Legoland announced that it will add a VR overlay to its Project X roller coasters in Florida, Germany, and Malaysia, transforming the rides into The Great Lego Race VR Coaster. From Legoland's press release:
Featuring a colorful lineup of racers drawn from the ranks of the popular LEGO minifigure mystery assortments, The Great LEGO Race pits riders in a rollicking race against wild, brick-built contraptions driven by Trendsetter, Pharaoh, Surfer Girl, Wizard and Pirate Captain, including a rocket-powered surfboard and a stylish scooter fueled by espresso. Wearing VR headsets, guests will experience the action from every direction – up, down, forward, backward and all points in between – in a dazzling environment where everything is made of LEGO bricks.
Guests will have the option of riding the coasters with or without the VR headset. The new experience will debut later this year at Legoland Malaysia, with a spring 2018 debut slated for Legoland Florida and Legoland Deutschland.
The VR revolution in theme parks fired up last year, when Universal Studios Japan and Alton Towers each added a virtual reality overlay to one of their coasters. VR came to the United States later in 2016, when Six Flags added VR overlays to nine of its coasters across the country. Six Flags later added VR to some of its drop rides and switched some of its VR coasters to "mixed reality" experiences that combined passthrough camera views of the riders' surroundings with animated video. This year, Cedar Point added VR in the evenings to its Iron Dragon, and SeaWorld jumped aboard, too, adding VR to its Kraken floorless coaster in Orlando.
But industry leaders Disney and Universal (outside of Japan) have resisted the VR fad, with Disney CEO Bob Iger openly criticizing it. While VR on coasters can amaze fans, that comes with the prices of having to wait much longer at dispatch for everyone to get their headsets adjusted. That extra wait to dispatch trains slows cycle times and inflates the wait beyond the point that many fans consider worth the benefit of the VR experience.
Some Six Flags parks have removed VR from their coasters, including Superman at Six Flags New England. And Six Flags Magic Mountain now is running its New Revolution in "classic" mode, without VR, too.
Will SeaWorld and Legoland eventually step away from VR rides? Or will Six Flags find a way to improve dispatch times and give the technology another go? No theme park has yet figured out how to wow people with VR while still keeping people moving through a VR attraction at a respectable pace that matches non-VR versions of the same ride system.
Theme parks — and their fans — are looking for enhanced experience, not trade-offs. Will Legoland be the park that delivers this, or will it suffer the same problems as other parks have? We will find out later this year.
Our "must read" discussion on virtual reality on roller coasters:
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The fad is dying down... and VR will never ever make a bad coaster good... and it can't make a good coaster great.
This seems like a really strange move for Legoland.
I did enjoy it still as a one off but when I am there next I would opt out of the VR
Air is a fantastic rollercoaster and the design of it is perfect for being able to enjoy seeing what is around you - VR should surely be better suited to rubbish coasters where they need the visual assistance
Kraken was excellent - not tried the VR version but not sure why they have bothered
I hope this VR transformation works out well for Legoland.
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