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Serena

Miss CoasterForce 2016
Staff member
Social Media Team
Went to Japan last week, as my band were touring there. Managed to squeeze in a couple of theme park visits with @daviddoc - who happened to be on the other side of the world at the exact same time as me! This is one of the things I love about CF, you're never far from a fellow theme park nerd!

Landed nice and jetlaggged in Tokyo late Friday afternoon and we wasted no time visiting the Shiba Inu and Owl cafe's of Harajuku - so cute! But this isn't CuteAnimalForce. So on wards we headed towards Tokyo Dome City for an evening of huge Intamins, hilarious shopping mall log flumes and scary moth-themed horror mazes.

I had already ridden Thunder Dolphin - the giant Intamin Mega coaster that sits a top the baseball stadium - in 2015, and remember loving the first drop and the views but finding the rest of the coaster a bit meh. But this time I really loved the whole ride! Still adore that first drop - it reminds me of Hyperion in it's breathtaking steepness. Still love the views of Tokyo all lit up at night. But this time round I felt...hang on, the rest of this coaster is actually really fab!

Lots of lovely swooping dives, a few pops of airtime and such unique interactive moments with it's shopping mall surroundings. The fact that an Intamin Mega coaster even exists in the centre of a major city is ridiculous when you think about it, and I've come home with a whole lot more love for Thunder Dolphin than I previously had.

We did some of the shooty dark rides which are always fun, and the new indoor coaster 'Panic Coaster: Back Daaan.' Which is a Gerst family shuttle with several tire launches. This ride is so funny. You complete the first half facing forwards in a dark room. Nothing special. Then you get launched out backwards and the room us filled with light up balloons and J-pop music blasting. Quite the contrast!

Another fun ride is the log flume, where the lift hill is covered in fairylights (yay!) and you drop through several floors of the shopping mall. And get absolutely soaked.

On my previous visit to Tokyo Dome City, we did the horror attraction and you had to place a ring on someones finger and then all hell broke loose inside the maze. The horror attraction was still there, but this time with a different theme. But remembering how scary that first one was, I was very nervous to go in.

Now.

I have a few strange, irrational fears.

One of them being Things That Fly Erratically (bats, butterflies...MOTHS) Well, they only bloody went and THEMED THE HORROR MAZE TO MOTHS. I had to close my eyes for most of it.

Terrifying.

Finished up the evening with lots of tasty shrimp at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co, the restaurant is located so you get a lovely view of the lit-up water fountains. Tokyo Dome City is such a fab inner city park - full of quirky attractions and has a lovely buzzing atmosphere at night. It's one of those places I feel that I could keep coming back to and the novelty of these great rides in such a cool location would not wear off!

Ride of the day: Thunder Dolphin


Day Two:

Visited One Piece Tower in the morning, which is an indoor theme park based on the huge anime show One Piece. As a fan of the show, it was absolutely incredible. But this isn't AnimeForce, and the park has no creds. So...moving on....

Took the band to Sega Joypolis in the evening. Last time I visited Sega Joypolis we got there quite late and didn't have much time for anything apart from the cred and Sonic Athletics. Ever since, I had been desperate to get back there and experience all the mad arcade delights and screen-based dark rides this place had to offer. Well.
Turns out...they're mostly crap. And there's so much faff involved. You can only have a couple of people in front of you queuing, but getting on a game or a ride seems to take forever - even when the place is empty.

We did a horror maze themed to zombies which was very tame. An interesting 4D cinema where the whole room span. A VR game that made me feel a bit ill. Dawn of the Dead (with spinning vehicle) which made me feel a bit ill. The Jungle simulator ride which made me feel a bit ill. The half pipe ride gets some nice airtime but...it made me feel a bit ill.

Best part was going to the top floor restaurant where you can sit outside with your chips and admire the awesome view of Tokyo.

Ride of the day: 4D Haunted House Thing


Next couple of days were spent playing shows which was cool. Then after getting home from our headline show in Tokyo at 2am, it was time to set my alarm for 5am and head to FujiQ HiLand!

Bare with me, I'm about to share an extremely nuanced and balanced opinion here...

FUJI Q IS THE WORST AMUSEMENT PARK IN THE ENTIRE WORLD AND NO WORLD CLASS COASTERS CAN MAKE UP FOR THIS DIRE PARK.

Hey! Did you know...that I ABSOLUTELY HATE FujiQ HiLand?

And I never used to!

On my first visit, I rode everything I wanted to ride (despite rain) and had a pretty enjoyable time. This time though...oh boy. A totally different story.

@daviddoc and I arrived at the park nice ad early for opening. We saw the coasters running, despite drizzle. Everything was looking optimistic. We headed into the park and joined a queue (after some confusing signage we couldn't figure out if we had joined the queue for Takabisha or Do Dodonpa) Got to the station, saw those lil Gerstlauer carts...ahh! Takabisha it is!

Takabisha has been in my Top 10 since riding it in 2015. I think it is the best example of a beyond vertical drop. The launch is brilliant. The inversions are big and graceful. But it's deffo no longer in my Top 10 now! Don't get me wrong...it's still fun. But...has it always had this many inversions?!?! Hahaha It just felt so...samey. I still love the tension of that holding brake at the top. But aside from the indoor section and the beyond vert it just kind of rides like The Smiler. Ugh.

Still a cool coaster, but not Top 10 worthy.

Anyway, on wards and upwards to more coasters right? WRONG! It started to rain so they closed everything. It wasn't particularly heavy rain.

We used this time to do some indoor attractions. The Flying Theatre (crap), The Evangelion exhibition (fab if you like anime) and Endless Haunted Mine - a new trackless dark ride where you are belted with your arms down, have to wear surround sound headphones and go into an incredibly well themed mine, with actors, to die. It was so well done!

The vehicles made all sorts of sharp movements, there was one part where the sound of a blade heading you came on and the vehicle suddenly shunted to the side in a way that made your neck jolt. Superb! Very scary.

By now the rain had eased off, it was mostly cloudy with some light drizzle occasionally. Did the coasters open? No. They remained shut.

We killed some time in Thomas Land (which is far superior to Drayton Manors), did the VR Do-Dodonpa thing (quite funny) and went into Super Scary Labyrinth of Fear. The facial prosthetics in the Labyrinth were incredible and filled me with so much dread. Walking into a room, you couldn't tell who was human and who wasn't. There was lots of excellent dark quiet passages that built suspense and tension, but when we exited we both exclaimed "is that it?!" It's good but it doesn't live up to its reputation.

Are the rides open yet? It's not raining anymore? Ah, no. They're "closed due to rain."

WHAT RAIN?!

It was starting to get frustrating now. We killed time in Starbucks, and then 30 mins before closing the park, they re-opened one ride: Takabisha. Everyone in the park started running towards it. SO THEY CLOSED OFF THE QUEUE. They announced they were opening it, then closed off the queue and turned us away.

One coaster. We were at FujiQ HiLand for 8 hours and we rode ONE MEASLY COASTER. And of course there were no refunds or rainy day come back tickets. That was it. It just felt like they couldn't be bothered? I don't know. Either way, FujiQ are never taking my money again. No matter what wacky contraption they build next (for the love of God FujiQ, BUILD A COASTER INDOORS)

Ride of the Day: Endless Haunted Mine



The next day couldn't be further away from the disappointment of FujiQ. Nagashima Spa Land is such a lovely amusement park. I got a good feeling from the place as soon as we set foot in it. So. many. huge. coasters. It's like a cross between Cedar Point and Kennywood, in that it has lovely water views, loads of creds and a nostalgic charm to it as well.

Naturally, we headed straight for Hakugei - the huge RMC conversion of White Cyclone. Argh. It looks so pretty all blue and white! And it has plushy white whale mascots in the ride op booth! I think our first ride was 2nd or 3rd row.

Ooof. This thing is INTENSE. The double up is possibly the strongest ejector I've experienced. It left bruises on my legs. It's an assault on the senses - the outward overbank, the sideways airtime, the relentless variation of elements. But hands down my fave thing about Hakugei is the inversions. They are PERFECT. The Zero G rolls actually give you airtime and fly through so smoothly. The stall is wonderful, getting flipped inside that mess of white supports. It's a bloody great big buffet of a coaster - packed full of all sorts of crazy ingredients. So much variety!

The only thing is...the intensity stops it being re-ridable for me. I only managed 3 rides in the day, because it kept giving me a massive headache afterwards. But that's probably just me being a soft weakling!

So that's my opinion on Hakugei. Onto the rest of the park! There's so many creds that I can't even remember which order we did them in, so I shall write about them in order of the most noteworthy.

Steel Dragon 2000 sure is imposing! It looms over the entrance of the park in all its Giga Coaster glory. It seems to take a lifetime to get to the top. The first drop is brilliant. But then...it's just so...windy? And kind of dull? The bunny hops back to the station are fun, especially the ones in tunnels which are so hot it's like being flung into an oven. It's a novel big coaster, but it wasn't exactly what I wanted it to be unfortunately.

Ultra Twister was my 600th cred, woo! Milestone! It's so weird! Very clunky! Very harsh brakes. Nice pop of airtime.

Acrobat was a very pleasant flyer. I used to hate B+M flyers but I think they're starting to grow on me. The pretzel loop was actually rather nice on this one. Lovely colour scheme on the track as well.

@daviddoc thinks Bobkart isn't a cred, but it's on Coaster Count, so I'm counting it! It's so much fun! One of my fave rides in the park.

Shuttle Loop has a surprisingly forceful launch.

Jet Coaster is a lovely forceless smooth Togo through the trees.

And I'm sure you don't need to hear about the Wild Mouse or Corkscrew etc.

We also did a horror maze themed to decapitated dolls, it was creepy. The food in the park was great, got a lovely big pot of noodles for £3. What can you get in Alton Towers for £3?! Nothing but despair and disappointment!

We finished up our fantastic day with some rides on Hakugei and Ultra Twister. Then it was time to tackle the long drive back to Tokyo, with a car full of interesting snacks - including a chocolate Mario and garlic shrimp flavoured crisps.

Ride of the Day: Hakugei


The next day I was taking the Svalbards to Tokyo DisneySea. I booked all our tickets. Drummer decided he couldn't be arsed to go on the day. Cool. As soon as we got to the park we found out our Japanese Record Label were taking us for a fancy dinner that night, so we had to leave the park early, before it got dark. Boo. We rode the Big Three - Indiana Jones, Journey To The Center of the Earth and Tower of Terror. Great rides, even if ToT is a bit underwhelming and Journey feels kinda short. Watched some shows. Met Jafar. Wondered round. Then left in the afternoon. CAN SOMEONE PLEASE REMIND ME NOT TO GO TO THEME PARKS WITH THE BAND AGAIN PLEASE? They just. don't. get. it.

DisneySea is a lovely place to walk around but it does feel kinda lacking in the ride department.

Ride of the Day: Indiana Jones

And that's that! Thank you for reading my essay, apologies for the lack of photos!






 
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Matt N

CF Legend
Great report @Serena! With regards to Hakugei, have you ridden any other RMCs, out of interest? If you have, I'd be intrigued to know how it compares to your others, as Hakugei doesn't look quite as intense as some of the others on a POV.
 

Serena

Miss CoasterForce 2016
Staff member
Social Media Team
Great report @Serena! With regards to Hakugei, have you ridden any other RMCs, out of interest? If you have, I'd be intrigued to know how it compares to your others, as Hakugei doesn't look quite as intense as some of the others on a POV.

Thanks Matt :) Yes, I've ridden Storm Chaser and Wildfire as well. I would rank them as follows:
1. Hakugei
2. Storm Chaser
3. Wildfire

The POV of Hakugei really does not reflect how it rides!
 

Matt N

CF Legend
Hakugei is great
Best R.M.C. in the world
It's better than SteVe
Really? Wow; promising stuff! Thanks @daviddoc!
Thanks Matt :) Yes, I've ridden Storm Chaser and Wildfire as well. I would rank them as follows:
1. Hakugei
2. Storm Chaser
3. Wildfire

The POV of Hakugei really does not reflect how it rides!
Thanks very much @Serena!

Your two reviews of Hakugei make for promising reading, and as both people on Captain Coaster who've ridden it have also given it 5/5 stars, that has certainly raised my expectations of Hakugei compared to other RMCs!

Looks like you two had a great trip! I'd love to visit Japan some day!
 
Hakugei really is phenomenal, hopefully I'll be able to get a hold of the reverse pov and 360 cam of our first ride on it.
I've done wildfire, outlaw run, goliath, twisted colosus, wicked cyclone, joker, railblazer, new Texas giant, iron rattler, medusa, twisted timbers and SteVe; and hakugei is my favourite of them all.
 

HeartlineCoaster

Theme Park Superhero
Entertaining stuff as always.

I could potentially revisit Fuji next week, but it's stories like this that remind me I'm better off leaving the memories alone.
Prefer it to Nagashima as they've done the exact same rain thing to me but, you know, RMC.
 
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