Magnum recording is back again...

Sounds like we were in different parks anyway.

To me, the spiel makes no difference. It is still the same ride. Some of you are so picky that your worry about something that has no affect on the ride itself. Sure it was better before the spiel, but does it really make that much of a difference ?

But at the same time, the spiel was just one of those things that I loved about Cedar Point. When I was a kid, I memorized them just so that when I grew up, I could work there and do it. Another thing was that they were so damn entertaining at times.

Unless your name is Dorthy and you have a little dog named To-To, don't step on my yellow brick road.

I mean, it showed some personality and just added to the fun. The recording is just kind of bleh.

I dont care either way. Sure the non-auto spiels are more fun but there are quite a few of foriegn people working at cedar point. If we cannot understand what they are saying then there is no point in saying it whatsoever!!!!! I understand that the others were more fun and i quite enjoyed them. But like i said we need to understand them unless of course we have ridden so many times that we have it memorized. (which isnt hard because it is just about the same for every ride at any amusement park these days)

Also like others pointed out: cp needs to fix the timing or the is no point at all. *** Edited 7/23/2005 5:49:59 PM UTC by cedarpoint24/7***

I like the speil, I think it creates a suspenseful atmosphere in the station. I'm pretty sure the speil is supposed to be heard while waiting for your train and while in the train. If you ever have waited for Magnum, then you have for sure heard the end of the speil. It isn't muted to people waiting in the station.

I think that for people who have been there before and have had the personality of a human spiel, it will be a disappointment. However, to the GP's Saturday trip, it's no big deal, just another ride with an annoying audio track that they won't listen to.

Last time I was there, they had an awesome person running the spiels, really brought life into it (can't remember the name though). So, for me, it'll feel like a loss. But like I said, the majority of Cedar Point's guests are just general public, and the office knows that, so I guess that's how they can make it seem right.

Still sucks though.

I think the biggest disappointment with the recorded spiel is at the end of the ride. When you've got a live spiel from a person who's allowed to get the riders fired up, coming back into the station and cheering is one of the best parts of the ride in my opinion. With the recorded spiel, everyone just silently exits the ride. It creates the preception that no one is having fun.

I think more people notice the spiel than what some may think. I remember when I was growing up that whenever someone talked about their trip to CP, making fun of something they said in a spiel was always something that would come up. It's something that sticks with people. I don't think it's a deal breaker, but it's another one of those little things that help to create the atmosphere of the park.

Race for the Fry said:
I like the speil, I think it creates a suspenseful atmosphere in the station. I'm pretty sure the speil is supposed to be heard while waiting for your train and while in the train. If you ever have waited for Magnum, then you have for sure heard the end of the speil. It isn't muted to people waiting in the station.

Yeah when there is cool music and a different sounding voice like MF,TTD and even MaxAir I don't mind but the bla bla bla boring voice doesn't create suspense.

Walt, you say that a big reason you go to the park for the atmosphere. How can't you be upset by the destruction of the fun, exciting atmosphere that has been commonplace on the coasters for so long? It's sheer idiocy to remove something that has worked for decades and replace it with a boring recording that doesn't even finish during the ride's interval.

On my visit earlier this year I couldn't even hear the spiel with all the people talking in the station and I was trying to listen to it to see what it said. How do you expect first time riders or the general public to listen to the safety jargon if their attention isn't peaked? A ride operator can inflect or increase the volume of their voice to grab the attention of riders while a the autospiel does not. Which is more safe for the rider?

I have 2 questions:

1) What is a "setup"?

2) Which coasters have auto speils and which don't?

A ride setup, on Magnum anyway, is where a train is not dispatched in time, and the train which was dispatched before is stopped on the safety brakes out by the lift hill. It requires someone to go out there and turn it back on, causing a lot of downtime.

Most rides at CP, sadly, have auto spiels. The only ones I can think of that don't is Raptor, Mantis and Mean Streak.

To me, auto-spiels vs. recorded spiels make up about 2% of what I consider "atmosphere." Would I rather hear a poem, silly rhyme or something that tries to get a laugh? Actually, no. But, I would rather hear a real human deliver an enthusiastic spiel and 'how was your ride?'. That said, it matters little to me considering the big picture.

Ralph Wiggum said:
I think the biggest disappointment with the recorded spiel is at the end of the ride. When you've got a live spiel from a person who's allowed to get the riders fired up, coming back into the station and cheering is one of the best parts of the ride in my opinion. With the recorded spiel, everyone just silently exits the ride. It creates the preception that no one is having fun.

I forgot about that on Magnum. On MF, they have a seperate guy to do that, so I guess I overlooked it. I can see how it would create that image.

I forget, is there a seperate person on Mantis?

I personally think that human spiels involve the ride operators more closely and make them pay attention, but whatever.

The problem I have is that the recorded spiel can't be heard in its entirety, so it doesn't matter if it says the same thing every time for legal consistency should it ever be required in court. You can't hear the lift recording at all on the ride (just in the parking lot, between dispatches). The ride operators can't see each other now or the train effectively on dispatch.

Now I ask you, what good are three "safety measures" designed to cover the park's rear in the event of an accident, when all three can be easily smashed to bits in court by even a non-lawyer?

Having worked Mantis before, I've had the honor of spieling there. The person on Unload-1 gets to spiel while checking/adjusting seats (it's HARD when you have to give instruction to specific guests while spieling)

On WT, however, there is both an auto-spiel and one that must be said:

"Riders on the platform, please secure all loose articles on the shelves before boarding. Cedar Point is not responsible for anything that is lost, stolen, or damaged while riding...Thank you, and enjoy your ride..."

We occasionally ask "welcome back riders how was your ride" as the train is coming back into the station

As far as the Magnum spiel, I enjoyed it everytime I came back and heard everyone scream when asked how their ride was. Once they said "picture taking is prohibited on this ride; we will do that for you; before the third tunnel on the left"...it was really funny and gave it an individual touch. It's sad to see something automated that's not even correctly tailored move in.

Jeff said:

You can't hear the lift recording at all on the ride (just in the parking lot, between dispatches).-lawyer?

You can also hear it for about a 1/2 second when you go right past the speaker going up the lift.

"...lcome to...scending to a hei...your ride on..."

But yeah; early in the morning the lift speil is clearly audible walking across the SC parking lot from Lighthouse Point.

*** Edited 7/24/2005 1:48:52 AM UTC by Brian Noble***

Amen, Mr Noble, Amen.

MrScott

Quite frankly, it doesn't matter to me whether they have an automated spiel or not.

But if they are going to do an automated spiel, they could at least do it right. Don't instruct riders to do things that are mechanically impossible. Don't make statements that indicate that the person writing the spiel has never seen or ridden the ride. Be clear, concise, and complete. Use plain language rather than legalese. And most important, keep the total length of the recording short enough that the whole thing can play. The new recording is long enough that NOBODY gets to hear the whole thing. People waiting in the station get to hear the first 75 seconds five or six times, but the recording is so long that it gets cut off when the next train pulls in.

I spent the whole day in the park on Friday, and I was very disturbed at what I saw all over the park. Cedar Point wrote the book on good park operations. Over the course of many years, Cedar Point has figured out the most effective way to operate rides safely and at maximum capacity. People will always tell you that a ride can never run at its theoretical hourly capacity, and anyone who has been to Cedar Point can tell you that statement is false; Cedar Point has run rides at THC for decades, and they've done it without hurting anybody. They literally wrote the book on park operations.

This year, it is as though someone took that book and threw it away. I'm not at all happy to see it happen. :(

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I think the co-author of that book is running Geauga Lake, and he took it with him.