Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem (USF)

[Clive]

We know what Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem would be like as a ride experience without 3D... it's Jimmy Neutron's Nicktoon Blast or The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbara, two lackluster simulators barely worthy of a regional park.

You can pull it off if you remove the (legitimately funny) first preshow involving 3D glasses. I think doing that is the wrong move.

Screens/3D are an issue, but this is absolutely the wrong call in addressing the problem. It's a band-aid in the wrong spot.

 

[Brian G.]

Agreed with the entirety of your post; but this is where I disagree. I don't believe the problem is screens and 3D. It's simply screens. And the removal of 3D won't help that whatsoever.

This is where I think Universal is miscalculating. They open F&F without 3D thinking "Oh, 3D is the issue". When in reality it had nothing to do with 3D. Hell, 3D would have improved it from a giant turd to a large turd.

It's screen fatigue, not 3D fatigue.

You can't have a 3D problem without a screen problem so I can understand that rationale.

I guess it's six of one, half dozen of the other. For every "Another screen ride" comment, I know there's an "Another ride with glasses" comment. I remember some joked that Universal should sell take-home 3D glasses because many of their rides use them.

We know what Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem would be like as a ride experience without 3D... it's Jimmy Neutron's Nicktoon Blast or The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbara, two lackluster simulators barely worthy of a regional park.

You can pull it off if you remove the (legitimately funny) first preshow involving 3D glasses. I think doing that is the wrong move.

Screens/3D are an issue, but this is absolutely the wrong call in addressing the problem. It's a band-aid in the wrong spot.

Fair point.

 

[emsvcs3]

To each his own, but I actually think that Hanna-Barbera was the best of all the rides to occupy that space. The ride and those characters added a lot to Universal in the old days. The issue probably has more to do with how far technology has come since then. Simulators feel pretty mundane in the digital age, but that stuff was exciting for its era- something that hasn’t been the case with the subsequent replacements. But I do think that Despicable Me is a big improvement over Jimmy Neutron.

 

[RevFreako]

I really don't know what else to say because I feel as though this has already been explained a million times by myself and lots of other people on the forums. Removing 3D is the wrong decision and if they are using GSATs as justification to remove it then they are interpreting the results incorrectly. I'm sorry you feel criticism is equivalent to "the sky is falling" but my arguments are perfectly sound and your own explanation for the removal of 3D contradicts itself within the same post. "A screen is a screen - glasses or not." Ummmm, correct. That's exactly what I'm arguing. Removing 3D keeps the screen but makes the experience worse as the ride was designed for and utilizes 3D to create depth.

If a restaurant had a survey and people reported there were far too many burgers on the menu and the owner of the restaurant interpreted that survey to mean they should keep the burgers on the menu but remove the cheese, onions, and ketchup essentially making the burgers less desirable you'd think they were absolutely insane. That's what removing 3D from a screen-based attraction is like. It keeps the main problem and draws more attention to said problem.

Are we just ignoring Supercharged ever happened? Pretty sure we already know what happens when you remove 3D from an attraction that is meant to have it.

I think we're all trying to ignore Supercharged ever happened.

 

[Mad Dog]

To each his own, but I actually think that Hanna-Barbera was the best of all the rides to occupy that space. The ride and those characters added a lot to Universal in the old days. The issue probably has more to do with how far technology has come since then. Simulators feel pretty mundane in the digital age, but that stuff was exciting for its era- something that hasn’t been the case with the subsequent replacements. But I do think that Despicable Me is a big improvement over Jimmy Neutron.

I recall Jay Stein (JayBangs) saying that the Hanna Barbera simulator attraction had one of the highest GSAT's in the park during Universal's first decade.

 

[SpatulaShack]

Just a friendly reminder that THIS hilarious safety spiel is one of the highlights of the pre-show. It is completely interwoven into Gru and the girls welcoming us to their home. The goggles are mentioned again separately from this video as well. I have no idea how they would play any portion of that first pre-show without completely removing it entirely or doing an awful and abrupt editing hack-job.

Continuing in the recent tradition of doing unnecessary downgrades to rides in the hopes of "fixing" the incorrect problem they'll have to scrap the entire thing. Custom animation like this costs a pretty penny and takes a long time to create so I assume we'll have the pleasure of watching various unrelated clips from the movies play instead. Surely this will improve those GSATs! After all, if you remove 3D projection and 3D glasses from rides built from the ground-up to utilize the technology then the rides will magically improve and guests will love it!

I hear people are tired of simulators as well so the logical next step to take here would be for top brass to order that all current simulators operating in the park like Simpsons and Fallon deactivate their motion-bases. If they don't move then they technically aren't simulators! And if they aren't simulators then the number of simulators in the park goes down! If the number of simulators in the park goes down, then guest satisfaction goes up! What I would give to be a fly on the wall when decisions like these are made.

 

[Nick]

Are we just ignoring Supercharged ever happened? Pretty sure we already know what happens when you remove 3D from an attraction that is meant to have it.

I can hop on board with some other parts of your post, but Supercharged was going to be bad 3D or not. 3D can’t fix that mess.

 

[belloq87]

To each his own, but I actually think that Hanna-Barbera was the best of all the rides to occupy that space. The ride and those characters added a lot to Universal in the old days. The issue probably has more to do with how far technology has come since then. Simulators feel pretty mundane in the digital age, but that stuff was exciting for its era- something that hasn’t been the case with the subsequent replacements. But I do think that Despicable Me is a big improvement over Jimmy Neutron.

I think Hanna-Barbera unquestionably had the best ride film of all three, and the most diversity of settings and gags.

 

[Disneyhead]

I'm hearing that this decision has nothing to do with "too many 3D attractions" and more to do with "little kids (the target demo) won't wear/don't like the glasses".

 

[shiekra38]

hmm.. logic... If they remove 3D from a ride then people won't notice that majority of their attractions are made up of screens:bigeye:

It's like a burger place that has bad meat and then decides to remove the lettuce on all the cheeseburgers

 

[Brian G.]

Just a friendly reminder that THIS hilarious safety spiel is one of the highlights of the pre-show. It is completely interwoven into Gru and the girls welcoming us to their home. The goggles are mentioned again separately from this video as well. I have no idea how they would play any portion of that first pre-show without completely removing it entirely or doing an awful and abrupt editing hack-job.

Continuing in the recent tradition of doing unnecessary downgrades to rides in the hopes of "fixing" the incorrect problem they'll have to scrap the entire thing. Custom animation like this costs a pretty penny and takes a long time to create so I assume we'll have the pleasure of watching various unrelated clips from the movies play instead. Surely this will improve those GSATs! After all, if you remove 3D projection and 3D glasses from rides built from the ground-up to utilize the technology then the rides will magically improve and guests will love it!

I hear people are tired of simulators as well so the logical next step to take here would be for top brass to order that all current simulators operating in the park like Simpsons and Fallon deactivate their motion-bases. If they don't move then they technically aren't simulators! And if they aren't simulators then the number of simulators in the park goes down! If the number of simulators in the park goes down, then guest satisfaction goes up! What I would give to be a fly on the wall when decisions like these are made.

C'mon, man. You can make a point without always getting overdramatic.

Just something to consider after a bit more thinking:

1. USJ's Minion Mayhem is not 3D. Admittedly, it uses the old BTTF IMAX dome so it's on a much larger screen, but it is in 2D.
2. There are many people who cannot handle the 3D aspect of rides. My wife, for example, rarely rides 3D attractions due to her vision and the headache she gets afterward. I'd also imagine it's probably a PITA for the kids to put on the glasses. They probably chose this one as it is the most "kid-friendly" of all the 3D rides.

UDPATED: I guess I was close to hitting it on the head..

I'm hearing that this decision has nothing to do with "too many 3D attractions" and more to do with "little kids (the target demo) won't wear/don't like the glasses".

 

[universal_fanatic]

Ah, now that's a compelling reason to remove the 3D.
I've never noticed before but do they have smaller glasses for kids?

 

[Parkscope Joe]

I'm hearing that this decision has nothing to do with "too many 3D attractions" and more to do with "little kids (the target demo) won't wear/don't like the glasses".

Interesting update, thanks.

 

[Imperius]

So we got worked up over the reason for nothing?

 

[Brian G.]

So we got worked up over the reason for nothing?

Welcome to the Internet.

 

[SpatulaShack]

I'm hearing that this decision has nothing to do with "too many 3D attractions" and more to do with "little kids (the target demo) won't wear/don't like the glasses".

While this reason is a million times easier to swallow it's still an odd choice given the success of the attraction and the fact it's been cloned so many times with the 3D intact.

I also assume this means all other versions installed at other parks will remove the 3D as well. Still sad regardless as the overall experience will suffer.

 

[Brian G.]

While this reason is a million times easier to swallow it's still an odd choice given the success of the attraction and the fact it's been cloned so many times with the 3D intact.

I also assume this means all other versions installed at other parks will remove the 3D as well. Still sad regardless as the overall experience will suffer.

It's only been cloned once in 3D in Hollywood. Japan isn't in 3D.

 

[Clive]

Then I guess my question would be... why now? Just weird timing.

 

[shiekra38]

Then I guess my question would be... why now? Just weird timing.

Attractions are updated all the time...Many things are unnoticable,

and then some things like this (or things like DD no longer dueling) are quite noticable

 

[RevFreako]

So we got worked up over the reason for nothing?

When have we ever done that here