Theme Park Insider - SeaWorld Orlando - Attraction Review

Theme Park Insider readers offer their ratings and reviews for Antarctica - Empire of the Penguin, a dark ride at SeaWorld Orlando.

Antarctica - Empire of the Penguin opened May 24, 2013 as SeaWorld Orlando’s most expensive attraction to date.

This replacement for the park's Penguin Encounter takes riders on unique trackless motion-base vehicles for a ride through ice caverns, following the life of Puck, a young Gentoo penguin struggling to adapt to life in Antarctica. The ride culminates in a live penguin exhibit, which is kept at very frosty 30+ degrees.

Riders may select a "mild" or "wild" adventure, which determines how much your ride vehicle will spin. Anyone who can sit up on his or her own may ride on the mild side. You must be 42 inches tall to ride on the wild side.

On the ride, for the first two rooms, you're experiencing a cave in Antarctica through the eyes of Puck. (When you see him multiple times "in" the ice, in the first room? That's you, as Puck, looking at your reflection.) After spinning through the second room, as an eager young penguin, you return to the third-person point of view from the preshow for the rest of the ride, to watch Puck tackle the challenge of diving into the sea for the first time. (Parents should note that sensitive children might be frightened by this scene.)

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45 votes, so far