My Time at Epic Universe

My Time at Epic Universe

I was luckily invited to go view Epic Universe, the newest park at Universal Orlando Resort. This park is a game changer. The amount of theming, the quality and number of attractions. The different food options available, the incredible hotels that surround it. This park is going to be a huge step closer to being a full week destination. A huge step closer to the stereotypical Disney World vacation to visit all four parks. Universal now has three incredible parks to visit. Epic Universe, islands of Adventure, and I will combine Volcano Bay and Universal together because Universal Studios is in a rough state at the moment. I understood why after stepping into this brand-new theme park. I whined about the lack of staff at the other parks and once again, I understood why. Now, I do hope the cost cutting measures stop now that the park is about to open and income is going to start FLOWING in. I have not heard much bad publicity about this park. It has almost all been positive, just adding to the hype. I want to visit on the first day of opening just to be there, but the amount of hype and excitement continuing to build might keep me away for a few months.

Let’s go deeper. Talk about some positives first.

The first thing I have to talk about is Monsters Unchained. This ride has me still thinking about going on it a day later. I turned down a ride on Mario Kart for the second time, to ride this ride for a third time. It just blew my mind how good it was. The queue was good, the preshows were impressive. The capacity was good. I fell in love with this ride the first time I rode it and all I want to do is ride it again. The story is good, the ride motion in the vehicle is fun, some really amazing moments, you feel a part of the story, and the animatronics are the best I’ve seen. They listened to their fans; less screens, more physical sets and I believe that this ride is the perfect balance. The screens add to the story, but the story isn’t centered around screens. It is so much more enjoyable than the similar counterpart in Forbidden Journey where the screens tell most of the story supplemented by some physical sets. I guess they were tired of having to clean up throw up on that ride. Truly one of the best attractions ever made. I can’t wait to ride it again.  

Moving into the shows. After several years of more abandoned theaters than actual shows, Universal finally decided to deliver quality shows at Epic Universe. I liked the Untrainable Dragon the best but the Fantastic Beasts Cirque show had some incredible moments as well. I love it when theme parks have shows on offer. I love Carousel of Progress; I love Hall of Presidents at Magic Kingdom. These shows leave them in the dust again. I think Universal really made a statement to Disney with this entire park. We are going to win the decade.

I am so excited to go back, and while writing this I got excited so let’s just go land by land.

Berk was just breathtaking. It was beautiful in the morning, beautiful at sunset. Hot at noon. There is so much to look at in the land. There is constantly new details that you see the more times you go, and the more you look at it. There are several food options, a couple of stores, a meet and greet for Toothless, a theater show, and several other characters walking around. The flat ride of the land is fun because of the goal of trying to flip the dragon. One flaw I have seen is the queue for Hiccup’s Wing Gliders. The queue is extremely hot, covered, but just very stuffy. It is open air and there are just too many down and backs, very similar to HHN queues. The Fyre Drill ride is a little bit weak. Just a shooting game with no scores kept. The whole goal is to get soaked, I guess. It is one of the weaker attractions at Epic Universe. Thinking about it now, I would like to say it is the worst attraction. The Meet and Greet for Toothless has to be brought up again. It is just incredible how they made him so lifelike. He is just a giant dragon you can pet. One of the coolest additions. And I don’t even like meet and greets.

The newest Harry Potter land is incredible to walk in. The scale is just on another level. The further you walk into the land, the more the buildings surround you with complete immersion. The show is pretty good there. Not quite as good as the show in Berk, but still some amazing effects. I haven’t gotten to ride the E-ticket in the land which is the must ride of all of Epic Universe, better than Monsters… Which I find hard to believe. The queue on the other hand is EPIC, there is no other word to describe it. The scale, the level of detail, the length of it, this ride is going to be immensely popular and I wouldn’t be surprised if this attraction brought back virtual queues to Universal. There are a few restaurants in the land, and of course, a Butterbeer cart but I haven’t tried any of those. I have probably explored 40% of this land on two visits, that is how big it is. Universal knows what their cash cow is. Harry Potter saved this theme park.

The Universal Monsters are alive and well in Darkmoor. There are several well themed restaurants all around this land. Some food items just aren’t very appealing, visually which I have a problem with, I eat very much with my eyes. Ygor was walking around the land, the Invisible Man, a couple violin players playing. A fun roller coaster in Curse of the Werewolf. And the best attraction in the world right now. Monsters Unchained is just the perfect attraction where Universal listens to their fans. Forbidden Journey is a strong ride, but it makes people sick with the screens. Monsters Unchained takes the amazing theming, the amazing facade, and makes the attraction rerideable. Even now, I can’t wait until this weekend. I get to go on it AGAIN. After three rides in one day, I will honestly ride it as many times as I can this coming weekend. Perfect attractions are hard to find. This attraction just made me feel all the emotions. Flight of Passage accomplished that feat when it first opened but since then I guess I have gotten older, my eyesight has gotten worse, and maybe the screen has worn down too because I don’t like it quite as much. I had a perfect run-through of this attraction. All the animatronics were working, and I just hope they stay on top of their maintenance. This attraction would be missing a lot if this ride went down to B-mode like the yeti of Expedition Everest.

Nintendo World… This place is the most kinetic land of all of the lands. Everywhere you look, something new catches your eye. Maybe it’s Yoshi walking up on the hill close to his ride. Or all of the Yoshi Island ride vehicles. This world also has the addition of Donkey Kong Country which has the roller coaster go through the land. The immersion is next level. There are also little side quests with the power up band that are fun to do. Blocks to hit, mini games to play, it makes you feel like you are in the game. Yoshi Island is a cute ride. Not amazing but cute. Doesn’t really have the Peoplemover charm. If it went all throughout the land and if it moved quicker, I think it could be a contender, but it is just too slow, and too short. A nice change of pace. Mario Kart is not my type of ride. It is far too chaotic for me. And without the AR goggles, the ride is basically a less fun Runaway Railway with how slow it is. This ride does have a good queue, I will say that. The façade of Bowser’s Castle is just incredible to me. Mine Cart Madness is another underwhelming attraction for me. I wish it was longer but the way it beats you up, I wish it would be over. Very cool technology but a LONG line, a rough ride, and a not very fun line makes me not want to ride very much. This was also an attraction I had to wait 85 minutes to ride, and it just didn’t live up to what I wanted. One of the skippable attractions for me. Unless in a couple of years it is a ten-minute wait, only then will I do it. Probably my favorite land to be inside of, it is very fun to look around.

Celestial Park really did put the park back in theme park. This place is beautiful, the water is a perfect shade of blue and the foliage is very pretty. I haven’t done the carousel yet and I haven’t seen all of the fountain shows and fireworks, so this is an incomplete grade. It is an awesome center of the park though. One ride I can absolutely talk about is Stardust Racers. One of the best roller coasters in Orlando. The dueling aspect coming back to Universal has made me extremely happy due to my feelings of Dueling Dragons. This ride is better than Velocicoaster and a tremendous amount of capacity makes lines move quickly. They have a decent pizza place for a theme park and a decent barbecue place. I haven’t eaten at the rest but will do soon. This land is a great connection point for all the worlds. I haven’t been in the crazy summer crowds, but it is, peaceful. The Helios hotel can be seen anywhere you stand in Celestial Park.

I went to the most visited park in the country on the Friday before my Sunday trip to Epic. Spent a little time in that park, rode a few rides, and I can confidently say that this new park should be the most visited park in the country. The new rides, the theming, and even some food options are better. I even went in a technical rehearsal period where the best attraction is still under maintenance and not open to the public. This should give the kick in Disney’s pants to start construction on a new park. If Universal can stay on top of the behind-the-scenes area of this park, it will continue to be a very popular tourist destination and honestly, make Disney look bad for the quality of attractions their best is. I have ridden Rise of the Resistance, and I thought it was awesome, but the Monsters attraction at Epic Universe is one of the best rides I have ever ridden. Blows it out of the water. It just has to stay on top of maintaining the incredible animatronics. The incredible show scenes. Having a full number of staff to have a good amount of throughput. There are a few underwhelming attractions, but this park is jaw dropping.