I went back over to Seoul for a few days over Christmas to catch up with old friends and basically just hang out for a bit since it’s almost five years since I moved away from there. Since there’s nothing major that’s new at any of the parks there, I wasn’t really going to bother with any of them, but found myself at a bit of a loose end one day, so decided to head over to Lotte World.
I knew from the website that Atlantis Adventure was closed, which was disappointing, but not a massive blow since I must’ve ridden it 25+ times in the past. I figured that’s there was enough other random stuff to keep me occupied for the day, plus some minor new attractions to have a look at.
As I soon as I got there, about an hour after opening, I heading straight outside to get the bigger rides out of the way.
The place was already absolutely heaving; it was busier than I’d ever seen it before. It was the Christmas holidays, so it was to be expected, but it was just absolutely ridiculous. I’d always made an effort to go on normal weekdays before (I used to have random days at work – about once a month - where I’d be done by 9am), so it was a bit gutting to see it so rammed.
Like I said, I knew that Atlantis was down for the whole time I was in Seoul, but it looks like it could be that way for quite a while. There’s some fairly major renovation work going on with it at the moment.
I’ve got no idea if this is purely cosmetic, or for the ride itself or whatever.
The rest of the rides on Magic Island were just insanely busy. I’ve never waited more than two cycles on Gyro Drop before, but it had a 90 minute wait which I just wasn’t prepared to put up with, so I skipped it.
It was a bit of a shame since it’s one of my favourite drop towers. They’ve added the same stupid scream guard things to it that they’d added to Gyro Swing just before I left.
I’ve just realised I didn’t take any pictures of Gyro Swing. It was running, but again with a stupidly long queue that I just wasn’t prepared to put up with. I should probably add that the temperature was exactly 0 degrees, so hanging around outside wasn’t particularly attractive.
There was a new Disco since I’d been here last, but it was closed. There used to be a crappy old Waikiki Wave thing in the same location. No big loss that it’s gone or that I couldn’t ride the replacement.
The line in front of it wasn’t for the Disco. It was actually for Comet Express.
**** ridiculous, but I did suck it up and queue for almost two hours because I figured I had to ride something. Comet Express is an excellent ride as well, easily my favourite spinner. You can’t tell from the tiny entrance, but it’s actually huge and built entirely underground.
Construction of Lotte World Tower (also known as Lotte World 2) is finally well underway now.
When it’s finished, it’ll be the 4th tallest building in the world, with the world’s highest observation deck, and will look like this:
I didn’t bother with Bungee Drop. It’s a fun little tower, but not worth the almost 2 hour queue.
Instead, I just sacked off everything else outside and went back to the indoor section.
French Revolution isn’t worth this:
It looks great, but it was a piece of **** 5 years ago, so **** knows what it’s like now.
In its defence, it has one of the best spectator/coaster interactions to be found anywhere.
I just headed down to the first floor to try and find something worth doing. This wasn’t it:
The Sinbad boat ride only had a 20-minute wait though. It’s also excellent.
A huge area has been given over to this stupid Enchanted Forest area, which is basically loads of empty space with a few tanks with insects and **** in them. They also have the audacity to make it an upcharge attraction, not that I paid since I accidentally went in through the exit and out through the entrance past the ticket window. Waste of **** ing time.
I walked past the stage show. I forget the Korean name, but it roughly translates as “Sluts in Lycra and Fags with Glitter”.
A few other general pictures:
I wasn't in the mood to pay extra for this, despite it being quite cheap.
The indoor rapids ride on the 3rd floor didn’t have too much of a queue. As a ride itself, it’s a bit poor, but when you take into consideration the theming, and the fact that’s inside a building, it’s pretty impressive overall.
Back on the first floor, there’s a fairly new, and pretty impressive kiddy area.
I didn’t try “Do You Speak Beluga” as it would just be in Korean. It’s basically the same kind of thing as Stitch Encounter and Turtle Talk at a few of the Disney parks though by all accounts.
The one new ride I did try was Dragons Wild Shooting, which was actually very good. It has real sets, but the shooting is done on a number of large screens. It’s very cartoon-like and cute and excellent for what it is.
I sucked up the 90 minute queue for a ride on Pharaoh’s Fury, as I’ve always rated it really, really highly.
I honestly wish I hadn’t as I was left really, really disappointed. It’s still an excellent dark ride, but it just seems to have been somehow neutered. The “rolling ball” effect had been replaced with a crappy projection that makes no sense and the fire effects have been completely removed. On my last visit, the fire effects weren’t working, but it now seems like they’ve been completely replaced with some crappy fog and lighting.
I used to place this ride on par with Indiana Jones at DisneySea, but it just isn’t up to scratch anymore. The most disappointing thing was the queue line. Whenever we’ve had “Best Queue” topics, I’ve always raved about the queue for this ride. It now looks like this:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzCHVL-DlFo[/youtube]
Yes, it’s still better than 99% of the queue lines out there, but it used to look like this:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvcTLZuDgU4[/youtube]
It shouldn’t be a big deal, but I was just so disappointed. There’s nothing new on that floor, so it’s not as if the space they’ve decided to save is being used for anything constructive. When the ride opened, the queue line was actually a big selling point: 1km long, thousands of paintings etc. Such a shame.
Anyway, yeah, I kind of wish I hadn’t gone back to Lotte World. I’ve always loved it, but the crowds made it unbearable, and one of my favourite ever dark rides is now just a shadow of its former self, which is ridiculous when it’s still actually the most recent major attraction the park has.
It's still a great park, and anyone who hasn't visited shouldn't be put off by my crappy day there, but I just left in a really sh*tty mood.
I knew from the website that Atlantis Adventure was closed, which was disappointing, but not a massive blow since I must’ve ridden it 25+ times in the past. I figured that’s there was enough other random stuff to keep me occupied for the day, plus some minor new attractions to have a look at.
As I soon as I got there, about an hour after opening, I heading straight outside to get the bigger rides out of the way.
The place was already absolutely heaving; it was busier than I’d ever seen it before. It was the Christmas holidays, so it was to be expected, but it was just absolutely ridiculous. I’d always made an effort to go on normal weekdays before (I used to have random days at work – about once a month - where I’d be done by 9am), so it was a bit gutting to see it so rammed.
Like I said, I knew that Atlantis was down for the whole time I was in Seoul, but it looks like it could be that way for quite a while. There’s some fairly major renovation work going on with it at the moment.
I’ve got no idea if this is purely cosmetic, or for the ride itself or whatever.
The rest of the rides on Magic Island were just insanely busy. I’ve never waited more than two cycles on Gyro Drop before, but it had a 90 minute wait which I just wasn’t prepared to put up with, so I skipped it.
It was a bit of a shame since it’s one of my favourite drop towers. They’ve added the same stupid scream guard things to it that they’d added to Gyro Swing just before I left.
I’ve just realised I didn’t take any pictures of Gyro Swing. It was running, but again with a stupidly long queue that I just wasn’t prepared to put up with. I should probably add that the temperature was exactly 0 degrees, so hanging around outside wasn’t particularly attractive.
There was a new Disco since I’d been here last, but it was closed. There used to be a crappy old Waikiki Wave thing in the same location. No big loss that it’s gone or that I couldn’t ride the replacement.
The line in front of it wasn’t for the Disco. It was actually for Comet Express.
**** ridiculous, but I did suck it up and queue for almost two hours because I figured I had to ride something. Comet Express is an excellent ride as well, easily my favourite spinner. You can’t tell from the tiny entrance, but it’s actually huge and built entirely underground.
Construction of Lotte World Tower (also known as Lotte World 2) is finally well underway now.
When it’s finished, it’ll be the 4th tallest building in the world, with the world’s highest observation deck, and will look like this:
I didn’t bother with Bungee Drop. It’s a fun little tower, but not worth the almost 2 hour queue.
Instead, I just sacked off everything else outside and went back to the indoor section.
French Revolution isn’t worth this:
It looks great, but it was a piece of **** 5 years ago, so **** knows what it’s like now.
In its defence, it has one of the best spectator/coaster interactions to be found anywhere.
I just headed down to the first floor to try and find something worth doing. This wasn’t it:
The Sinbad boat ride only had a 20-minute wait though. It’s also excellent.
A huge area has been given over to this stupid Enchanted Forest area, which is basically loads of empty space with a few tanks with insects and **** in them. They also have the audacity to make it an upcharge attraction, not that I paid since I accidentally went in through the exit and out through the entrance past the ticket window. Waste of **** ing time.
I walked past the stage show. I forget the Korean name, but it roughly translates as “Sluts in Lycra and Fags with Glitter”.
A few other general pictures:
I wasn't in the mood to pay extra for this, despite it being quite cheap.
The indoor rapids ride on the 3rd floor didn’t have too much of a queue. As a ride itself, it’s a bit poor, but when you take into consideration the theming, and the fact that’s inside a building, it’s pretty impressive overall.
Back on the first floor, there’s a fairly new, and pretty impressive kiddy area.
I didn’t try “Do You Speak Beluga” as it would just be in Korean. It’s basically the same kind of thing as Stitch Encounter and Turtle Talk at a few of the Disney parks though by all accounts.
The one new ride I did try was Dragons Wild Shooting, which was actually very good. It has real sets, but the shooting is done on a number of large screens. It’s very cartoon-like and cute and excellent for what it is.
I sucked up the 90 minute queue for a ride on Pharaoh’s Fury, as I’ve always rated it really, really highly.
I honestly wish I hadn’t as I was left really, really disappointed. It’s still an excellent dark ride, but it just seems to have been somehow neutered. The “rolling ball” effect had been replaced with a crappy projection that makes no sense and the fire effects have been completely removed. On my last visit, the fire effects weren’t working, but it now seems like they’ve been completely replaced with some crappy fog and lighting.
I used to place this ride on par with Indiana Jones at DisneySea, but it just isn’t up to scratch anymore. The most disappointing thing was the queue line. Whenever we’ve had “Best Queue” topics, I’ve always raved about the queue for this ride. It now looks like this:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzCHVL-DlFo[/youtube]
Yes, it’s still better than 99% of the queue lines out there, but it used to look like this:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvcTLZuDgU4[/youtube]
It shouldn’t be a big deal, but I was just so disappointed. There’s nothing new on that floor, so it’s not as if the space they’ve decided to save is being used for anything constructive. When the ride opened, the queue line was actually a big selling point: 1km long, thousands of paintings etc. Such a shame.
Anyway, yeah, I kind of wish I hadn’t gone back to Lotte World. I’ve always loved it, but the crowds made it unbearable, and one of my favourite ever dark rides is now just a shadow of its former self, which is ridiculous when it’s still actually the most recent major attraction the park has.
It's still a great park, and anyone who hasn't visited shouldn't be put off by my crappy day there, but I just left in a really sh*tty mood.
