There will be spoilers for RotR here, proceed with care!
So folks? What do you think?
I was only able to ride it once, but I was totally impressed. All the animatronics and screens felt like real people who were really there, the blaster shots and the lightsabers were life like, the hologram was super cool!
But I was a bit disappointed with the story line. We tried to join the Resistance and failed? I was fully prepared to say “the Resistance base is in Pecara” at the first opportunity to see the reactions, but there were none, so the whole “thanks for keeping the location of the base safe” felt really empty. I also have a problem with rides that congratulate me for riding (the one ride that I feel like could actually pull that of is MFSR). I agree with @sanstitre_has_left_the_building that the whole seatbelt thing kind of breaks the immersion, but I was still impressed they pulled of an almost believable safety check. The “how many in your group” part shouldn’t make any sense, but at the time it didn’t break immersion for me.
It makes sense that the part you will wait in the most is the boring grey corridor, but it is a little bit frustrating to be moved from an interesting space quickly just to wait in a boring one later.
The story line is very dependent on the cast members to be fun, in my opinion. We had CMs in the line (old Batuu base) who were interacting about joining the resistance, which was fun. The scene with Rey’s hologram then going into the shuttle off-planet moved very quickly, but once we were in the star destroyer in the room with the troopers we were there a while. The cast members gave us a good stern ‘wait here for processing’ speech. The CMs playing the imperial officers had at least a few mintues to interact with our party, and I did hear someone give away the location of the base, to which the CM said something like “You’re obviously lying to me, the interrogation will get the truth out of you”. They built up the interrogation at the hands of Kylo Ren, which was very effective. By the time we had our escape from the room into the vehicles, everything moved so quickly that it was seamless. The resistance fighters who saved us used the line “You’re too valuable to the resistance to lose - buckle up! We need you to make it out of here and my navigation skills are a little rusty”. It didn’t break immersion too badly. The CMs on our day were all very energetic (or very serious, as their job required) and fully immersed. Without that human factor, I agree that the ride wouldn’t have been nearly as great as it is. To me, RotR is Disney finally taking advantage of their great recruiting and human factor to enhance a ride rather than relying solely on pre-recorded videos or animatronics.
I went to RotR at Disneyland, and I am wondering if that influenced things? The ride was a walk on up to the first vehicle, and there was no time to feel like I was at a resistance base. I was promptly moved from the first ride vehicle to the gray corridor, but the CM there at least gave a “you are know property of the 1st order” speech. At the gray corridor the CM was asking for group sizes, and telling people that video transmissions would not be leaving the spaceship (people were filming everything), which was fun, but they didn’t really mentioned the base location. The CM that got us inside the ride vehicle was doing the standard seat belts and checks procedure, no special resistance add ons. The audio being repeated in English and Spanish also broke a little bit of the immersion
That sounds like quite a few small differences that add up to a big experience change. CM’s probably matter more than location, but the crowds that you’re with probably make a big difference too, given the shared group nature of the ride storyline.
I… had an unfortunate first ride and I haven’t had a chance to go back for a second ride. Mostly because I can’t convince myself to wake up that early on a weekend.
I don’t want to just bash on the ride, but it certainly has some issues. My main problem was the group I was with included 7 teenagers who were screaming the music the entire time. Absolutely awful.
So, I’ll try again and see if I don’t mind the other issues as much when the rest of the ride is better.