full, but the park was absolutely dead! I haven’t seen a park of this size this dead since BG Tampa over ten years ago!
Roar 7/10
After processing the season passes, we heading for Roar first thing, and grabbed a front row seat with a short 10 minute wait or so. I was really looking forward to this ride especially after seeing some highlights of its sister in SFDK on TV. The ride was interesting. It was far more of a twister than I thought, and it produced all right airtime. I was thinking it will be better at night in the back row.
Another nice thing about this ride was that I wasn't forced to use a locker! So once we got off the ride, my friend and I wasted time by going to other rides only to find out that lockers are required for all the rest of the rides worth going on. So we walked back to the car and put all the loose belongings away. I really had my hopes up for a minute that SFA might be the one speical Six Flags Park that didn’t carry this disgusting policy, but I guess I was just being fooled while waiting in line for Roar.
By the time we got the season passes, went on Roar, and walked back and forth from the car 1.5 hours had passed and it was 2:30. I thought the park was closing at 10, but apparently it was 8; so we really only had 6 hours or so. Thank God the park was dead! The longest wait we had was probably no more than 25 minutes!
7/10 Tower of Doom
I liked it; it was fun and had no wait! The weightlessness feeling was short but fantastic. These rides don’t have to be 250 feet to be fun.
Wild One 6/10
This ride also had zero wait! I took a back seat ride. The back seat of this thing might be the most intense wooden coaster experience I’ve ever had, and yes that includes the dreaded Mean Streak.
Falling Star 5/10
It looked interesting from the station while waiting for Roar, but the ride was not nearly as fun as it looked. Almost felt more like an observation ride.
Tower of Doom 7/10
Why not one more ride; when there is a 1 minute wait!
Wild One 6/10
I think I may have waited 5 minutes for the front. The front was fun, and not nearly as intense as the back
My friend decided to pay 4 bucks and enter a food eating contest that apparently the park does everyday at 4 pm. He did well finishing in 2nd place after losing in the tiebreaker; I got there just in time after eating at subway.
Superman Ride of Steel 8.5/10
My home park is SFNE and its just one hour from my house. I've never been to Darien Lake before while this was my trip to SFA: so you all know what that means! I am well aware of all the glamour and fame the one in my home park gets and all the bashing the other two get. In fact, I bet a lot of you guys would probably think that I shouldn't even bother with this version. But I was interested and finally it was time for me to find out for myself just how unique the Massachusetts one was after being on it a billion times and never either of the other two. We had about a 20 minute wait for the back seat. The same seat I almost always sit on when back home. The first thing I noticed was the really small queue. It was nothing like the one at SFNE; maybe half the size with no theming and SFA is about the same size as SFNE too. That was a deduction in my book. I noticed a lot of laughter and screaming when the ride hit the breaks maybe 90% of the amount you get with the NE version so that got me excited.
Ok onto the ride.
First, for some reason I really liked how the coaster did a 180 before going up the lift hill. That was one of the few things that I really liked more about this version. The first drop was fun and exciting, but it completely pails in comparison to SFNE’s version with the underground tunnel. For the rest of the ride I was very impressed actually. Don’t get me wrong though, The SFNE is undoubtedly better, but this version has some tricks of its own up its sleeves. I was really impressed with the helixes. I found them to sustain the high G forces for longer than the SFNE version. The excessive use of flat track also was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. It did not kill the ride like I thought it would, but it didn't help either. This ride also gave a lot of low to the ground speed elements that the SFNE version lacks a bit. On the other hand, the SFNE one has more airtime, better pacing, and just quite frankly has more to it. The SFA one seemed a bit short in comparison. . So once again a great ride, but not as good as the SFNE version.
Batwing 7.5/10 2x
We had a 25 minute wait for the front seat followed by a 10 minute wait for the back seat. I was really excited for this ride. I have been on SFGADV’s SUF a bunch, but this was Vekoma. There certainly seems to be a lot of pluses and minuses when comparing the Vekoma and B&M versions. First off, In terms of being comfortable, I hated the Vekoma restraints, B&M has them beet by a mile here. I honestly almost thought it was hard to breathe with the Vekoma restraints. Now as for the ride itself, I prefer this over SUF. I found going up the lift hill backwards a lot cooler. Batwing had really intense elements. I also felt like the downward forces while in the flying position were a lot stronger on Batwing. It felt a lot more vulnerable too. So overall, I loved the ride. I just wish the restrains didn’t constrict you the way they do. I definitely prefer the layout to the Vekoma version over the B&M; this coming from someone who has not been on Tatsu though.
Mind Eraser 4.5/10
This was a literal walk on for the back seat, but unfortunately it was easy to tell why. What a jerky ride! This ride wasn’t any better than the one at SFNE. Once was enough for it; just enough to get the credit.
Roar 7.5/10
We had about a 2 minute wait for the back seat this time. The ride definitely was better in the back and later on in the day, but still not quite what I was hoping for. If only I could have ridden this full train and after dark.
Jokers Jinx 7.5/10 2x
We first got a back seat ride with a zero minute wait, followed by a 10 minutewait for the front seat. There was a concert going on while we were in the park by Flo Rida that we did take a quick look at on the way to Jokers Jinx. We later found out that Flo Rida followed us to SFGADV the next day. It was easy to tell that the concert ended when the ride went from no wait to a 10 minute wait in no time.
Anyways,I knew when I came to this park that this was going to be the ride to best replace the Chiller. The ride has a similar launch and goes upside down with only a lap bar. I truly enjoyed this ride. It was nice to go upside and be worried free of banging my head. Now if only it could have replaced the backwards barrel roll on the Chiller. That was the single greatest inversion I’ve ever been on! Regardless this still was a super ride though!
Superman Ride of Steel 8.5/10
We ended the day with one more back seat ride on Ride of Steel. We had probably a 25 minute wait or so. And the only reason it was that long was because it broke down. It was just like the first ride absolutely awesome, and it was just one of those rides that I didn’t want to end! Looking back on it, I think I’m going to rank this ride just outside my top ten steel at #11. Kennywoods’ Phantoms Revenge has a very slight edge on this coaster in my book barely holding onto the #10 spot. SROS at SFNE is #5 on my steel list.
Overall
The part of the day that most surprised me was the lack of a crowd. There was a threat of rain, but it never came until we were literally inside the car leaving the park. I wonder how much business this park normally gets. I felt like 2 rides on each of the major coasters here with the exception of Mind Eraser was just enough to call it a full day. This park reminds me most of SFNE. The park was well kept, clean and all the employees were friendly especially the one at the eating contest. He was awesome! I loved it all! Thanks for reading.
Last edited by GIGAFORCE01, August 17, 2009, 2:37A
-Eric: Major Parks: SFNE(homepark), SFA,SFGADV,CP,BGE,BGA,Kennywood,and Sea World: Track record 65 different coasters ridden #1 is Millennium Force #2 is El Toro and than there are all the others