Universal Orlando Resort Expansion (Part 1)

[Disneyhead]

^thats a good point as well about current expansion. Disney World spread itself too thin, and have almost hit diminishing returns. There comes a point when you just have too much going on. Universal doesnt want to be those guys. They have the resources to improve their current parks and expand there, and THEN see if it would be financially beneficial to expand.

I mean what resorts have more than 2 parks? WDW and....thats it. Is Universal really at the level where they become the second-largest theme park resort in the entire world? Im not being negative, and I would love for more expansion to come in terms of another park, but do we really think it makes logical sense to add another park, or is this just kind of a pipe dream for fans at this point?

If the 3rd gate has a mega IP or 2 attached like LotR it would do fine.

 

[TylerDurden]

If the 3rd gate has a mega IP or 2 attached like LotR it would do fine.

Yeah should a solid "anchor" IP be acquired, theres a big case for a third gate. But until then, I think we are best-suited just looking out for the two somewhat small exisitng parks to improve and expand.

 

[shiekra38]

If the 3rd gate has a mega IP or 2 attached like LotR it would do fine.

The key is marketing..IOA was a phenomenal park with Potter-level theming that rivaled anything at Disney when it opened...however it was marketed poorly and therefore performed poorly...if Universal doesn't want to end up in the same boat they did with IOA then they will have to get more aggressive with advertising...which they have been doing recently..

 

[mahnamahna]

If the 3rd gate has a mega IP or 2 attached like LotR it would do fine.

I'm iffy on whether they'll get LOTR - although they've got other options: Star Trek, Warcraft, Godzilla, Hasbro, Laika, Mario, Pokemon, Zelda, the Classic Monsters/Van Helsing, etc. maybe none of them except Mario come close to equaling LOTR in terms of potential/appeal, but they'd be pretty solid additions to any 3rd gate should it ever happen.

Agreed... once they get the current parks fairly well-rounded, a 3rd gate could be sustained. Personally, I'd assume both parks would have to surpass 10 million each in attendance before a 3rd gate happens.

But October 1st, 2021 as either the announcement date for the 3rd gate or the opening date for the 3rd gate has to happen if they announce in 2017/2018 anyways.

A 3rd gate at Uni is possible - 3 full day theme parks are equal to the 2 full day, 2 half day parks WDW currently has. That's probably the 10-15 year goal... make Universal its own multi-day destination while maximizing the little space they have :thumbs:

 

[Teebin]

Mario come close to equaling LOTR in terms of potential/appeal, but they'd be pretty solid additions to any 3rd gate should it ever happen.

WHAT??? Mario who??? I don't know of any Mario anything that comes close to a hair of LOTR.

 

[martymcflyy85]

I agree. Mario (video games) is the man.

 

[DragonSlayer]

LOTR would make me book a flight the day it was announced. Mario would not.

If we're talking Potter-scale IPs, Lord of the Rings is the only option.

 

[Cole]

I agree. Mario (video games) is the man.

Never EVER going to happen!!!! We will get DC land before anything Nintendo I promise you that

 

[mahnamahna]

LOTR would make me book a flight the day it was announced. Mario would not.

If we're talking Potter-scale IPs, Lord of the Rings is the only option.

Big problem though... LOTR isn't happening any time soon I doubt Christopher Tolkien would approve a theme park area when he flipped out about the online LOTR game. Sure, we've heard rumors of Middle Earth coming to Universal Orlando, but until the insiders say it's been given the go-ahead, I'm just going to assume we're not getting it.

Nintendo seems like they'd be easier to work/negotiate with - maybe they'd be like Rowling where they want every detail to be just right, but their openness to 3rd parties/licensing as of late shows they're not impossible to strike a deal with.

And Mario would increase appeal with a key demo for theme park growth - families. Not to mention you could definitely have some Potter-scale theming in a Mario area - and I did say "even come close". I do obviously know LOTR is bigger than all of the IPs I listed. But there's no denying Mario has some mass appeal. He's the most universally recognized video game character with the #1 franchise/brand power. In terms of franchises with as much kid appeal as Seuss/Potte/Marvel, Nintendo/Mario is pretty huge as far as potential goes.

LOTR + Mario would be ideal for me as a fan of both franchises, but I'm not sure if LOTR is a sure thing... neither is Mario, but getting the rights to him would probably be slightly easier than working with Christopher Tolkien

 

[mahnamahna]

Never EVER going to happen!!!! We will get DC land before anything Nintendo I promise you that

Nintendo would be a merchandise goldmine so I wouldn't say "never EVER"

 

[DragonSlayer]

This argument over Nintendo and other similarly unlikely IPs has now been dragged into this thread, the waterpark thread, the Kidzone thread and the mystery plot thread. Can we please stop with the contast repetition of such preposterous ideas? I never said Lord of the Rings is or is not likely, I simply stated that it is the only option available with similar appeal to that of Potter. The past few weeks have been rife with the same stuff being regurgitated over and over, 'justified' and presented as quasi-fact on quite frankly ridiculous grounds.

Blue sky ideas are fine, but please just present them as such.

[/rant]

 

[Cole]

This argument over Nintendo and other similarly unlikely IPs has now been dragged into this thread, the waterpark thread, the Kidzone thread and the mystery plot thread. Can we please stop with the contast repetition of such preposterous ideas? I never said Lord of the Rings is or is not likely, I simply stated that it is the only option available with similar appeal to that of Potter. The past few weeks have been rife with the same stuff being regurgitated over and over, 'justified' and presented as quasi-fact on quite frankly ridiculous grounds.

Blue sky ideas are fine, but please just present them as such.

[/rant]

I'm sorry for bringing it up again. Your definitely right it's been done to death and we all just gotta stop

 

[mahnamahna]

This argument over Nintendo and other similarly unlikely IPs has now been dragged into this thread, the waterpark thread, the Kidzone thread and the mystery plot thread. Can we please stop with the contast repetition of such preposterous ideas? I never said Lord of the Rings is or is not likely, I simply stated that it is the only option available with similar appeal to that of Potter. The past few weeks have been rife with the same stuff being regurgitated over and over and 'justified' on quite frankly ridiculous grounds.

[/rant]

When the insiders tell us what's actually going into the KidZone area/mystery plot, then we probably will stop the "contast repetition of such preposterous ideas". This is about Universal Orlando expansion... that includes a potential 3rd gate.

Mario has some pretty wide appeal so it's not "preposterious" to mention him as a potential IP - as far as kid and female appeal goes, Mario would likely win out over LOTR due to the colorful environments, kid-friendly nature, Princess Peach, etc. but I'm not going to go there I will give you that most older adults, teens and males would pick LOTR over Mario. But LOTR has Christopher Tolkien in the way right now, yet I wouldn't call it "preposterious"

Nothing wrong with speculation... especially when we have no info to go off of for really anything besides Diagon and Kong. If we got rid of all speculation, the forums would be slightly empty. The only "preposterious" ideas are the ones that are already licensed to other theme parks(DC, Looney Tunes, Peanuts, Sesame Street, Madagascar, LEGO). Anything else that has theme park potential is fair game (including Nintendo, Laika, etc)

I get your frustration with the other threads but this is basically a "Future of Universal Orlando" thread, so IP ideas should be allowed. No idea why it's in the waterpark thread but speculation shouldn't have to be so serious - this is theme parks, not the stock market :smiley:

Can't really blame anyone when we haven't gotten any concrete intel/facts for quite a while on anything aside from Kong. Plus, the DisneySea-level 3rd gate is probably the most exciting thing mentioned on here in quite a while, so it makes sense everyone pounced on it.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm sorry for bringing it up again. Your definitely right it's been done to death and we all just gotta stop

Well what's left to talk about if we do stop?

 

[DragonSlayer]

Well what's left to talk about if we do stop?

Perhaps some reasoned and thoughtful conversation...

As I said, I'm not trying to stop speculation. That was clearly stated in my previous post. Just trying to restore some logic.

 

[Vyrus]

Guys this is a speculation thread as is the others as well.

No one knows what will be going into Kidzone, water park or the rumored 3rd gate. So its viable that all 3 of these properties could fit into each one. However personally speaking I think Nintendo and Rings would serve a better purpose is a brand new 3rd gate myself, as I really don't see it as an option for Kidzone when you JUST opened up a Spongebob store right in the middle of it.

But you can't be mad if people want to speculate, if you just disagree or think it would be better in one spot over the other, just voice that opinion

Now back to your regularly scheduled [HASHTAG]#potterwatch[/HASHTAG] programming.

 

[mahnamahna]

Guys this is a speculation thread as is the others as well.

No one knows what will be going into Kidzone, water park or the rumored 3rd gate. So its viable that all 3 of these properties could fit into each one. However personally speaking I think Nintendo and Rings would serve a better purpose is a brand new 3rd gate myself, as I really don't see it as an option for Kidzone when you JUST opened up a Spongebob store right in the middle of it.

But you can't be mad if people want to speculate, if you just disagree or think it would be better in one spot over the other, just voice that opinion

Now back to your regularly scheduled #potterwatch programming.

^this^ I do agree that Nintendo and LOTR would make more sense in a 3rd gate.. but no reason to ban talk of them in any of the speculation spreads until we get some concrete info.

Gotta say... the Diagon Alley special really shows how bad TDO has messed up in terms of PR - makes me wish Disney still did those types of specials.

 

[Cole]

^^It's funny how Disney is considered to be the ultimate secretive, everything has to be hidden magic machine yet there is a behind the scenes video for almost every attraction unlike universal where you kinda have to dig to find one and very rarely do you get something like this special. Hopefully universal learns from this special and opens up more to fans with more content and blog posts. They'd totally destroy the Disney parks blog because they would actually have stuff to show rather than T shirts and contests on who's the eighth miner

 

[Nick]

If the 3rd gate has a mega IP or 2 attached like LotR it would do fine.

Yes, but would this help Uni overall, or would the third park eat at IOA/USF attendance figures? Obviously it will improve attendance, but would it be enough?

 

[fryoj]

I disagree with those saying that they have to fill all the useable land and hit capacity and have two full day parks before starting the third gate. They are on a mission right now. It's clear they are going after disney and for that to be achieved, I think a third gate is almost guaranteed. They've already said they are going to spend hundreds of millions each year and build thousands of new hotel rooms. We are already seeing that stuff go into effect. They aren't waiting to see if they hit capacity to build new rides. They aren't waiting to see how cabana bay does before starting the work on hotel 5. They have a long term plan and I see no reason that they would wait to start building a third gate. I think they are already in the process of doing it. The planning, plans on land acquisitions, etc, are probably going on already. obviously its not going to happen tomorrow. The land acquisitions alone could take years, especially if they have to get into Eminent Domain to get some of the properties. I think the only two things that could slow this down are buying the land, and whatever timeframe or if they change their mind.

 

[shiekra38]

I disagree with those saying that they have to fill all the useable land and hit capacity and have two full day parks before starting the third gate. They are on a mission right now. It's clear they are going after disney and for that to be achieved, I think a third gate is almost guaranteed. They've already said they are going to spend hundreds of millions each year and build thousands of new hotel rooms. We are already seeing that stuff go into effect. They aren't waiting to see if they hit capacity to build new rides. They aren't waiting to see how cabana bay does before starting the work on hotel 5. They have a long term plan and I see no reason that they would wait to start building a third gate. I think they are already in the process of doing it. The planning, plans on land acquisitions, etc, are probably going on already. obviously its not going to happen tomorrow. The land acquisitions alone could take years, especially if they have to get into Eminent Domain to get some of the properties. I think the only two things that could slow this down are buying the land, and whatever timeframe or if they change their mind.

Simple economics will tell you that it is not good to expand without warrant..People forget that we are dealing with huge amounts of money here and that Universal building a third gate is more risky then Disney building one...with Disney people will show up just because, with Universal they have to try harder to get people to show up...Potter was a once in a lifetime IP that will probably not happen again in our lifetimes..Disney has the history and name to be able to build whatever crap they want and get people to show up...Universal isn't blessed with that curse yet...therefore I do not believe they should build a third gate until they are without means of expanding their current parks any further..Give them a chance to continue to build on their name and build up their parks..I know we want a third gate, but we don't have to pay the bills