PKD Construction Tour 2/16/05

Earlier today I had to chance to visit Kings Dominion for a special tour of the park, and most importantly the construction progress of Tomb Raider:Firefall. I want to give special thanks to the PR Staff at PKD for giving myself, as well as the others there the chance to view the park during its downtime in the offseason. Now some notes of interest.

Like Six Flags, Kings Dominion will be added bring a friend for free days this year. Also after your 4th or 5th visit to the park during the year, you receive an extra bring a friend for free ticket.

As far as the ride goes, Tomb Raider looks really good. The pipes that shoot out fire are really surprisingly close to the ride and I was also told that you WILL get wet on this ride. Also Michael from the park informed us that there could be the possibility that the they will experiment the idea of filming you ride the attraction and selling it, just like you would for a onride photo. The Congo Grill will be rethemed into the Tomb Raider Grill, which I am against but oh well. Also those bungie things by the Rebel Yell will be removed at the end of this season. So if you like those things, this is your last year to enjoy them.

We got to see the inside of Flight Of Fear...or basically Jokers Jink inside a building. We also got to see the Volcano getting its new paint job. The ride is going to look really good with its new coat of paint. No color change though.

Also one last thing to add. An extra weekend of Fear Fest this year, and much much more attractions. Congo and even the water park will hold attractions for Fear Fest this year. Well, have a nice day :)

Ah, looks like that on ride movie quite possibly could be hitting the states after all, eh?

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Tim - I don't think they meant the camera would be on the ride; rather they would film the ride in operation while you're on it.

Yeah, you get blasted with water on this ride so it's probably not smart to put the camera on the ride itself.

But yeah, I apologize, I should of mentioned that the filming would have been done from a platform looking at the ride.

I hope the water is off on opening day for two reasons, first since it will probably be cold on March 19th and second even if it was the middle of the summer i'd like to try out this floorless topspin with getting wet.

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Does anyone have any pictures of the park during the tour. I would love to see what the ride is looking like.

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Yes, right now you can view pictures of the ride at http://www.pkdplace.com. There are pictures of the ride and others things we saw during the tour. Also at http://www.thrillnerds.com you can view a video of the tour.

Saw the pics earlier today & while the TR:FF shots were good it would've been even better if someone had gotten some head on shots as well.

The idea of doing a ride video sounds really neat but with the back to back seating how do they expect to pull it off?if they're not too expensive & of decent quality I just might pick one up when I take the ride for a spin this season.

Alex Nagel said:
I hope the water is off on opening day for two reasons, first since it will probably be cold on March 19th and second even if it was the middle of the summer i'd like to try out this floorless topspin with getting wet.

Don't count on that. Last year it was extremely warm, and I remember wearing just a t-shirt and shorts, as were my friends and other patrons of the park. After waiting in a queue which probably won't have much shade, I don't think you'll mind getting wet on a typical Virigina summer day.

Mamoosh said:
Tim - I don't think they meant the camera would be on the ride; rather they would film the ride in operation while you're on it.

there is a company that is looking into placing some lipstick cams on coasters and rides and recording your entire ride, selling it on video VHS or DVD after your ride. I don't know if this is indeed what they're planning, but I did see something about it a while back.

SAM

That'll be done in Europe before it hits the US although it'd be great to see a few US parks utilize the technolgy as well for the 05 season.