More dark rides, please.

Chitown said:
Since Shapiro got on board with SF, I am still surprised that he hasn't installed some Scooby Doo Sally dark rides to more of the parks.

He has the licensing, the rides are family friendly, and they don't cost like a major coaster and seem to appeal to everyone.

I always enjoy the one at SFSTl and I am sure the one at SFFT does quite well also.

I say, bring them on. He updated Monster Mansion at SFOG so he knows they are an asset even though that one doesn't have a shooting platform.

It would be nice to see all SF parks with a dark ride. I really want to see one at Great Adventure (and would have rather had a dark ride than TDK).

They keep stressing how important family visitors are and an interactive dark ride is a perfect family ride yet the park refuses to add any real family rides while removing others and continues to have one of the most unbalanced ride collections of any major park.

^Have you been to SFMM? That takes the cake for the most unbalanced major park in this country.

Ensign Smith said:

Anyone else think Holiday World needs a second dark ride? For years I've felt they need a Santa Clause-themed dark ride. Even better, see how expensive it would be to acquire the license for the old Rankin & Bass Christmas specials. Now that could be a great ride. Paula?

Love this idea.

MrZero said:

Ensign Smith said:

Anyone else think Holiday World needs a second dark ride? For years I've felt they need a Santa Clause-themed dark ride. Even better, see how expensive it would be to acquire the license for the old Rankin & Bass Christmas specials. Now that could be a great ride. Paula?

Love this idea.

I work for the Company that owns these specials. Trust me, it wouldn't be cheap.
Frankly, too, I think adding characters as 'slick' and corporate as Frosty and Rudolph wouldn't really fit in the home grown, family owned atmosphere of HolidayWorld.

I do agree that a "North Pole" Dark ride at HW would be fantastic, In fact I feel like all of "Christmas" could use a dramatic re-theme to make it more north-pole-y, or maybe, here's a crazy idea, retheme the entrance plaza to make it represent ALL holidays, and build a brand new "Christmas" section elsewhere in the park.

I also would love to see a Haunted House dark ride a'la Knoebels down in Halloween. I think it could be built down between Frightful falls and Legend, with Frightful Falls itself going through part of the show building. Two for one!

I love Knoebels WAY more than Cartman loves Cheezy Poofs....yet I still think there are better traditional dark-rides out there (yes, even outside of Disney). Still missing the Haunted Hotel from MBP, and the one from Erieview.

I love Knoebels too, but I didn't get much out of their dark ride either. On the other hand, I am a sucker for interactive dark rides. I could spend a day on MiB, even with Mummy just around the corner.

You should leave your mom out of this.

lol...Okay Gonch. I would have never guessed. I always thought of you as liking creepy, funny stuff.

Smith has brought up something on my mind for a very long time. I've always wondered why there weren't more dark rides. They are family friendly, and an affordable addition, and they are vanishing faster than they are being built.

I think that new dark ride installations have tapered down because of vandalism. Most new dark rides have a camera room position and locking lapbars.

With the exception of It's a Small World, I've never met a dark ride that I didn't like.

I totally agree, and as a dark ride enthusiast I find it interesting to note it's evolution. As a youngster, my dark ride adventures took the form of Pretzels and Old Mills. It's all we had, and every park and every carnival midway featured at least one, and they were wildly popular. I still love those rides, to me they fall under the category of "tried and true" and I guess I'll accept the label of "nostalgic" and wear it proudly!

Dark rides today strive to be cinematic experiences- I can understand the reason for story-telling, but fail to see the necessity of it. Of course, at parks like Universal and Disney with strong movie tie-ins, the task is an easy, albeit expensive one. Then you have the Six Flags, Paramounts, and the like, who are left to conjure up similar fantasies with smaller pocketbooks. Not to mention themeing that revolves around a storyline that doesnt hold much promise of being able to stand the test of time, or rests on licensing agreements.

The audience of today has a short attention span, and I think the industry recognizes that with the developement of the shoot-em-ups. Each ride has the potential of being different, and if nothing else gets em through the turnstile for a repeat ride, maybe that will. I find them to be slightly annoying, and in a strong effort to obtain a good score, I wind up missing a lot of the ride and scenery. And sometimes they dont even seem like dark rides, more like well-lit indoor rides!

So while we might all agree that a dark ride is a good thing for a park, it's challenging to play "park owner for a day" and choose just the right one or two. There's absolutely nothing wrong with Knoebel's ride, aside from seeming slightly homemade, and it delivers jolts and surprises in traditional ways that "get" most riders each and every time they go through. Busch and Kennywood have fared a little better with more lavish rides by choosing themeing that is more general. Pompeii, DarKastle, and Ghostwood Estate come to mind. But I firmly believe that a really great rebuild of LeCachot would have been just as popular and probably less expensive.

What amazes me is the park that brought us a quality ride like Ghostwood also absolutely ruined their beautiful, totally antique Old Mill by updating it as Garfield's Piece-O-Crap. Perhaps the Mill needed a rehab, and maybe the park wanted a character kid's ride, but combining the two? Oh, my goodness.

This is one thing in the theme parks that just have been barely touched. While I do love the old school stuff, it does need to be mixed with the new school stuff.

As for the cheesy stunts. I just don't understand why parks don't hire a illusionist to do some REALLY cool new "cheesy stunts." There is SOooo many things that can mess with people's heads that create something fun, new and exciting that haven't even been attempted yet on rides. For instance spiderman at Universal and that huge drop that isn't really dropping.

One could make the statement too that look what goes on at Halloween now. SOooo many dark walk-through attractions. I have seen A LOT of really cool effects that I thought, "Hey that would be AWESOME if they added that to a ride" I personally say add a spinning tunnel to every break run!

As for what park needs one more than any other park in the WORLD. I would say hands down Cedar Point. I would say DT use to count until they wripped out all the theming but one or two pieces of cardboard. But if any park needed to invest into a Toy Story or Spiderman ride it would be CP hands down. The only problem I have is for some unknown reason CP can figure out how to make theming work and no matter what they do. I was really hoping for a dark ride this year over a coaster because of the economy. And they all ready have at least 5 existing buildings it can go in.

Cedar Point's dark ride history is rich. Now, nothing.

I've said it somewhere before, I'm sure, but what Cedar Point should do is take the Pirate Ride building, expand it, and build the world's greatest Laff in the Dark. Newly designed "cheesy stunts" and illusions would be perfect. On the midway, throw in a thrilling flat to replace Calypso and design a really cool Turnpike station. That little area could be spectacular.

^Do not touch the Calypso! I love that ride, and really Ive never seen another one anywhere else. Besides, that ride always fills every car, its quite popular with kids. Ive seen kids marathon that ride while I waited for Blue Streak.

Also, the Pirate Ride building will never be used for a dark ride for a long time, the park just spent some serious coin making it into to one fantastic kiddie haunted house for Halloweekends.

I still say tear down the Aquatic Stadium and put it there. You could even theme it to a Snoopy theme there and expand Planet Snoopy's footprint.

I agree about Garfield. I was very disappointed when I heard about the retheme, and even more disappointed the first time I rode it.

Knoebels Haunted Mansion "gets" me every time. I know what's going to happen and when it's going to happen, but it still makes me jump, and then I laugh my butt off. It's so much fun.

That ride actually uses a method that is rare, and very effective. The light comes on, the trick is activated, and then just before the trick is over, the light goes out. This creates an illusion that the trick is still moving, and it really freaks me out in a good way.

The Garfield ride is an atrocity of epic proportions. The Old Mill was a little silly, but its age and goofy oldness (and scary boats) was quite an attraction itself. What they did was far worse.

At least it's not any worse than the two movies . . . And if you think about it, it's considerably better given that it's far shorter than either of them.

I would like to see more coaster/darkride hybrids. Exterminator was a great addition to Kennywood and is extremely popular.

Adding darkride features to a family coaster would be another great idea. And of course there was the former Alpine Sleigh Ride at Astroworld that combined coaster and darkride elements.

Of course this is not that new of an idea. Those old Pretzel rides at Conneaut Lake Park and Camden Park may have simple stunts but they are the oldest existing examples of this genre of ride.

I wish Camden Park's Haunted House had more impressive stunts, but yes, it does drip of nostalgia.

Camden's current dark ride is actually the second one to sit in that spot. When I was a very small boy they had a single story ride called Laff in the Dark, but I don't know who made it. There was a painting of a green-faced witch on the wall behind the loading platform, and it seemed very scary to me. I only rode it once with my grandmother who laughed throughout while i hid, eyes closed, under her arm. I opened my eyes long enough to see a hoot owl with red light bulbs for eyes, and another time to see a skeleton. That was it.

The current ride was originally called Wacky Shack and must've been installed sometime in the early-mid 70's. Decor-wise, it had all the earmarks of a Bill Tracy ride, but I'm not sure if it actually was. Around then that ride design (with the lift and little dip in front) started showing up at lots of parks and there were small, portable versions for the carnival circuit. Some were gravity rides, shorter in length (like Conneaut's and Camden's), and some were powered, like the one at Waldameer. (Which is a true Tracy ride.) Apparently they had to alter the dip on Waldameer's ride when new hush puppy cars were purchased-you can still see the outline of the former, steeper dip along the front facade.

"I would like to see more coaster/darkride hybrids".

Right. And something other than the spinning mice variety. I'd like to see something closer to what Dollywood has done (Mystery Mine), but with a richer/compelling storyline. Something timeless...

From my now defunct Camden Park web site:

The Haunted House is one of two known "gravity" still standing (the other is Devil's Den at Conneaut Lake Parkin PA) and it is short but sweet. With a coaster-type chain lift anddrop, this ride zips you through the darkness, speeding past the gagsand back outside in under a minute, but the walls are close and thegags seem closer as you fly by.The facade of the ride was repainted this year (2004) as well as putting newgags inside the house itself, next year there are plans to add a fogmachine inside the house.

The Haunted House at Camden Park was originally a Laugh in the Dark ride named The Laughing Lady but is currently a Gravity Pretzel ride with stunts and the facade designed by Bill Tracy. Over the years the stunts have been removed and replaced with new items, so few if any original Tracy stunts remain. The ride is modified from its original form by the addition of an anti-rollback (just like on any roller coaster)
When I worked at the park in 2004, I used to love to operate this ride. The load operator would push the car into the crash doors and onto the lift chain, then the unload operator would "catch" the car as it exited (usually by standing in front of it!) When we were not busy and I was on unload I would occasionally move into the house (it helped to know the maintenance path, short cut!) and do a few startle scares then still make it to unload in time to catch the car. That was till the park manager got wind of it and said it was not safe and to stop (which I did!). Another thing I used to love to do, was to stand inside the last corner where it was dark, wait till the car came in front of me and walk behind it a bit. Then right at the end I would reach out and grab the back of the car and stop it. It's amazing how many people I would get with that, they never knew where I came from.
Aww memories, since I had to move back to WV this year, I may try to get a job there again this year :)