SeaWorld ditches VR headsets on Kraken
Before noon Tuesday, Pennsylvania tourist John Lusk rode Kraken Unleashed for the fifth time that day while his wife patiently waited for him down below.
The coaster was fast, full of turns and loops that made him feel the G-forces. “It’s a beautiful ride,” Lusk said.
Kraken Unleashed has gone back to being a regular roller coaster again at SeaWorld Orlando, with a virtual reality experiment ended a little more than a year after it began.
SeaWorld began phasing out the ride’s VR headsets this summer because of poor guest reviews and to keep the wait times shorter during the busier days, spokeswoman Lori Cherry said.
By mid-August, the headsets were completely removed, Cherry said.
The news wasn’t unexpected, said several who follow the theme park industry.
The reviews on roller coasters refitted to offer virtual reality have been decidedly mixed, said analyst Bob Boyd of Pacific Asset Management
“There’s certainly a novelty to it. It’s something new,” Boyd said.
But it hurts roller coaster’s capacity, Boyd said, since attractions workers must wipe off the headsets before the next group of riders climb on. The wait times get longer and longer.
People can only look straight ahead in the headsets so their ability to view the illusions they create are limited on a speeding coaster. The technology, as it zooms and twists and turns on the track, requires maintenance expenses, too.
“It wouldn’t surprise me that it hasn’t had that kind of payoff,” Boyd said.
There was a buzz when SeaWorld debuted the VR in June 2017. On its opening day, news media stories centered around SeaWorld’s new technology that made riders feel like they were underwater on an adventure and dodging sea creatures on the steel floorless coaster built in 2000.
“It’s a cheap way to get a marketing blip and introduce something new,” said Dennis Speigel, president of the Ohio-based International Theme Park Services, a consultant for theme parks.
Speigel said the VR infrastructure may cost a few hundred thousand dollars, a minuscule amount compared with the multimillions it costs to build a new roller coaster. Cherry declined to provide the costs of installing the VR.
However, most regular theme visitors prefer a roller coaster just the way it is — sans VR headsets, said Speigel.
“I don’t think anyone will view this as a failure,” Boyd added. “You put out an experiment and sometimes it doesn’t have the turn you hoped it would.”