Alton Towers Resort General Discussion

[TheBeornen]

Yeah it's more of a family experience but it's fun and still my favourite dark ride at the park. My point was mostly about having experience attractions for all demographics

[TheDuke]

I personally think we'll be seeing alot of duel and I hope sub terra in the updates based on the SW8 video recently which focusses on the eggs

[Nutty Man]

I personally think we'll be seeing alot of duel and I hope sub terra in the updates based on the SW8 video recently which focusses on the eggs

I thought that was a bit odd, so I hope it was a bit of a reference. I never experienced NST (in fact I never went to FV whilst it was working) so would love it to reopen.

[ChessingtonSam]

To be honest, I'm pretty sure this is Merlin trying too make current holders of the Alton Towers Annual Pass upgrade to a Merlin Annual Pass which would give them a better profit margin. It's irritating but they are, in the end, a business and they want to make as much money as they can with the smallest expenses. This said, I may be purchasing one of these as I believe it offers rather good value for money.

Actually, the Standard Merlin pass has the same exclusion dates in August.

[jackf1tz]

*Premium. Sorry, should have been a bit clearer.

[lewis97]

As posted on TowersTimes Facebook, Alton Towers have confirmed their Early Ride Time line-up and staggered openings for the 2018 season.

Early Ride Time will now only be from 9.30am – 10am, and include Wicker Man, Spinball Whizzer and Postman Pat Parcel Post, Go Jetters Vroomster Zoom Ride, Justin's Pie-O-Matic Factory, In The Night Garden Magical Boat Ride, Something Special: Sensory Garden & Numtums Number-Go-Round.

CBeebies Land and X-Sector will open at 10am, with Marauder's Mayhem and Heave Ho! in Mutiny Bay also open. Dark Forest, Cloud Cuckoo Land, Sharkbait Reef by SEA LIFE, Battle Galleons, Runaway Mine Train and Hex will open at 11am. While Skyride opens at 11.30am and Forbidden Valley, Duel and Congo River Rapids (now a seasonal attraction operating 26th May – 4th September 2018) at 12pm.

[Ryan.B]

Almost got no words for this, certainly not words I can say on here. Would make sense to open the whole park at 11 and close at 5:30/6. If it closes before 5:00 its not really worth a visit in my opinion.

[demz_4]

Disgusted that Nemesis, the parks main attraction in many eyes, is open for a shocking 4 hours on most days! An absolutely ridiculous decision. If that doesn't change within the first month I’ll be shocked! There’s going to be some big customer service queues.

[Nickolai]

I am definitely not happy about this. Honestly what are they thinking?!

[Morgan]

Very disappointed with this news. What's the point in having most of the major stuff at the back of the park so it draws people away from the entrance if they're shut for the first hour or, in the case of Forbidden Valley, TWO hours? If you're a thrill seeker, then for the first hour or so there's only two thrill rides (three if you count wicker man).  This honestly puts me off visiting a little, as I struggled to find things to do when everything was open!

[Joel Allen]

Not happy about this either.  Congo being seasonal and forbidden valley opening at 11:30!! That means I won't be able to go on the river rapids in April :@ Galactica, Nemesis and The Blade will be open, on 4pm days, for 4 and 1/2 hours!That's crazy... I do hope Alton make some changes... we did last year. 

[Robert.W]

Looks like what I'd previously heard was true after all. I'm really not happy with this at all. I hate to say this, but if the park really are that short on cash, they really shouldn't have bothered with Wicker Man.

I've said this before, that 2018 should have been a comeback year for Towers... well not any more by the looks of this. I imagine the general public will also be just as unhappy, not to mention confused about the new staggered opening times. 

[Nickolai]

If the opening dates don’t put the GP off too much and there’s are high crowd levels from Wickerman to put on them on the road to recovery, I hope 2019 will be the golden year of operations.

[ThemeCrafter264]

This is awful, abysmal news. The park will soon realise they have made a major mistake. and the park will only continue to make their lives harder and harder in increasing the amount of visitors coming. I can only dread what the new for 2019 cuts are

[Bert]

I also knew about this rumour and now I know it's true I'm very annoyed. 

One thing that is bound to happen with these cutbacks is when the park gets busy at Fireworks, Scarefest and Summer Holidays/School Trip season the queues for rides are going to be even worse than they already were.

Also it's with the huge accomadation expansion, It's clear Towers are changing marketing to hit people who are willing to spend stupid amounts on products. 

Think of it like in-app purchases for 'freemenium' games, Most people won't pay for in-app purchases in games but then you have a miniscule percentage of people spending insane amounts to get privilages(in this case the hotels) and buissnesses have realised that it is more pofitable to make 'freemenium'  games and let something like 0.75% of players who spend silly amounts of cash on the games and annoy everyone else. 

The difference with AT being a theme park and not a 'freemenium' video game is that people already have paid to enter the park. 

Watch this space, Once investors have found another way to make even more money you can bet Towers will follow(about 5 years behind though)...

[S.J_O'Grady]

They're going to get so many complaints about this. You cannot expect an ordinary member of the public to turn up and find arguably the main ride, and others, closed for 2 hours of an already embarrassingly short opening day. The fact is they're not gonna know this until they get there, and when they do it will hit em pretty hard!! It's so sad to see a great park run so badly.

[MakoMania]

Cuts, cuts and more cuts, but what else should we expect from Merlin. Race to the bottom for sure.

[Teammaddiz]

Absolutely disgusting, simply. It's Merlin's business model perfectly: charge more and more to get in, spend less and less on your actual parks, and slowly decrease the opening hours year round. Adjust accordingly until you no longer see a drop in expected visitor numbers all things considered. After a year or two, repeat. 

As much as I want Wickerman to be a huge success to get more woodies in the UK, I do think a drop in visitor numbers this year would do Alton some good. Fewer visitors tells Merlin they simply can't keep employing this business practice and actually need to provide a quality service for the extortionate amount people pay to visit. It's a business. They need to make money. But this is beyond a joke. 

[MakoMania]

Don't worry Teamaddiz, they'll be sure to cut even more in 2019 regardless of whether or not attendance improves or declines.

[ROYJESS]

I'm lost for words, these cuts are really bad. Not worth a day visit

RIP Alton