Walt Disney World Tech News & Discussion- Magic Bands, Genie+, and more

[belloq87]

Not filled up to the point that standby queuing is shut off. That was my point.

 

[GadgetGuru]

I came away cautiously optimistic about all of this. Of course, I’m not a local.

I adore MaxPass at Disneyland and would love it at World. If you use it right, you can practically double the amount of stuff you do.

As for LL+…I really hate virtual queues. As much as this creates poor incentives for Disney, I’d pay a small premium to guarantee a spot on Rise. Just Rise. Only Rise is cool enough and worthy enough for me to pay extra. But, I’ll do it.

 

[belloq87]

I've seen this circulating from Touring Plans:

"Here’s the attractions we expect will be a la carte, although this has not yet been confirmed by Disney and is subject to change:

• Magic Kingdom: Space Mountain and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
• EPCOT: Test Track and Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
• Hollywood Studios: Rise of the Resistance and Slinky Dog Dash
• Animal Kingdom: Flight of Passage and Kilimanjaro Safaris"

 

[ThemeParks4Life]

I've seen this circulating from Touring Plans:

"Here’s the attractions we expect will be a la carte, although this has not yet been confirmed by Disney and is subject to change:

• Magic Kingdom: Space Mountain and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
• EPCOT: Test Track and Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
• Hollywood Studios: Rise of the Resistance and Slinky Dog Dash
• Animal Kingdom: Flight of Passage and Kilimanjaro Safaris"

Space Mountain sounds like a placeholder until Tron opens; otherwise, the rest make sense.

 

[Mad Dog]

I could live with it. But it's going to be a complicated mess for the vast majority of out of state tourists. ...But it's less complicated to the Paris France mess.

 

[Cup_Of_Coffee]

As an out of state tourist, I like this! Seems like less planning, although a bit more $. I think this is a step in the right direction. A little complicated at first glance but it’s essentially a paid version of the old system from what I can tell. Which deserves an eye roll, but what else do we expect from modern Disney?

 

[Alicia]

Every other theme park and amusement park in the world only offers skip the line passes for an additional fee. Roller Coaster Tycoon computer games twenty years ago only offered skip the line passes for an additional cost. Universal charges for Express now. SeaWorld offers Quick Queue. It just took WDW longer to realize that when everyone has skip the line, no one does.

Edit: As Joe points out, Roller Coaster Tycoon may not have had them, so that's my fault for misremembering. Planet Coaster does though, cause it is the way of the world now, so point still stands.

 

[UniversalRBLX]

I don't hate having a paid express line, but I'm worried about capacity when it comes to Lightning Lane, Genie and Genie+ all using the same fastpass lane. If there's more users using this than the original fastpass, the lines will crawl.

 

[Yabbadabba Doh]

Saw this coming back when they shutdown fastpass+. Seems an awful lot like DLs MaxPass which I really liked when we were there back in 2018. I’m not thinking this will impact like FP+ used to since the upcharge and day-of/in park access makes it less likely that a large number of folks will use it. I see it being like express pass at UO, never bought it and see little to no impact on standby lines

 

[UniversalRBLX]

Saw this coming back when they shutdown fastpass+. Seems an awful lot like DLs MaxPass which I really liked when we were there back in 2018. I’m not thinking this will impact like FP+ used to since the upcharge and day-of/in park access makes it less likely that a large number of folks will use it. I see it being like express pass at UO, never bought it and see little to no impact on standby lines

That's what I'm hoping for, crazy prices where standby lines are affected minimally. BUT, the one time $15+ use might be justified for some people who plan their once in a lifetime vacation.

 

[SailwiththeTide]

That's what I'm hoping for, crazy prices where standby lines are affected minimally. BUT, the one time $15+ use might be justified for some people who plan their once in a lifetime vacation.

Stand by lines will be impacted. Like Max pass at Disneyland a lot of people used it and for WDW it makes sense to pay the fee per day on a Vacation. Where I feel Disney screwed people is the AP or Key holders. I had Max Pass at DL for my AP and I paid $200 for it but got the same benefit as someone who bought the day price. Now I have to pay the day price each time to get the benefit. If I go 50 times a year that is $1,000 extra for my pass. Most passholders won't do that and some are even fine without FP but some passholders like going to Disney for the rides.

 

[UniversalRBLX]

Stand by lines will be impacted. Like Max pass at Disneyland a lot of people used it and for WDW it makes sense to pay the fee per day on a Vacation. Where I feel Disney screwed people is the AP or Key holders. I had Max Pass at DL for my AP and I paid $200 for it but got the same benefit as someone who bought the day price. Now I have to pay the day price each time to get the benefit. If I go 50 times a year that is $1,000 extra for my pass. Most passholders won't do that and some are even fine without FP but some passholders like going to Disney for the rides.

If you go 50+ times I don't think you need to pay for this?

 

[SailwiththeTide]

If you go 50+ times I don't think you need to pay for this?

Like the Dude said " well like that is your opinion man" If I go 50 times or 10 times or 2 times I still want the fast pass experience. I certainly may be in the minority but any park day for me is a full day of rides. Every trip to Universal, Knotts and Magic Mountain is like that. I may be a rare breed but that is what my experience is. So in 2019 I had the fast pass option with my pass and it was fair. I paid a price like a pass that was discounted but was fair.

 

[rhino4evr]

not being able to pre-book fast pass on the first day of your vacation for the length of your stay will be a very welcome change, and will likely piss off the folks that spend lots of money staying several weeks at Disney resorts. I'm ok paying for fast pass as long as it's not like $50 per ride...that being said, likely less people will pay that and possibly stand by will move quicker due to less fast pass users. I would imagine rides like Rise and Flight of Passage will get "booked" up quickly. I think I'd only pay for Rise at the moment, just because its so annoying to get a boarding pass. WE shall see how it goes.

 

[Thatguyoverwhere]

It's sad to see one of the few free amenities of this already very expensive theme park get stratified into yet another extra-cost luxury, but I can definitely get behind them eliminating the ridiculous reservation system that effectively forced you to plan every second of your day a month in advance to avoid getting shut out of every ride, show, and restaurant by people bored at home planning imaginary trips to Disney. What I'm worried about though is that they're making the prices relatively attractive--they want everyone to buy it. I think families are going to see that extra fee as just one more drop in a bucket that's already overflowing anyway, and figure they might as well just pay for it so that they won't be miserable on their once-in-a-lifetime vacation. Kinda leads me to think Disney isn't designing this as a premium option that offers truly short wait times to a select few, but instead it'll be another crowd dispersion system just like FastPass that guests will now willingly pay an extra $15+ to use.

 

[shiekra38]

Drowning the simple act of skipping a line at an upcharge in unnecessary bureaucracy, over-thinking, and over-engineering is such a metaphor for the current state of Disney Parks

 

[MrBlonde]

It's sad to see one of the few free amenities of this already very expensive theme park get stratified into yet another extra-cost luxury, but I can definitely get behind them eliminating the ridiculous reservation system that effectively forced you to plan every second of your day a month in advance to avoid getting shut out of every ride, show, and restaurant by people bored at home planning imaginary trips to Disney. What I'm worried about though is that they're making the prices relatively attractive--they want everyone to buy it. I think families are going to see that extra fee as just one more drop in a bucket that's already overflowing anyway, and figure they might as well just pay for it so that they won't be miserable on their once-in-a-lifetime vacation. Kinda leads me to think Disney isn't designing this as a premium option that offers truly short wait times to a select few, but instead it'll be another crowd dispersion system just like FastPass that guests will now willingly pay an extra $15+ to use.

With dynamic pricing, this is now merely a $15/day price hike for people who'd use it. Plus additional DLC for instant access!

 

[Vyrus]

I forsee this as crap show IMHO. At $15 a person, for a family of 4 it's only $90 bucks a day for the Genie+. But here's 7 drawfs mine train *notification* "Skip the line for $25 per person" Family of 4 pays it, another $100 bucks, now you're in another $190. Then I'm having to walk around the park all day, looking at the app and see which attractions have a LL spot available...oh wait here's one in 2 hours. So I now need to kill time for those 2 hours, maybe I get on 1, 2 or 3 attractions in my time, maybe none since the lines are too full. Then you have to imagine the amount of ankles and people getting bumped into since everyone will theoretically pay the $15, everyone will be walking around on their phones, and at the end of the day its going to make the experience worse. Bottom line as many are saying Disney is squeezing for every dime out of you, and it always feels like they are trying to cater to an upper middle class- high class visitor with all of these upcharges.

I like it the way some people describe it online, this is a Disney Parks' version of DLC.

 

[devinp267]

So rise can handle more people for the right price? Cause surely this is about to get ate up.

 

[SailwiththeTide]

I forsee this as crap show IMHO. At $15 a person, for a family of 4 it's only $90 bucks a day for the Genie+. But here's 7 drawfs mine train *notification* "Skip the line for $25 per person" Family of 4 pays it, another $100 bucks, now you're in another $190. Then I'm having to walk around the park all day, looking at the app and see which attractions have a LL spot available...oh wait here's one in 2 hours. So I now need to kill time for those 2 hours, maybe I get on 1, 2 or 3 attractions in my time, maybe none since the lines are too full. Then you have to imagine the amount of ankles and people getting bumped into since everyone will theoretically pay the $15, everyone will be walking around on their phones, and at the end of the day its going to make the experience worse. Bottom line as many are saying Disney is squeezing for every dime out of you, and it always feels like they are trying to cater to an upper middle class- high class visitor with all of these upcharges.

I like it the way some people describe it online, this is a Disney Parks' version of DLC.

The math is a little off. $60 a day for a family of 4 but the point is still valid.