What's new

Thirteen, Intamin ''psychoaster'' - Alton Towers 2010

Status
Not open for further replies.
Even if it's not overhyped, you can still say the themeing is crap. I never hyped up Saw, yet the themeing is still crap.
 
^I don't see why people say the theming is crap though. It looks almost exactly like it was drawn in the artists impressions and it's got enough stuff in it to set the atmosphere for the ride and make it seem like a real warehouse converted by Jigsaw.
Doing my NoLimits rec of Saw actually makes you realise the detail and effort the park have gone into and all the small hidden things they've put in for the fans. People today just don't appreciate the time and effort that goes into themeing a ride such as Saw or SW6.
 
This is the Alton new coaster topic btw not Saw, we had 200 pages about Saw and it was worth about 1 :)
 
Ollie said:
^I don't see why people say the theming is crap though. It looks almost exactly like it was drawn in the artists impressions and it's got enough stuff in it to set the atmosphere for the ride and make it seem like a real warehouse converted by Jigsaw.
Doing my NoLimits rec of Saw actually makes you realise the detail and effort the park have gone into and all the small hidden things they've put in for the fans. People today just don't appreciate the time and effort that goes into themeing a ride such as Saw or SW6.

How can you say that. I know I haven't personally seen it in person, but really, it's a tin shed, with a few pipes and wood panels stuck on it. Okay, inside might be a bit better, but it's not exactly large is it?

You want detail? Look at Disney. Thorpe did the best they could with the budget they had, that doesn't mean it's good.

That is like saying the Sheperd's Pie you made was good beacuse you 'did the best you could with the money you had' even though it's made from string.
 
Marc does not know what he is on about. We need something to bicker about on this topic until the track arrives on site. :p
 
I'd say its themeing is "reasonable". I like it. The stuff they have is good, Its just its poorly layed out. Like just tacked on the side of a giant box. One of the most expencive bits of themeing is behind 2 fences aswell?!!

And it would of worked if the same level of theming continued throughout the ride. Like out on the track side.

Anyway, back to the Crypt.
 
Why is everybody complaining about the theming of SAW?!
Althoug the ride itself is pretty bad (mostly because of uncomfortable trains) I still think the theming is great!

The first thing you see when you enter the area is the beyond vertical drop and the spinning saw almost cutting the head of the riders! Other than that there are also a police car, some barbed fence and the big warehouse building housing the station. Inside the building the theming is awesome! Turned down flashing light, noices, videos of jiggsaws puppet, all the torture devices and even some corpses! And everything are made with detail.

The indoor section of the ride incorporates a video, a head chopper where you almost crash into some spikes and a slow barrel roll where a corpse spray some guts in your face! Outside the building the theming contioues with some barbed wire and yet another video of jiggsaw before climbing the lift hill. And after the first drop you have the head chopper with the giant spinning saw.

Immense theming if you ask me! The ride is one of it's kind in the UK, there aint no competition. Nemesis has a pretty interesting layout with tunnels and some purple waterfalls, but when it comes to pure theming I personallt think the cannon and alien station is pretty lame..

I hope SW6 both get an interesting track layout aswel as some good theming! Let's hope it's not a gertslauer but still has the theming of SAW :wink:
 
I have yet to find one person who has noticed the spinning saw when on the coaster, you just dont see it even though you know its there.

The best part of the inside section is the drop, infact thats the best part of the ride.

It's to bright to notice the body on the floor and you need to be on certain seats to even get the spray.

The part with the air blowing at you, I have no idea what that is meant to be other than anoying.

Had they inclosed the lift hill it would have been better, but they did not so you end up waiting to go up the lift hill with a silly video that you can hardly hear.

Theming outside the ride does not improve the ride experience, a police car and some wire does not make good theming.

I hope they do not make the same mistakes with the Alton coaster.

Now please get back to the Alton Towers coaster, post in the Saw topic if you all want to speak about it. Sorry if this looks like moding btw I read this topic for SW6 not bloody SAW.
 
Martyn B said:
Furie, why do you think the inside will be a dissapointment to us? What makes you think it will be average like Saw?

Did I miss something?

It's something people have been saying. People who are involved in the inner workings. While no actual details have been released (because it is top secret) - those people working on it have said "enthusiasts will be disappointed".

Take it with a pinch of salt, but let's face it - Alton are bigging this up to be a "world's first". We know that if it's a simple drop mechanism or backwards drop/launch - it's not going to set the world alight like Oblivion - so we'll be disappointed.

The thing that will make it is if the indoor section has a show attachment to it, and that is what makes up for an otherwise lacklustre looking effort.

Nothing on this we know about (or can guess about) is outstanding. Hopefully the whole thing will come together well, but the problem is, it's the same team worked on Saw.

Ollie is right, Saw is the "best themed coaster to open for years in the UK". Yeah, no ****! Its competition is hardly great is it? Stealth? Rita? G-Force?

Nemesis was better themed on opening. With the bus, APC, alien gun, weird torture devices on the hills, the superb station monster, etc. It still doesn't make it brilliantly themed mind - it's just good.

Saw is the same. It's perfunctory theming. A few old tools in a horrid wire mesh queue and some mannequins don't make a good theme. The building is too clean cut and looks like a tin shed painted to look run down. The internal theming is bettered by the ghost train at Brean for goodness sakes! There is nothing outstanding about the Saw theming at all - other than the fact that the rest of the UK has suffered from exceptionally poor theming for years.

I do hope that the team have more freedom and budget for this ride to do a proper job mind. We'll see...
 
Nemesis is not better themed than Saw. More effort went into Saw's THEME. Here's why.

Creating a theme from scratch which does not represent any REAL world thing and making a story fit to it is a piece of piss. What's hard is themeing to an existing story, culture, environment. You have to get it right, or it sticks out like a sore thumb. Stuff like Jigsaw's voice not being Jigsaws. The "traps" dotted around the queue are exactly what they did with Nemesis - use found objects to theme with. The problem was, with Nemesis, we didn't question why there was a fecking diamond drill there because we are unfamilar with the "world" of Nemesis. So any addition can be accepted as part of it. With Saw, you do question it, because it doesn't fit in.

Black Mamba suffers something similar to Saw. Here you've got a ride... themed to.. Africa. Africa is a big place, with many different cultures and customs. Black Mamba is in places an unconsidered clash of all of those bordering on the offencive. You've got Voodoo alongside the Islam.

Of course you could argue that, Nemesis (on opening) appeared better. So the effort that went in is irrelevant. Having not experienced Nemesis on opening, I can't judge this argument, but I sincerely doubt it. Nemesis' theme isn't hard to pull off. A military camp, set up to monitor a beastie that's broke out of the ground and ensure it doesn't brake free of the restraints put in place to keep it there. Better still for Alton, they've not taken it upon themselves to really make any of this too obvious. Yes, there used to be that audio story, but the fact that the audio story was even needed is proof the theming is **** - surely?

Coming up with ideas from "nowhere" like Nemesis is a lot easier than actually researching and theming to something specific. I can draw great fantasy dinosaur like beasties, but drawing scientifically accurate dinosaurs is incredibly difficult.
 
Bollocks Joey! :p

Lionsgate say "here is a list of all the objects from the film you can use". They get them off Lionsgate and put them into the ride theming.

If Saw was Star Wars, then I'd agree with you. The items would have to be made specifically. However, the props in Saw are all off the shelf things - it's a requirement for the film's own low budget. They just use anything you can buy or find in a hardware sotre, or get from a local scrap merchant.

No real effort has to be made to recreate the theme. They have the films as reference. They have Lionsgate to help reference. They have objects that are readily available to both of us. It's not a challenge to make Saw: The Ride's theme.

I know what you're saying Joey, but it just doesn't work in the context of Saw - it's an easy theme to make with everything available to the designers.

Hex is the same. Hex is very well themed, but it was an easy job to theme - they just copied pictures of the Towers in the mid 1800's and recreated it using lots of easy to find reproduction bits and bobs. It looks good, but that doesn't mean it was hard to do. The problem with Saw is that it wasn't hard to do AND it doesn't look great.

Just for the record, I rate Saw and Nemesis theming about equal in all honestly. They both are alright and do the job -but neither are brilliant - they both cheat.
 
They should get the people from Universal to work on the theming, the same team that done the Mummy. They are sister companies so it would not be that hard, the coaster type will be the same as well so how hard can it be?

But just like Saw only a small part of the coaster will be themed anyway, which is a shame.
 
I think the difference is that most of the coaster will be ducking and diving through trees, so it doesn't need to be themed quite as much. Also, I think the reverse "trench" will be something more than a plain concrete "air tunnel" - well I hope.

See, it's a mixed bag not knowing what to expect from the team and budget. It could be brilliant right through, or they could slash the budget and it be a dog's dinner. Maybe not constrained by license, they'll make a better (Hex quality) job of it?

To be honest, it's a difficult call at the moment and I'm wavering around in the middle somewhere about it all -because there's just not enough evidence to make any kind of prediction.
 
For me the whole of Saw is themed so when they lose the deal they can just turn off the TV's and remove some of the lose items and thats why it is not as good as it could have been.

With Alton no money is being wasted on film tie ups so the whole lot can be spent on the ride.
 
Whilst it maybe the same team that worked on Saw, that doesn't mean the outcome will be the same.

Just compare the themeing and ladscaping of Alton to Thorpe - no comparison. Saw's themeing fits the rest of the park - average, the big question is, will Alton settle for average?

I dont think so. Mutiny Bay reminds me of 'classic' Alton, and that was their last major investment, so with that in mind, I'm thinking positive about this, and just hoping the days of Spinball & Flume are over.
 
The plans say that the new ride will use the same building effects and colours as used on MB, so looks prommising in that respect. The entrance to the ride is huge, if you look on ATA it says it is 20m across. The exit is the Corkscrew entrance and this uses the Corkscrew photo booth. I would say this points to the removal of the ride being part of the story of the new one.

But then again, MB is not a new area, the actual story of it is pirates invaded the port of Merrie England so they just gave it a make-over and passed it off as a new area, same story with CCL. If Ug Land is not completely changed next year, this is what I expect will be the reasoning behind it. "Something was discovered removing Corkscrew, which caused all sorts of nasty things to happen to Ug Land". That would be lazy, so hopefully it will be done properly. Rita's station will not be covered up, the plans clearly show that. Rita is clearly shown on the plan, so has to stay like that. The other buildings are just outlines so will propbably change. One thing about Rita that will change is the name and/or logo, it would seem. Merchandise is very cheap and it does not feature on multi-ride merchandise, which is odd as before this year they over-sold the ride and passed it off as an amazing ride, not a above-average one. Hopefully it will be completely re-themed. If they are updating the name/logo, they might aswell go the whole way and do thr whole ride, wouldn't be hard, paint it the same green as the top parts, reclad the control building and trains, add some vines and branches, and with a lot of tree removing going on, that wouldn't be hard to find.

Right now I am bordering on excited, most things are looking good.

My money is still on Intamin. Gerstlauer don't really have the type for this. It is confirmed it will have two trains, so a Eurofighter is right out. I'm going for a drop or double-tilt (tilt forwards, then backwards) inside the building.
 
I still don't think Rita will change too much. I think it will keep the same name, colour and trains. I think they will just change the station and control building to match what they're doing with the new ride.
 
Why do I always sound negative but Mutiny Bay is simply rubbish. I and others did not even notice it had really been redone, did not even notice the water ride walked straight passed it.

Then look at the re theme of the log flume, what a bad job there.

I do hope they do a good job but at the moment I am not getting my hopes up.

So I will keep an open mind and hope they get the budget and can do a really good job.

They need to do something with Rita though as the area just wont work well, I bet they regret just sticking Rita there taking up so much land.
 
Mutiny Bay is fine, it's definately not a massive spectacular area, but does it's job - and is fun for kids.
They've put some nice things round there, and Sharkbait Reef is actually a bloody good investment.

Definately scrubs up better than Merry England, and all I remember is that Merry England was just a 'pass through' area, nobody really did anything round there, now a lot of people can be found in Mutiny Bay.
 
Blaze said:
My money is still on Intamin.
Don't expect to get rich soon then. :p

And Marc it's the Splash Battle you walked past. Even though it's part of the Mutiny Bay area it's still quite far from all the other rides in that area. I'm still not sure how you did it. Maybe you were expecting it to take up the whole lake but it's a damn good ride and the themeing is pretty good.
I'll be surprised if you managed to walk through the rest of Mutiny Bay and not notice anything. And aren't there plans to remove the log flume soon or something?

Anyway I just wish the track would hurry up and get on site so I can finally start talking about it. It's the time in construction where it should be there. Most the groundwork is complete and the footers are in place.
Apparently they've started putting concrete in one of the large holes no. Not sure exactly as I was just skim reading the TT Forums.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top