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Hot take (and I’m sure there’s a better thread to post this on I apologize): I really don’t like the fear-mongering some people do of Winterfest being cancelled every year. I’m sure on one hand it could be scaled back a bit (I can see that slide thing not being brought up this year) but also I think Kings Island is a park Six Flags sees as valuable and I think it’s still favorable to have the park open for a winter event.

They also stated that it will be replaced with a different show. I don't believe Winterfest is going anywhere. People spend plenty of money there. I see several boxes of cookies being carried around, plenty of people skating, buying the specialty hot chocolates and pulling out credit cards at restraunts. There seems to have been several misses this year. At the beginning of the year people were talking about cutting hours and or days and instead we got extended hours (sundays till 11 for haunt) added days (thursdays) and an additional weekend after Haunt. (strange that if you are expecting anyone to admit missing those points you'll only hear crickets...) We are fortunate enough to have enough of a population around the park to keep it going with little to no competition. Kings Dominion competes Bush Garden Williamsburg an hour away. We have no major park that close to us. We compete against animals inside their shelters in a zoo and drive-through attractions. People during the winter tend not to drive too far away from home. If you want a sign of Winterfest going away I believe the first sign will be when Ice Skating is not offered one year. It takes ALOT of money to do that and since they have already seemed to drain the fountain in preparation for Winterfest, I think it's safe to say Winterfest is safe for the foreseeable future.

I never understood why the park never used the IP for nearly 20 years until PTE. We could’ve had Haunt Mazes, merch, etc in between 2003-2022

Noon closures this weekend for Haunt. What’s the best place to take a nap at for the all nighter at the park? https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1bCm2yBEfH/?mibextid=wwXIfr

Continuing to ideate... One option for a non-IP family area at Kings Island is a medieval kingdom area that plays into the "Kings" part of Kings Island. This iteration recombines Planet Snoopy and Camp Snoopy into one area. No new rides or attractions for now. Linus Launchers and the log flume are "moved" back to Rivertown. If I were to immediately vote for a new attraction, I'd go with a Mack Interactive Boat Ride with theming related to King Arthur and the Lady of the Lake. It could go in the center (between K, J, and F) and balance out the pathways while making the land more elliptically shaped. Additional reshaping could take place if the outer paths seem too narrow for the crowds that might inhabit them. My second vote would be to replace Woodstock's Air Rail with either a new B&M Family Invert or a Vekoma SFC (which would then be named Dragon Fyre). More could probably be done depending on what rides the park is willing to part with. I took some inspiration from the Medieval Faire area at Canada's Wonderland and more from the area of the same name at the (oft-forgotten) KECO park, Australia's Wonderland. Parts of the lore are drawn from Arthurian legend while the rest is a general Medieval Faire/Renaissance Festival mashup.

I'm disappointed that they did nothing with Phantom Theater for Haunt this year. It would have been so easy to have Maestro open up Haunt every night or have the characters roaming around during Tricks and Treats, promoting the new ride. It would have been the perfect seasonal tie-in and help promote and build interest for the new ride. It's not surprising, but still disappointing that the park doesn't do any creative in-park marketing anymore.

The new numbers are white and I only saw them on the ones that come together. It was like 1 -14. The black numbers are probably still there, but doubt I could see that while riding.

They still have 3 weeks to announce any kind of pricing they wish to/feel the market will bear.

It looked like the floats for the parade were assembled the last time I rode Adventure Express. Honestly, I had been just assuming the entire event was cancelled (or that it would cost an extra $10 per visit to look at the lights) so it was nice seeing any sort of progress.

^Great job putting together the map visual! I like where you are heading with this. I would suggest removing Whirlybirds for the water boat ride replacement. The pathway location you indicated between F,J,K is critical for maintenance vehicle traffic from backstage to forklift ride vehicles etc.

Expect less entertainment for Winterfest this year. Tower Topics has already reported the KI tradition of Tinkers Toy Factory was cut. Without the many characters including Santa from that show to participate in the parade, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the parade cut too. Six Flags does not like winter park events so enjoy this year’s Winterfest as it may be the last for many more years to come. Then the park won’t have to worry about draining the fountain early or removing all the Halloween in a short period of time.

Love this new shirt art!!

I would phrase it more like: They have shareholders to answer to, so they aren't going to pay for the extra workers or night shift wages that a park like Dollywood would. The bonus weekend will be an interesting time to see what stage of the turnover they're at. We still don't even know what will be open for Winterfest this year either. With other parks cancelling or scaling back their events, could Kings Island also see a scaled back Winterfest for 2025?

If Dollywood can flip from pumpkins to Christmas in one night, they can take 3 weeks to transform a fountain. But they have shareholders to answer to, so they are going to do what they need to do

Today marks the anniversary of Kings Island’s 2019 announcement that Vortex would be retired, and I’ve published a piece on TPBD reflecting on the ride’s legacy. https://themeparksbydon.com/remember-the-grip-Vortex-kings-island/

Kings Derby would actually be a new ride with a new structure to compliment the Grand Carousel's pavilion! The queue structure for Diamondback would be a recreation of the old shooting gallery/shop building and serves to bring the "town" back to Rivertown. I have another concept with Action Zone becoming a Medieval Faire area, but this one struck some inspiration yesterday.

I love this idea so much! I especially love the other extra details outside of the kids area, like the enclosed queue structure for Diamondback for the extra pre ride story telling and the relocated Carousel Pavillion structure to the Salt Water Circus lawn. Although, I had always envisioned Action Zone rethemed to a Medieval/old Britian theme to tie in with Banshee's Irish roots and Celtic tones. As much as I love Peanuts and Looney Tunes, I honestly think having a kids area without IP would be a great change and allow for a blank canvas of creative ideas.

I don't expect any new add-ons to come to Winterfest this year. Unless there were additional fees for Holiday in the Park activities that Winterfest didn't have, we probably will just get similar offerings to last year's event. I forget who said it, but the quote goes something like this: "If Kings Island's Winterfest is not profitable, it's because of bad management". Fear-mongering doesn't help anyone, but it is worth saying that everyone should go take in the sights and experiences this year because Six Flags has proven themselves to be wholly untrustworthy. If any part of Winterfest is on the chopping block in the foreseeable future, I'd bet we'd see it scaled back to the scale of the 2005 event. (I agree with you BryanJay!) Surely someone in the SFEC corporate offices is doing calculations on whether cancelling an established event is worth the bad press and potential lost customers. With the new CEO will come the potential for a shift in strategy and some changes to the event lineups as well.

This is the 2nd most “2025”thing Ive read about this week, as in “Absolutely nothing at all that occurs in nature nor anything people will come up with in their unsound minds surprises me this year” thing.

I get she was injured on the ride and do have empathy for her injuries. -BUT- Claiming the park is negligent due to the coaster speed and placing the ride near water? SMH My initial question reading this "how can anyone prove the duck came from said body of water?" Why wasn't this reported when it happened? And the lawsuit was filed shortly after the unfortunate SDR fatality & quick settlement for another SDR incident.

Operations are usually very very good a this park, they all got headsets and everything. Velocicoaster hits like 60 second intervals pretty consistently. Velocicoaster and Hagrid's are both amazing rides, but I would add the Hulk to that list too. Islands of Adventure Must-Rides: Velocicoaster Hagrid's Incredible Hulk Coaster Spiderman Jurassic Park River Adventure (although it closes January 5th, 2026 until November of next year-MAJOR referb) Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey Those are just the best rides there in my opinion, but there are more rides that are good too. Universal Studios Orlando Must-Rides: Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts Revenge of the Mummy Transformers the Ride: 3D (not a must-ride, but pretty good in my opinion) Those are the must-rides I would say, but there are other rides there that are good too Single Rider: Universal uses Single Rider Lines, and they save quite a bit of time. But I will say Velocicaoster Single Rider will not save you much or any time at all. Plus, the regular queue line is super cool and much better than the Single Rider Line. So don't use the Single Rider Line on Velocicoaster. But, every other ride will definitely save time going in the Single Rider Line. Mummy, Gringotts, Hulk, and DEFINITELY Hagrid's will save you time. Now the Single Rider Line does often skips big portions of the queue theming, so if that matters to you I would recommend doing the regular line the first time. But after that if you want to save time and don't necessarily care about seeing the lien again, then go ahead and do Single Rider. Hagrid's Single Rider Line is amazing, and can save you tons of time!!! Now if you are a huge HP fan, then you might want to go in the regular line, but otherwise do Single Rider. The wait was a posted 125 minute wait and we waited 10. Such a time-saver. Sometimes the line can be hard to find off of the regular queue, but it is there. The Single Rider Line may be closed, but if you just step over the chain and go down there they don't say anything and just let you go. That's my biggest hack at Universal: USE THE SINGLE RIDER LINES!!! That's all I got right now, but if you have more questions feel free to ask!!

Plus the name "Diamondback" wouldn't nearly make as much sense without the diamond seating layout pattern...

Great to see Herschend going headstrong into improving Kentucky Kingdom. I never made it down there this year, but will definitely find my way down there at some point next season. The fair board seems to have finally picked the right folks to run the park, and I hope they get a good return on their investment for this. KK has been a bit of a mess since Six Flags left and needs stuff like this to revive it.

Funnily enough there have been times when guests thought Boo Blasters actually was a show and had to ask random guests in line on what the attraction actually was. I also remember one time when a guest cussed out the worker because he wanted his family of 6 to all ride in the same ride vehicle, literally caused a big scene and was screaming because he tried to convince them that all 6 family members could fit in the same ride vehicle, he then got out line with his family giving everyone the middle finger. I honestly can't stand guests like that.

I assume that means no more fountain shows on the hour this weekend, even a version with pyro and lights but no water? I can't remember what happened last year with the midnight show.

I think most of the general public (even the moronic ones) will understand that it is a ride because they will know that there used to be a ride there before with Boo Blasters. If anyone walks by and thinks it is a show, I will think they have a bad grasp on the reality of theme parks. Maybe I'll be kinder to them if we see another Phantom Theater show return next year.

Agree, they've hit a homerun with Order of the Dragon. Knott's scary farm level theming and scares. No other Haunts outside of Knott's can do that.

1. Maestro in the queue. Seems like a no brainer. With some updates and special effects, it could be really, really cool. 2. Pepper’s Ghost finale. It sucks, but with screen based tech, the no reason why they would. Prove me wrong! 3. Not remove it in ten years.

I personally like the staggered trains because they are longer and you get some serious airtime in the back of those super long trains. I do feel like the 4 across trains are faster, but Diamondback isn't meant to be a super fast paced speed ride-that's Orion's job. Diamondback is there for the massive airtime. I wouldn't change a thing on Diamondback. It's perfect and is my all-time favorite hyper!

I wish they would put tunnels like the Incredibles coaster at California Adventure with lighting effects that fit the Orion space theme.

Oh, I’ll never forget where I came from. Hustling up and down every aisle at Riverfront Stadium, selling souvenirs at Reds and Bengals games from 1980 to 1982 for a straight 15% commission, built the foundation for every success that came after.

Yes, the event named HAUNT should be done up like the fall festival event at the highly religious amusement park in the nountains.

I work in an elementary school. I have seen zero kids ever wear a Peanuts shirt. Like never. Its nothing of relevance to kids at all in 2025.

The longest wait for a ride in the park being Boo Blasters On Boo Hill...