BREAKING! The Bat Flies Again at Kings Island! IT IS A WING COASTER!

POV

It is absolutely awesome that there is no midcourse. Although they will probably screw that up with a trim on the drop somewhere!!

Looks incredible. With Kings Island as my true home park, I'm very happy for them. Should be a fantastic addition.

The title of this thread is now hilariously incorrect.

Everyone point at Marvin and laugh.

Hahahahaha!!!!1!!1!

(Laughs)

Lord Gonchar said:

The title of this thread is now hilariously incorrect.

Everyone point at Marvin and laugh.

Yep, I fell for these fake pages hook, line and sinker. Not only Kings Island faked these, they actually watched the forums for a village idiot putting up the screenshots so they can take down these pages only minutes after I did.

And, their fakery -- lacking in most areas -- had some attention to the detail. Note close up front covering of the Bat wing coaster. It looked like a Batman of sorts -- they didn't just paint orange color over Gatekeeper's Griffin (is it?).

Well played, Kings Island. Well played.

Oh, well. I wanted a Giga. Damnit. And, Banshee looks far better than a regular old invert. New restraints, new and bigger (and dare I say, more graceful) elements.

Color me impressed, and I hope they have a media day and allow CoasterBuzz members to attend. I'll be there! (Ah, I'd have to buy the membership first. ;-)

I just got home from Kings Island. Had tons of fun on Diamondback. I just realized that the seats in the middle of the train has the most floating air time of any seats. Amazing. Loved the night time rides.

Kings Island also got a sign language interpreter at the last minute notice after I stopped by their guest service asking for one. I actually called them last Monday, and they called back on Wednesday point blank saying there won't be an interpreter. So, this was really nice. Although, I had some trouble making my way through the crowd to find a staffer who knew what to do and she led me BACK through the crowds to a point where I could see the interpreter.

All in all, nice evening. My first time seeing a new coaster being announced. Loved the videos and the roar of crowds. (Action Zone was PACKED!)

PS: Memo to self, be more careful in writing headlines next time. Sheesh.

Marvin Miller said:
new and bigger (and dare I say, more graceful) elements.

Precisely what I noticed while watching the POV. Love it.

Can't wait to hear all the complaints about the lack of intensity and "snapless" elements...

More importantly, what about the capacity?

(ducks)

The capacity shouldn't be a problem. The new campground looks like it has plenty of space.

Tyler Boes said:

Station:

Yess

Sold.

That's one half-assed gothic station. What is up with the singular castle wall to the right of the steps up to the station? Even Six Flags would do better than that.

The theming of this coaster will mostly be nice mowed green lawn. As with every other recent Cedar Fair ride....

DavidW said:

ALL coasters use 300 year old technology... gravity

Does this guy go to the same school that Tyler goes to? lol

(Always open with a joke.)

First of all, told you so. It was easy to see that it was going to be an inverted by opening your eyes and seeing what was right in front of you. The blueprints gave it all away.

Second, this looks really fun! I'll be there opening day!

LostKause said:

The blueprints gave it all away.

No they didn't. The already-poured parallel footers did. What other type of coaster has those? (A Flyer? bahaha, they don't make those any more....)

I didn't need footers or blueprints to know it was an invert. Just sayin.

It was that Phd you posses right?

In the end, while the decoy site looked like a waste of time, I thought it was funny. It's too bad some parts of the site still found thier way to outting the legitimate ride. I guess CHMOD doesn't work anymore?

Congratulations to everyone who knew in advance. Glad to see "Those who know, don't tell" finally broken. Always seemed too old-school to me.

I'd love to know how much marketing effort KI really put behind the decoy stuff so that I could make my own decision on "is it worth it". As mentioned, there's a line where it becomes not worth the limited reward they receive from it but I'm of the belief that some effort is good for the social media recognition and the potential "award" they could add to marketing down the line. Initially, I thought that the decoy site was nothing more than a few hours of an intern's time, but then it seemed like it was more a part of the overall marketing strategy. Don't know, though, what that means to the overall resources used.

I remember reading an article a while back that mentioned how enthusiasts and fans will burn the Internet up trying to figure out a park's new attraction. I can't remember where it appeared but it seemed to be geared toward the GP, in other words, to say something like "look at those crazy nerds over there, who knew?"

It also mentioned how the parks will try their best to guard the secret and have fun with throwing out teasers, red herrings, and false leaks just to keep the momentum going. I know I'm standing here without a link, but it made me think that perhaps parks view the enthusiast community as more important in the process than what we think.

Announcement events, like we saw last night, are commonplace in just about every industry. Surely the folks who pay closest attention to these events are the ones who somehow have a link to the industry, either through direct association, competition, or being a fan who holds a special interest. The rest of the population might be "meh" in regard to whatever the announcement, but if a place like Kings Island can work a sizable crowd into a frenzy while the media is watching, it has to be considered a success. The event extended past the boundaries of the park through live feed, and generated enough interest to at least cause a very slow Internet. ( at my house, anyway...)

As far as the marketing department's role in these red herrings, it now seems evident (at least this time) that everything we heard and saw was carefully planned. I believe it goes beyond the scenario where a bunch of guys are finally bored after everything is in place and decide to mess with everybody for the hell of it. We may or may not be the only ones watching, but they sure are watching us.

Maybe tomorrow, if we see Don, he can shed some light on the subject.

sws said:

More importantly, what about the capacity?

Per wikipedia, the capacity will be 1650. the wikipedia article is surprisingly informative already

Food for thought... What if they are going to re-theme Flight Deck and call it The Bat. Maybe for their halloween event... or permanently for the 2014 season. If that is the case, I speculate they didn't announce it yet because they don't want to take away from the excitement of Banshee - which by the way is AWESOME!

Glad to see "Those who know, don't tell" finally broken. Always seemed too old-school to me.

I'm not really sure what you're referring to here. I'm certainly not "in the know", but I knew.

Everyone but Marvin knew.