yesterday beloved boyfie and i went to a passholder preview for epic universe at universal orlando. WOW!!!! our expectations were high and they were met for the most part. here's my thoughts on each ride we rode.
mario kart: bowser's challenge: oh brother. this is the first ride boyfie and i hopped on at the start of our day. the posted wait time when we entered the line was 35 minutes, but we ended up waiting over an hour. i will say, the queue is absolutely adorable, and anyone who's even a small fan of nintendo is going to love it and the land as a whole. however, the ride itself was not the experience that i was hoping for. you're given a helmet/headband thing, and when you board the ride, you clip on ar goggles which are attached to the ride vehicle. the ar experience is NOT great. it is extremely overwhelming, and for someone like me, who gets easily overstimulated in lines (and in general), it was really difficult to follow. i ended up just taking the goggles off and enjoying the dark ride aspect of the ride, which is, admittedly, adorable and very well themed. overall, the ride isn't awful, and i would definitely give it a shot, it just wasn't the best start of my day. i would give it about a 6/10.
monsters unchained: the frankenstein experiment: hehehehe. i was highly anticipating this ride, and it definitely lived up to my personal expectations. monsters unchained is a dark ride that utilizes the same ride vehicles as harry potter and the fordbidden journey at islands of adventure, but does NOT utilize the same dome projection technology. monsters unchained mostly uses practical effects and high-quality animatronics, alongside lcd screens and the occasional small projection (example: at one point in the ride, a small projection is used to create the effect of bugs crawling on a sarcophagus). boyfie and i ended up riding this one three times. my rating is a solid 9/10- it's definitely clear that the ride is still in technical rehearsal. there were constant delays, one of the dracula animatronics wasn't functioning, and we got stuck on the ride once. not really issues, just things that need to be worked on.
yoshi's adventure: this ride is just a cute little baby ride. you get to ride in big yoshis and there are some cute scenes, including a scene with baby mario and baby peach. very inoffensive, how could you not like it? 7/10
curse of the werewolf: the space where curse of the werewolf sits was originally intended to be a live show, which i feel is important for the ride. it just kinda doesn't make sense. the theming is fine, the ride itself is fun, but what does it have to do with werewolves? not much. i do love coasters that spin, and spin it does. 7/10
stardust racers: 10000/10 no notes. any sensible coaster enjoyer will absolutely love stardust racers. launch coasters are the best. i don't really have much to say, this is just good, clean fun. the ride also has AMAZING capacity, considering that it is a duel coaster, so we never waited over ten minutes for our turn. feels good dude! 10/10 (real rating)
hiccup's wing gliders: my main issue with this ride is the queue, which is entirely outside and has very little shade. the high was in the nineties yesterday, and we were definitely feeling the heat. putting that aside, this is a really good family coaster, which isn't to say that it's a baby ride or that it's inherently worse because it's not intense. i love feeling the wind in my hair and taking in cute theming. in this one, toothless the dragon 'presses the button' to launch the coaster. need i say more? 8/10
mine cart madness: this ride was super hyped and it's just, like, not even fun. we waited for about an hour to be jostled around painfully. in contrast to stardust racers, mine cart madness has absolute dogshit capacity: each ride vehicle seats just four people. even despite my beef with donkey kong, i WANTED to like this ride, but it just didn't live up to the hype. it was disappointing, because donkey kong country is a well put together land, and mine cart madness objectively looks amazing from the outside. 6/10 bro
the average rating of all the rides we rode yesterday is about 7.6/10, which is not bad! epic universe puts a lot of focus on immersion and elevating the overall guest experience, which you can definitely feel throughout all of the lands. i loved it and will def be back (once crowds go down in a year or two lol).
here is a song i was listening to while writing this: click me bro