WoodVengeance

I'm not sure when you rode it, but I rode it last year and it was running smooth and whippy for me.

I don't think anyone who rode both of those is arguing with that. I'd even say Afterburn and Batman at SFGAm are better than Banshee for the same reasons.

The new area looks great. Not sure how I feel about the name "Wind Chaser" though. It seems the park wanted to keep part of the original Storm Chaser name, but I think they should've just went with a completely different name instead. The coaster is supposed to be themed to an Owl, so something like "Nightowl" would've fit a lot better in my opinion than Wind Chaser.

Given what's been happening at other parks, I don't think Mike would be the one to make that decision.

Not entirely, but they're repainting it to fit in with the Jungle Xpedition area.

If FoF gets removed, don't expect that land to be used anytime soon. Vortex was removed over half a decade ago and that land is still sitting mostly vacant.

This is the one park where I can safely say that its closure is completely justified. It does hurt that we're going to lose another classic Arrow coaster, but one coaster isn't worth the amount of neglect and abuse the animals there have to endure. Hopefully the animals there get the help they desperately need.

Best you'll probably get is a Mack Stryker at Cedar Point I'm afraid.

I believe that's a big part as to why we haven't seen many other Gerstlauers open up in the chain. Under Cedar Fair, the chain really emphasized wanting to prioritize capacity and reliability when it came to their big new additions. I feel the main reason Knotts even went with Gerstlauer was primarily due to the amount of land they had to work with. If Knotts had more space for Hangtime, it would've absolutely have been a B&M Dive Coaster instead. Under the new Six Flags chain, it seems capacity isn't as much of a concern when you look at coasters like Siren's Curse and Alpenfury only operating with two trains at two of the biggest parks in the chain. That could make a Gerstlauer more probable for Kings Island, but it's still something I have to see to believe given the park seems to be heavily prioritizing family additions at the moment.

Personally I think the privately traded companies do better in regards to providing quality services to their guests, as they don't have to cater to shareholders. Look at the Herschend parks like Dollywood and SDC for example.

Personally I don't see Kings Island dropping their Winterfest event anytime soon when the event still draws in crowds like this.

It's just giving people in the Virginia area all the more reason to buy season passes for BGW instead.

Using the Wayback machine, I found that Kings Dominion did include "Unlimited Winterfest visits in 2024 AND 2025" when they started selling their 2025 season passes. However, there is a disclaimer at the bottom that states "Season Pass benefits subject to change without notice."

Glad to see more wooden coasters in the chain getting GG's pre-fab track. I'm wondering if they're going to work on Wilde Beast at some point in the future.

All the more reason to go to Cedar Point more often.

New teaser from Kentucky Kingdom hinting at where the new expansion will take place. You can see that they deliberately covered up the rapids ride and Eye of the Storm from the map. However, you can still see Cyclos near Lightning Run.

The rapids makes sense for removal as that ride takes up a significant portion of land (about as much as T3) and I always felt Eye of the Storm was in a really weird spot. It's a shame to see rides like these get removed, but hopefully Herschend makes up for those removals with something well-themed, but we'll see.

I agree. Although some might argue SSBR has the better layout, I think Good Gravy was better executed when you factor in the theming around the area and the near-miss with the cranberry can.

I think many of us have just been spoiled by Cedar Fair with how we used to get big new coasters every 3-5 years. Now that Kings Island is under the new Six Flags chain, it definitely seems like they're taking a more budget-friendly route by hammering in on the family demographic while the chain is investing more into other parks like Great Adventure and Magic Mountain.

The situations involving the removals of Snake River Falls and Vortex are vastly different. Cedar Point stated that Snake River Falls was removed "to make way for future expansion", so it's highly likely that the park already has a plan for that area. Last time Cedar Point said something like that was when they announced the removal of Wicked Twister, and we know that was removed to make way for the Boardwalk expansion with the Grand Pavilion and Wild Mouse. For Vortex however, that was removed primarily due to the high maintenance costs it would've required to keep that ride operational. There was no replacement planned for Vortex, as the park was in the process of building Orion by the time they decided to pull the plug on it. It's also worth noting that a potential replacement for Vortex was likely delayed even further because of the pandemic that affected the entire amusement industry in 2020. Although Six Flags has already announced replacements for Kingda Ka and La Vibora already being built for 2026, some of the other coasters that closed in 2024 might have to wait a bit for their replacements. I imagine the Anaconda plot in particular is going to remain vacant for quite some time, as that was removed in almost the same fashion as Vortex. (Both Arrow loopers that were removed due to maintenance costs on years both parks were in the process of building new B&M coasters next to Flight of Fear) The main difference being that unlike the removals of Anaconda and pretty much every Six Flags coaster that closed for good in 2024, we were actually told of Vortex's closure beforehand.

Current wait time: nope

It's not 100% confirmed, but it's likely going to be the area around Thunder Run and Storm Chaser. It's hard to tell because of the blur, but you can make out Storm Chaser on the top of this image. I believe this is concept art for the new area that they're going to reveal at a later time.

Of those rethemed attractions, I'm wondering if Thunder Run and/or Storm Chaser are going to be included in that as well. Their themes would feel a bit out-of-place if this new area isn't going to be weather-themed.

I brought this up in a previous online discussion, and something I've been told was that most holiday events at amusement parks need to draw more attention from their local passholders since not as many people are willing to travel out-of-state for holiday events. Of course there are exceptions to this like Dollywood and Silver Dollar City, but that's mainly because those parks have the budget to go all-out for their holiday events that no other park in the region can compete with. Because of Holiday World's location being quite out-of-the-way for a lot of people, they wouldn't be able to draw in as much of a local crowd compared to parks like Kentucky Kingdom and Kings Island that reside in larger metro areas. Personally I don't agree with this, as I think it's close enough to Louisville that people would still drive an hour to go to Holiday World regardless, but that depends on how a HW holiday event would compare to Christmas at Kentucky Kingdom. Not saying they would need to go all-out like Dollywood, but just enough to grab attention outside of Indiana.

It makes sense for Invertigo to get the axe. Like the Flying Dutchman, the standard Inverted Boomerang is an old and rare Vekoma model (though not as much of a maintenance nightmare) and isn't really that popular of a ride at Kings Island. Right now Invertigo is the last of its kind in North America and is being kept operational due to receiving spare parts from Stinger at Dorney Park, which closed 7 years ago so who knows how long those spare parts will last.