Volcano Bay: General Discussion

[Miketheboss]

Call me debbie downer or annoying, I don't care.

Tapu Tapu sounds nice but it's not gonna work unless crowds are small. Adding the option of express makes it worse. Think about it, if lines would truly be "short", they wouldn't even be a need to sell express. A short line to me means 5-10 minutes.

Is Tapu Tapu required?

 

[JoeCamel]

Hi I'm new here We are travelling over from the Uk and have a single river cabana booked for June 25th and Express passes. Worried about our cabana not being ready

Do we have any reports on how Express is running yet?!? Will it be linked to TapuTapu?! Also can you still join the virtual line for the coaster?!

TIA

I think one of your questions got lost in the scrum. You can have express added to your Tapu Tapu by a concierge at this time. That may change by the time you get here. Let things settle out for the next week til operations gets the bugs out and then see what is happening. Opening day is NOT the day to judge anything as it is always a zoo.

 

[JunoSynth]

Call me debbie downer or annoying,

Tapu Tapu sounds nice but it's not gonna work unless crowds are small. Adding the option of express makes it worse. Think about it, if lines would truly be "short", they wouldn't even be a need to sell express. A short line to me means 5-10 minutes.

Still better than waiting in line. Is Tapu Tapu really the issue here or something else like packing the park full of people like sardines? Or maybe it's like someone else said. It's still the first day and we need to give them time to sort things out.

 

[Andysol]

I just got back from the park. Me and my 2 friends were the first people on the aqua coaster today at approximately 8:45. I was impressed with the park as a whole, however the tacos were actually the worst food I've ever had at a park. If you have any questions, feel free to ask as I'm pretty sure I understand most of the aspects of the park.

More info on the tacos. Cold, tasteless, etc?

How was the coaster? How were the other slides? River? Effects (both Tapu Tapu and the cavern)? Did the place look like a construction zone still? Crowds unbearable?

 

[JungleSkip]

Still better than waiting in line. Is Tapu Tapu really the issue here or something else like packing the park full of people like sardines? Or maybe it's like someone else said. It's still the first day and we need to give them time to sort things out.

I think it's a combination of all the above. No soft openings really hurt them here. that means they really don't know how the "no lines" concept works in practice, which means they have no real idea what the park's capacity should be set at.

 

[Happytycho]

Call me debbie downer or annoying, I don't care.

Tapu Tapu sounds nice but it's not gonna work unless crowds are small. Adding the option of express makes it worse. Think about it, if lines would truly be "short", they wouldn't even be a need to sell express. A short line to me means 5-10 minutes.

Is Tapu Tapu required?

Tapu isn't supposed to have any effect on the length of lines or depend on them. The sole purpose of virtual line is so that you can hang out in the wave pool or lazy river while waiting instead of standing around in a huge physical line. It was not designed to decrease wait times.

And I do believe it is required(at least for riding slides).

 

[Evan]

I think it's a combination of all the above. No soft openings really hurt them here. that means they really don't know how the "no lines" concept works in practice, which means they have no real idea what the park's capacity should be set at.

This and, obviously the highest thrill slides which are also the ones inside the Volcano are mostly 1 person at a time slides. These are going to command quite the wait for the foreseeable future. Now, if you're telling me the only way I can ride these is Tapu Tapu the "no line system", then great! I love not waiting in line... but if you are also telling me that for that 4-5 hour wait all I can really do is eat food and float in the lazy river... no thanks!

I think the system sounds great, especially when the park would never have the capacity to hold 6 hours worth of line for a single ride... but you aren't really spreading out your people if everyone is waiting for 3 slides and doing nothing else because the rest of the slides are on a 30 minute wait, and you aren't allowed to so much as look at them until you've gone through your 5 hour wait.

I'm glad you got me out of line, but now you gotta give me more flexibility with what I do during that 5 hours.

Now if these slides eventually average out at say, 30-60 minutes then sure, not that big of a deal, but if they average at 2 hours plus... I am not going to be happy floating around that long.

I guess my fear is, obviously no one wants to wait in a 3 hour long line, so obviously you're going to think, "Geeze, 3 hours already?! I better get my wait started", now the entire park is all waiting on 3 slides and doing nothing else but cramming the river, and spending money on food...

Oh, I guess that's kind of brilliant on Universals part....

 

[Mr. EPCOT]

Very busy today...

I still want the Kool-Aid guy to show up.

Call me debbie downer or annoying, I don't care.

Just one or the other? :tongue:

 

[sonoma15]

Aquacoaster is full for the day

 

[Skold]

We're in Bayside w partial Volcano view (I booked tower) and music was on at 6. It was great music but it did get us up early.

Right above some section of seating very close to the entrance, maybe this is that ice cream place? That path from CBBR to VB is right here and very short.

Won't be going in until Wednesday or so.

 

[MattA]

More info on the tacos. Cold, tasteless, etc?

How was the coaster? How were the other slides? River? Effects (both Tapu Tapu and the cavern)? Did the place look like a construction zone still? Crowds unbearable?

I was there at 6:00 and they let us around the park at 8:30 about. A whole hour and a half before regular guests were let in. So it was empty at first. Aqua coaster was great. Very fast launches. Honu and Ika Moana were also great. And so were the Tanniwah tubes. The tacos were cheap. The shell was literally tissue paper thin and tasted like saw dust. The toppings were disgusting together, and the chips that came with it were stale. As well as the salsa which was pretty much a little thing of tomato soup XD. I did get the lava cake after which was pretty good.

 

[Miketheboss]

Tapu isn't supposed to have any effect on the length of lines or depend on them. The sole purpose of virtual line is so that you can hang out in the wave pool or lazy river while waiting instead of standing around in a huge physical line. It was not designed to decrease wait times.

And I do believe it is required(at least for riding slides).

But it does have an effect on the length of the lines and it does depend on it. Tapu Tapu was created so that people can have a water proof wallet on their wrists. Which is a positive but to actually convince customers to wear it, they had to sell them on "short lines" which really isn't possible.

 

[fryoj]

Call me debbie downer or annoying, I don't care.

Tapu Tapu sounds nice but it's not gonna work unless crowds are small. Adding the option of express makes it worse. Think about it, if lines would truly be "short", they wouldn't even be a need to sell express. A short line to me means 5-10 minutes.

Is Tapu Tapu required?

This has been discussed for months. Are you really not able to comprehend how it works or are you still just poking holes in everything?

 

[IOAGuy]

Reading reports that the Tapu Tapu bracelet is glitching and screen disappearing.

 

[P@n!K_Sw1tC#]

Given that there's a ton of locals there with the same three or four slides on their minds, it makes sense that things are a bit lopsided right now. Once that crowd disperses things will flow a little more accordingly. I do like the option of giving people more than just the rivers/wave pool during the waiting period. An adult water fortress embedded into the volcano would have been a nice addition to remedying some of these issues.

Alas, this shows the importance of having high-capacity rides in parks like this. Given the hysteria, a Proslide Mammoth seems to be needed like yesterday.

 

[Teebin]

One would hope you didn't have to Tap to do a no wait slide. It is still unclear if one can hop on a 15 minute wait while waiting for a 3 hour wait on a different attraction.

 

[Andysol]

Tapu Tapu sounds nice but it's not gonna work unless crowds are small. Adding the option of express makes it worse. Think about it, if lines would truly be "short", they wouldn't even be a need to sell express. A short line to me means 5-10 minutes.

A short wait for me is about 5 mins too- maybe 10 (if you include walking up the stairs). Right now it's clearly longer. Maybe the goal is 5-10 minutes for express and when you get called back and they need to make adjustments. Programming, Staffing, Experience, Crowds, etc.
I mean, they had the entire mat racers, kids area one of the drop slides, etc- all not operating so far today. In addition to the Torrent river not having its wave generators yet. That's a ton of capacity between all of those.
Basically- what Skip said.

I think it's a combination of all the above. No soft openings really hurt them here. that means they really don't know how the "no lines" concept works in practice, which means they have no real idea what the park's capacity should be set at.

 

[Happytycho]

This and, obviously the highest thrill slides which are also the ones inside the Volcano are mostly 1 person at a time slides. These are going to command quite the wait for the foreseeable future. Now, if you're telling me the only way I can ride these is Tapu Tapu the "no line system", then great! I love not waiting in line... but if you are also telling me that for that 4-5 hour wait all I can really do is eat food and float in the lazy river... no thanks!

I think the system sounds great, especially when the park would never have the capacity to hold 6 hours worth of line for a single ride... but you aren't really spreading out your people if everyone is waiting for 3 slides and doing nothing else because the rest of the slides are on a 30 minute wait, and you aren't allowed to so much as look at them until you've gone through your 5 hour wait.

I'm glad you got me out of line, but now you gotta give me more flexibility with what I do during that 5 hours.

Now if these slides eventually average out at say, 30-60 minutes then sure, not that big of a deal, but if they average at 2 hours plus... I am not going to be happy floating around that long.

I guess my fear is, obviously no one wants to wait in a 3 hour long line, so obviously you're going to think, "Geeze, 3 hours already?! I better get my wait started", now the entire park is all waiting on 3 slides and doing nothing else but cramming the river, and spending money on food...

Oh, I guess that's kind of brilliant on Universals part....

If you decide it's more important to you to wait 3-4 hours for one drop slide instead of riding 10 others in that time with likely 10-15 minute waits that's on you, not universal.

 

[Evan]

If you decide it's more important to you to wait 3-4 hours for one drop slide instead of riding 10 others in that time with likely 10-15 minute waits that's on you, not universal.

I'm just pointing out the GP are not going to be pleased when they find out after they've waited an hour already for a 5 hour wait that they can't really do anything else unless it's a walk-on. They aren't going to understand the "Well technically you're waiting in line" thing, They are going to say... "I'm not in line, I have waited an hour, I have 4 hours to go, let me ride some damn slides."

Me, personally? I would not touch a slide that displays the current wait the Volcano slides are touting. Unless it's the one slide I've yet to do, and that is the reason I am coming to the park that day.

 

[P@n!K_Sw1tC#]

^^ No, it's on Universal to use basic industrial engineering principles to figure these things out. It's really not rocket science. But, like others have said, not having soft openings is going to cause issues like this. Things should be running smoothly in due time - but for now, we're in a very live version of test-and-adjust with this water park.