Review: Star Tours: The Adventure Continues at Disney’s Hollywood Studios

THE NEW STAR TOURS RIDE

A new Star Wars-themed ride has opened at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, using the same space and infrastructure as the former Star Tours.

The ride, with fun new queue elements and a totally new 3-D high-def set of films, is different enough to qualify (at least to me) as an entirely new experience, rather than an update of the old Star Tours.

I’ve had a chance to ride it, and it’s a lot of fun, even for those unfamiliar with Star Wars.  For those who are fans of the movies, it bears multiple repeat rides!

REVIEW OF STAR TOURS: THE ADVENTURE CONTINUES

The core concept of the ride–an ineptly-piloted adventure in the universe of Star Wars–remains from the old ride.

The simulator technology–which can be a little rough on those with above-average motion sickness–also remains.

New is an enhanced queue and a whole new set of films that create the simulated universe in 3-D.

Any one of the films would be different enough to make this a fun new ride.

But what Disney has done is to create four sections of the film with options.–the first with two, and the next three with three each.

As a result, 54 different experiences are possible.  These experiences aren’t uniquely different–e.g. half have one of two possible beginnings, and half the other–but there’s still plenty of options to motivate repeat visits.

Moreover, these options mostly aren’t minor inserts in an otherwise identical presentation.  Three of the four are entire scenes (though the first one is short).  The result is substantively different experiences.

You have to actually ride it twice just to see how different the experiences can be!

Reportedly, one of the reasons for the re-do was to draw crowds away from Toy Story Mania and balance out the park a little better.

The day I visited things weren’t working out quite this way.  Rope drop certainly saw many more people heading left than has been common at the Hollywood Studios for years, but the bulk of the crowd still headed for Toy Story Mania.

At 10.30a, the wait for Star Tours was posted as 20 minutes, and FASTPASS returns were at 1.05p.  At about the same time, Toy Story waits were 60 minutes and FASTPASS returns 5.20p…

I suspect that Star Tours: The Adventure Continues will have more of a beneficial impact on wait times at Rock ‘N Roller and the Tower of Terror than it will on Toy Story Mania, which will remain–at least until the Fantasyland expansion opens–the hottest ticket in the parks.

For even more, see David Koenig’s comments on MousePlanet here.