If the penny hasn’t dropped about how much Movie World’s DC Rivals HyperCoaster will redefine the landscape and sway theme park guests towards the park, seeing the all-mighty lift hill being finished yesterday should’ve at least caused a stir at Dreamworld.
To be fair, it’s not like Dreamworld doesn’t have great thrill rides. The Giant Drop, for example, is still one of those rides that even enthusiasts tend to shy away from. But new & innovative The Giant Drop isn’t, in fact, it’s quickly approaching it’s twentieth birthday. Think about that for a second. Twenty. Even a lot of the park’s other signature thrill rides, like the Sidewinder or The Claw, were all built at a time before smartphones or Facebook.
So what can Dreamworld do now to counter DC Rivals HyperCoaster? I’ve written about this before and really broke it down, but today instead I want to just talk about cool thrill rides. Sound good? Let’s look at cool stuff then, shall we?
1. Build the world’s tallest vertical-facing freefall ride. ($)
If The Giant Drop is Dreamworld’s best current weapon against DC Rivals HyperCoaster in sheer terror, why not redefine the best card you have and make it even more terrifying? After over a decade, Dreamworld lost the “world’s tallest freefall” title to Six Flags Magic Mountain, but the world’s tallest vertical drop title could be within Dreamworld’s reach, albeit with a small redesign. Could you imagine travelling up 119 metres and then facing straight to the ground? No need to imagine it, here’s Ikaros at Grona Land to get you in the spirit of what that might be like:
It’s one of the cheapest ways to go toe to toe with DC Rivals HyperCoaster in the short term, and if nothing else, would be utterly, ridiculously terrifying.
2. Build an RMC Single Rail Coaster ($$)
Six Flags & RMC (a current fan-favourite coaster designer) have announced what could mark the start of a monumental shift in the way coasters design. By using a single beam instead of multiple tubular rails, RMC say they can make an inexpensive, exhilarating and butter smooth roller-coaster in a smaller footprint and with less money. Ideally, I think Dreamworld “must” eventually build a roller-coaster in the next few years to keep up with Movie World, and this would be a great first step on that path. Maybe not the most ideal choice, the capacity isn’t that great and it’s not as impressive from the highway as Rivals, but it does have inversions (something Rivals lacks) and with a redefined Giant Drop (featured above), it would be a great 1-2 punch to Rivals.
3. Gerstlauer Eurofighter Coaster ($$$)
While not everyone’s favourite (they’ve have been known by enthusiasts to be a little rough on their best days) Gerstlauer, beyond a doubt has pioneered the thinking that you don’t need to spend vast sums of money to get something big & impressive. Adventure World proved this with Abyss, it’s short, sweet, and packs a hell of a punch. Its track is lined with barrel rolls, inversions, and great air-time. If I was going to design a Eurofighter to go up against Rivals, i’d go down the path of Takabisha at Fuji-Q Highlands & throw everything I have it. A launch, a big vertical lift hill, crazy inversions, lap-bars, you name it.
4. RMC Steel Hybrid Coaster ($$$$)
Yup, you guessed it, RMC, yet again. If you want to go directly toe to toe while trying to keep as much money as possible in your pockets, an RMC Steel Hybrid is the way to go. They’re unanimously loved by enthusiasts because they’re intense, smooth, have crazy elements & inversions and they’re bonkers to look at. Couldn’t you imagine one of these zipping up and down Blue Lagoon & Rocky Hollow? If we’re talking marketability, it’d easily take the crown for the country’s biggest wooden roller-coaster, only hybrid wooden-steel roller-coaster, & could easily take the tallest inversions in the country too, taking a lot of the shine off Rivals while offering a similar level of experience.
5. Intamin Semi-Shuttle, Triple Launching Roller-Coaster ($$$$)
It’s bonkers. It’s huge, and it’s also as impressive in terms of height and speed as Rivals while being different enough that both coasters could exist without treading on each other’s turf. Just watch the video to get a sense of how awesome this would be.
6. S&S Sensei 4th Dimension Coaster ($$$$$)
This is a personal favourite of mine. And look, if you’re going to spend stupid money on a single ride, it should be one of these. Nothing comes close to the insanity you experience on a roller-coaster where the seats are designed to spin at key moments of the ride. Yup, a friend of mine best described the experience simply as “you get off and think to yourself.. what the f*ck was that? Where did I go? What happened? Who am I? What did I just experience?” Six Flags Magic Mountain has one of these coasters, theirs is nearly 15 years old and it still draws several hour queues. It would be one of the few things that would put Rivals in its place without looking like Dreamworld were playing catch up.
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