I agree. As long as you try to be Disney, you are going to fail. Its best to stay unique. "But Orlando is making money...let's be like them!" is the attitude we are seeing.
The only problem with that philiosphy is that you will end up alienating most of your audience. Families is where the money is at. Universal is a business, in which they need to make money to spend money (at the same time spending money to make money). Families really stopped coming to Universal in the mid 90's cause after the 80's which was USH hayday they stopped with the family entertainment. In the 80's and early 90's they foucused on shows and rides the everybody would like(ie. A-team, Miami Vice, Star Trek, ET, Show Biz Quiz, World of Cinemagic, Conan, Screen Test Show, Aiprot 77', Emergency and Castle Dracula. To name a few).My personal issue with this is that i don't care about families with small children. Those families can go to Disneyland. Universal has a vibe for an older crowd that is being changed, that's what i don't like. Older kids can appreciate universal more, and older kids won't be as interested in a despicable me simulator. I think universal is trying to get families with younger kids to go there instead of Disney, and it's stupid of them to try to edge that market, they just won't win.
I would hate to tell someone if you have kids under the age of seven, your kids have no reason to be at Universal. I remember the incredible expeirences of going to Universal back when I was four to six years old. Parents want something for all ages. Universal realizes that. Despciable Me: MM is something for everyone, the queue and ride is a lot of fun( and yes I have been on it). USH can't be short sighted. They finally realize they have to cater to a larger audience or else it will just flounder.I didn't say families. I said families with small children. Families with kids all under the age of about seven just have no reason to be at universal. If they have at least one older child or all older children, then there's much more to be done and older kids can better enjoy what's happening, and appreciate the movie magic. Universal needs to focus a little higher on that target audience age, not lower. Older kids have better attention and better memory and are more likely to build those ties to the park that will keep them coming back. A small child is just going to remember loud noises and whatever toy they got that day.
I don't take this to be arguementative or rudel!!! I love this type of stuff. I agree they need to balance it. I hope that after Despicable Me, they add something for the older crowd. It's a fine line they have to walk. You don't want to be Legoland but you don't want to be Six Flags Magic Mountain.Having something for all ages is one thing, but the trend seems to be leaning towards younger focus, that's my fear. I worry that they will push to cater to a younger crowd at the expense of the bigger audience. I don't mean to be argumentative, I'm just quite passionate about this, so i hope I'm not coming off as rude! I'm glad to have someone to discuss this with.
Don't get me wrong, the ride experience is great. There's no denying that, but it didn't bring a new guest experience to the theme park industry. Sure, it's a great ride, but where did all the innovation lie from 1999 till now? Like Chris mentioned, most of the innovation was done behind-the-scenes - probably to limit costs.I disagree with you about Transforms. It may use some of the same basic ride system, but Transformers was a big enough deal that Tony Baxter (one of Disneylands head imagineers) made a special visit to USH to ride the ride during the soft openings. I realize that theme parks always send their people to check out their competition, but normally not someone of his stature. Why go check out a rehash of something from 1999 with just a different name. Transformers is probably the best and most impressive rides on the west coast. Including a very well designed queue(on par with something Disney would do).
King Kong and Transformers were big leaps - there's no denying that. But both (with a much larger emphasis on Transformers) were the product of severe budget restraints that could have perhaps hurt the guest experience. Transformer's facade is perhaps the greatest testament to that belief that compromises had to be made.Since the mid 90's to the early 2000's USH did little to nothing to the park. But to say that Kong, Transformers, plus the coming WWOHP is not a change in direction????
There's a difference between spending money for the sake of getting a higher turnstile count for a few months, and spending money for the long term future of a park. Simpsons may have increased the guest count for a year, but it's readily apparent that it didn't do much in the long term.Even if Despicable Me is a BTTF redo...To be honest...who cares!!!! They are spending money. Most theme parks will do this type of turn-a-round. I don't blame them for taking an attraction that was seriously showing its age and adding something that they have never had before, which is a ride for the entire family. Something that kids, teens, and adults can all relate to.
No, it's fine. Healthy debate is good. Shows that we're both passionate about the park.I hope this doesn't come across as me being angry or overly defensive, thats not my intention.
Slowly but surely they are re-doing the park. Over the next decade the whole upper lot is going to look quite different. I have complete faith in Mark Woodbury and Thierry Coupe.
I agree. Regardless of what we did as children (and I admit, I was terrified of everything at the age of 5), Universal is not known as a kid-friendly park. As we've seen with Six Flags, it's almost impossible to turn that perception around with teh general public.I didn't say families. I said families with small children. Families with kids all under the age of about seven just have no reason to be at universal. If they have at least one older child or all older children, then there's much more to be done and older kids can better enjoy what's happening, and appreciate the movie magic. Universal needs to focus a little higher on that target audience age, not lower. Older kids have better attention and better memory and are more likely to build those ties to the park that will keep them coming back. A small child is just going to remember loud noises and whatever toy they got that day.
Definitely. Out of all of Universal's recent releases, I think Despicable Me really hit the mark. I'm glad that it's become its own attraction, but I'm disappointed that Universal continues to subtract instead of add.Despicable Me is very popular with all age groups in Florida from what I hear, which certainly tanscends the old Hannah Barbera and Jimmy Neutron versions. Also for those worried about the queue: USF has a much smaller footprint than the T2 one. The only thing that may hamper things is the want to cheap out for the area usually used for HHN. However the ride will be open during the event, so I'm sure that will factor into things.
There's no denying that there's massive innovation behind the scenes. I guess I'm just disappointed in the front-facing portion of the ride. Again, the technology is impressive and the ride experience is top-notch, but the ride - in its essence - is a rebrand of Spiderman.About Transformers, the VTU system is certainly a remarkable innovation, albeit one that could easily go unnoticed unless you thought about it. Still I don't think that this should disprove that Universal doesn't care about the Hollywood park. They had Oceaneering invent this brand new technology just for us, and this is a huge leap for space issues in amusement parks. I think no matter what, that should not go unnoticed.