Alton Towers - SW7 - "The Smiler"

[gouldy]

Originally posted by mkingy

Less than a week

I really have started to feel quite excited about this over the last couple of days. I honestly don't remember being this excited about a new coaster. I can't even put my finger on why, I just have this feeling it's going to be awesome...

[gouldy]

We haven't seen the inside of the station in this much detail before now. It's meant to be like a hospital/correctional facility. It looks like they've achieved that, apart from the rainbow stairs

It looks really fun ^^ Do we know if there's going to be anything fancy going on for the opening days/week? (Like Swarm ) Couple of live actors near the ride?

[Coasterkidmwm]

Children's Hospital you dolt

If only the whole track was rainbow...

[gouldy]

Don't know about live actors, but all the ride ops and staff around the ride are dressed up and have this daft "smile" makeup on them

It's really not meant to be a children's hospital, Bert!

[mkingy]

Clearly they ran out of money so the classic hospital look of bland was the only option available to them.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GettingSmiliesPaintedOnYourSoul
This ride needs to be mentioned under this trope.

[gouldy]

Finally we have an onride (Not POV) video of the entire ride. This is an especially good video because it shows the inside of the station, and everything is running at final speed - as in, all of the lifts are at their final speed instead of how slow we've seen them in the past, and all the wheel assemblies are set up for the ride's correct speed through the layout. There are also some pretty nice shots of the ride itself in the video (like the way the final roll looks while the train is at the bottom of the vertical lift.


What is also clear is, for Alton Towers, this is a bloody long ride.




Doesn't look like the reporter likes roller coasters a hell of a lot though...

[Coasterkidmwm]

They purposely sent him on that because everyone thinks he is a tool at work or something. He had to have done something, but he didn't look enthused at all lol

[TheArchitect]

I like the surgery style lights above the station. He closed his eyes what a wimp. He seemed to have the feeling of "oh yay its over, oh wait... another lift... o gawd".
So nice to see a euro fighter with longer trains too.

[gouldy]

The TV advert first aired this morning.

Just did a stop watch on that vid from the moment the lights turn on(Love that part) to when the harnesses lift again and the time total is....3:28! Not the 165 seconds as counted, to me the ride length is from harness down to harness up. Also love the loud blast of HAHAHA as you hit the lift, seemed to make that bloke jump out of his skin

...Is that it?

Meh.

Might actually get some people in X sector though - longer oblivion queue?

[gouldy]

It's not quite it, because none of the preshow or dark effects in the tunnel before the lift are working, but yes that's pretty much it.

But to say "...Is that it?", seems rather harsh. I don't know what you're expecting of it? It's not quite Nemesis, but it's certainly looks a vast improvement on everything else in the park. This is kind of as good as it gets with steel coasters in England.

[Coasterkidmwm]

It looks better than AIR, Rita, and Oblivion, but then again I've never been to the park so my opinion is essentially garbage.

I would merely argue that although it looks like a pretty nice long ride, it doesn't look particularly 'thrilling'. The best bit looks like when you first come out of the station, and the endless meandering around loops just isn't to my taste. I couldn't disagree more that it's an improvement on nemesis or oblivion. While it looks okay, it certainly doesn't look like a ride I'll put in my top 10.

[Coasterkidmwm]

Seriously you'd ride a vertical drop and then a long left turn over this?

[gouldy]

Originally posted by flamingemu

I couldn't disagree more that it's an improvement on nemesis or oblivion.

I did say "it's not quite Nemesis", as in; Nemesis is better than this - but... Oblivion? It takes a massive judgement of subjectivity for someone to look at the two rides, and what they do, and say that Oblivion is a better ride than this.

But opinions are like that, I guess, they differ


I, personally, don't think this ride would be out of place at a large American park, especially seeing as it does grab a world record. I myself am more of an airtime person, than and inversion person - and would, no doubt, take something like Shambhala, over Smiler. But Alton Towers just physically cannot build rides like that. I also appreciate that not everyone is an airtime junkie like I am. I know some folk who have absolutely flipped their sh*t at this ride because of how impressed with it they are - I guess everyone likes different things.

Like I said before, anyway, this is pretty much the best they can do with what they have (especially given as it's basically now guaranteed that they will never be building a wooden coaster).


Just a personal thought on Alton Towers itself, though: Until this thing opens and I get to ride it for myself, if it had not been for Nemesis, I doubt I would ever really go to Alton Towers, even though it's my local park (ignoring that waste of space that is Drayton Manor). Other than Nemesis, the coasters there are of pretty lame quality, especially once you've been to the US and Europe a few times - everything at AT sort of just pales into insignificance (except, obviously, Nemesis).

[Coasterkidmwm]

**Looks up Drayton Manor on rcdb**

Intamin standup and a slow looking X-car thing.


Sorry 'bout your homepark bro

[gouldy]

Tell me about it. That X-Car replaced a perfectly good Pinfari ZL-42 as well. I would have much rather they kept the Pinfari, to be honest.

It's not bad to go to just once a year, and it's also quite cheap. But it's definitely a "family day out" rather than an enthusiasts paradise

In fairness to Drayton Manor, they do also have a totally badass drop tower. But as I'm not personally a fan of drop towers, it's still no big draw for me.

Both Alton Towers and Drayton Manor are about 45 minutes or so away from me, but I hardly ever visit Drayton Manor - probably 5 times in the last 10 years. By comparison, I've been to Alton Towers 5 times in the last 2 months.

[Coasterkidmwm]

I mean the kid rides looks nice there (althougth the kiddie Boomerang seems pointless since I'm sure the whole backwards aspect terrorizes kids). I'll always kind of be biased since something like Whizzer is still what I consider the ultimate non-"has 9 million worth of scaffolded mountain around it" family ride but yeah.

Well then again if you want to complete the family ride selection you could get a GCI

[mkingy]

Originally posted by gouldy

Tell me about it. That X-Car replaced a perfectly good Pinfari ZL-42 as well. I would have much rather they kept the Pinfari, to be honest.

Klondike [g]old mine was my favorite ride at that park before they got rid

[gouldy]

Yeah, I only rode it on a few different occasions, but I don't recall ever seeing such a heavily themed off-the-shelf Pinfari before or since, and remember really enjoying it. Very thrilling coaster, for much the same reason TheUltimate is thrilling - it was/is genuinely dangerous

Originally posted by Coasterkidmwm

Seriously you'd ride a vertical drop and then a long left turn over this?

Just a personal opinion I just love that dropping feeling you get on oblivion, which it seems like you won't get on the Smiler. Not a big fan of inversions on a non-inverted coaster.
I'm not saying the Smiler is a bad coaster, I'm just a little bit disheartened that the 'world first' was an extra loop or two.

Also, Drayton Manor - they have a nice water ride as I remember, and LOVE the drop tower there. Although the standup coaster pales in comparison even to the flying fish at TP [;)]