Apparently there are two groups of Disney visitors. Those that go to take it all in, and are happy to spend their day spending lots more money on food, watching parades, and hitting a few D tickets.
The other group, the one I'm for sure in, feels that when they drop a few hundred for their family to go somewhere for the day, the last thing they want to do is spend that time eating overpriced food, or watching a parade for an hour. For a 12 hour day, I'm paying about $25 an hour for us to be there. We want rides. The BIG ones! And as many as possible.
That's why to me, losing a band would be a BIG deal, becuase you are losing your E ticket ride, possibly. If we are relegated to one E FP, the value of that ride becomes tremendous, simply because that is the biggest entertainment provider, and we can't get another one without an hour wait for a ride we've ridden dozens of times. If a visit goes from getting 4-5 E ticket rides, plus everything else, to 1-2 E tickets, that is an ENORMOUS loss of value to the folks in my group. And a fanccy App isn't going to address that.
To the people in the first group, it has no impact. And to the first timer, who really doesn't even know what it used to be like, they will be ignorant to it.
I'm looking forward to the new FL, but it's definitely not a vacation maker, even with the small coaster addition.
And I refuse to say that TSMM is an E ticket. There is a park in Europe that uses the same ride system, and it supposedly blows TSMM away. An E ticket is the best of the best, and unique to Disney. TSMM is a 3 minute long arcade game. I mean, really, TSMM could easly be a stationary arcade game, two seats, two shooters, and it goes through the 5 scenes. And the experience would be EXACTLY the same. They could sell an enclosed two seater cabinet with the same size screen appearance for $10-15k each That's not an E ticket.
And Universal totally redid Spider-man, it just didn't advertise it like it was the greatest new thing. Disney has been squeezing every last drop out of the whole resort for a long time now. And instead of new capital, they are adding a fancy wristband that will have a few neat features, but it's not something that will bring people in. It's something that they think will extract more money from the same people.
As I get older, I realize going on the same vacation over and over just makes them blend together, and I ask myself "why did I spend thousands on a vacation that created no real new memories, just similar ones to the last 3 trips"
The WDW parks are really stagnant. REALLY stagnant. Splash opened over 20 years ago. The MK has refreshed a few things in that time, but no major addition until the new FL, which is out of our demographic, since we dont' have a little girl.
And a new system limiting our BIG rides sure as hell isn't going to get us there. And I can't wait to compare notes after FP+ rolls out. It's an absolute impossibility that it will improve the number of rides a savvy visitor will get. Anyone used to using FP to it's fullest is facing probably a 50% reduction in E ticket rides without using standby.
But I must thank Disboards for allowing debate on the topic. Theme Park Review is now removing any anti-Disney posts.
-R