TP Rich said:
But I think the people who say 'Thorpe isn't a theme park, it's an amusement park' are ridiculous. The only ride in the park that has no obvious theme is Slammer.
Yo callin' me ridiculous? D:
Seriously, if you consider Thorpe Park themed, you need to understand exactly what themeing is. The park has no distinct areas; they have now removed all reference to areas of the park, there is no clear distinction and to the general public, noone will notice any real change walking around the park. Yes, an effort is made to theme individual attractions but there is no consistency, little overriding area feelings or themes, and those that are there are not nurtured? If you understand me, there is little area upkeep, and the park clearly want to loose any real theme to each area.
Themeing individual rides, ala SAW and the Swarm, is very much an amusement park thing. It's very similar to Blackpool, Pepsi Max being themed to Pepsi, Infusion being themed to water, Bling being themed to bling. Certainly in that sense, it is not lacking themeing, but, is an amusement park.
A theme park has consistency and depth; such as, PortAventura, Disney, Universal, an amusement park has Isolated irrelevent themes, ie: Blackpool, and to an extent, Thorpe.