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Coasters that exceeded expectations.

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RyanB19

Roller Poster
We've all done it, judged a ride before going on it, sometimes they meet your expectations, sometimes they are a massive let down. Which coasters did you expect to be poor before riding?

For me, Kanonen was the main one. I was expecting the typical Rita and Colossus type of pain as it rattled around, but it was actually really smooth. Next to no headbanging, decent bit of airtime, forceful launch despite the size and some actual enjoyable hangtime in the roll as well as the loop carrying some force. Comes in at number 9 on my list. Another one would have to be Twister at Grona Lund. I expected a ride that looked like it would be over too quick, and had heard it was very mild in airtime with the trains being not so good, the ride looked quite slow on POV's. When it came to riding it the restraints were really comfy for me and it was smooth. Every hill delivered a fun pop of airtime, and when you thought it was over it kept on going.

Honourable mentions go to Kvasten, Saw, X, Velocity and Revolution!
 
Verbolten and Cornball Express are immediate coasters that come to mind. Both weren't highly touted. Both were at smaller parks and neither was physically imposing but both were legit fun, with Cornball cracking my top 10 for some time.
 
Ride of Steel @ Darien Lake

Now I got Joey, and Jarrett to (hopefully) back me up for this one. But since the one at SFA is the absolute worst hyper i've ridden my expectations for this one were pretty much negative on a scale of 1-10.

But the ride its pretty damn great. It had a fantastic first drop, lots of great pops of floater and wasn't all that rough to boot. Definitely threw me for a loop.
 
Shambhala. I had never done a B&M hyper before and I thought it looked a bit slow and forceless. Obviously I was completely wrong.

Wodan. It had really average reviews but I thought it was the best coaster at Europa.

Flight Of The Pterosaur. I always thought the standard Vekoma SFC model looked excruciatingly dull but actually I really enjoyed it.
 
The bobsled at Parc Asterix immediately springs to my mind - I'd completely forgotten it existed when I went but it really packed a punch!

Also Baco - which I expected to murder me based on accounts prior to my visit. It was a little rattly. I actually really liked it.
 
Griffon. I wasn't expecting the ride to be as fun as it was. I always thought dive coasters looked like dull, one-trick ponies until I actually rode one. The drop was damn good, and the sensation of flight has yet to be matched by another coaster for me (and I've ridden wing coasters and flying coasters).
 
Quite a few actually.
Hydra springs to mind as I heard it was pretty rubbish and the Jojo gimmick was the only decent thing but I thought it was a solid ride, not earth shattering but not as awful as I heard.
Silver Star as well, everyone was hating on it saying it was the worst hyper and trimmed to death, I rode it and it was blissfully fab, and went straight into my top 10.
Roller Coaster at Great Yarmouth, wasn't expecting anything really but was pleasantly surprised at the airtime and fun factor.

Few other random rides I didn't expect to be decent but we're good fun but the above 3 stand out.
 
Hollywood Rip Ride and Rockit.

This thing is insanely good even without the musical gimmick. I've only ever heard people chastising this ride for being rough and painful but I thought it was really fun and unique ride.
 
I thought the look of Timber Drop/Mumbo Jumbo was going to be a painful ride, but came off loving them!

Went to Parc Asterix and was really excited for Zues as I had only heard good things. I only rode it once in pretty bad rain and came off thinking it was the worst coaster in the park.

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Silver Star - I'd heard nothing but crap about it (admittedly from people who'd all ridden it at the same time and it was apparently trimmed to s**t), but I loved it. It's one of my favourite hypers.

Viper (SFGAm) - I was expecting just a filler attraction, but it's the best thing in the park after Goliath.

Hades 360 - I don't think I've ever heard any love for this thing, especially since adding the inversion, but I thought it was great. It is really, really aggressive though, probably the most physically demanding coaster I've done after X2/Dinoconda
 
Tennessee Tornado: I absolutely loved it. The banking in the loop is hilarious, and it's quite intense. Wish it was longer like they originally designed. If it were, it'd be top ten.

Firechaser Express: just a fun little ride, more parka need this

Maverick: yes it's known as one of the best coasters out there, but CP fanboys say the same about Millennium Force, but holy **** it's amazing. The amount of airtime, variance of elements, is just fantastic.

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Steel Eel- Thought it was going to be pretty terrible, but I actually really really enjoyed it. Thought it had some pretty awesome ejector air. Don't judge me.

Batman the Ride (SFFT)- Thought this was going to be a pointless, painful ride, but it was actually a huge surprise and I thought it was so much fun.

Thunderation- Best mine train I have ever been on.

Legend- Heard bad things about it before I rode it, but they had just recently retracked it so it rode great.

Firehawk- It's a Vekoma, so obviously I didn't have high hopes for this one. Wow it was really fun actually. B&M flyers are still better.
 
tomahawk said:
Tennessee Tornado: I absolutely loved it. The banking in the loop is hilarious, and it's quite intense. Wish it was longer like they originally designed. If it were, it'd be top ten.

Firechaser Express: just a fun little ride, more parka need this

Maverick: yes it's known as one of the best coasters out there, but CP fanboys say the same about Millennium Force, but holy **** it's amazing. The amount of airtime, variance of elements, is just fantastic.
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These are three excellent candidates. Especially Tennessee Tornado - amazing that it was built by Arrow.

Some other surprise hits:

- Storm Chaser at Kentucky Kingdom: I have ridden a number of other outstanding RMCs, and felt well-prepped for this ride. For some reason however, this one felt different, especially given its smaller size and unique melding of the Twisted Twins footprint. I was really impressed with the rides and rerides on this one.

- Thunderhead at Dollywood: This was my first GCI, and was totally blown away with the Timberliner trains and non-PTCness of the coaster. :p

- Green Lantern at SFMM: I had heard mediocre reviews of Intamin Zacspins to this point, but wow! What a ride! I loved the pops of strong airtime and pacing of this quirky design.
 
Could somebody in the know shed some light on how Tennessee Tornado was originally meant to have been? I didn't know it was designed to be longer!

As for this topic, I'd say Desert Race at HP was surprisingly smooth and gave some airtime. I also quite enjoy Th13teen however the theming and second half let it down for me.
 
Hyde said:
- Thunderhead at Dollywood: This was my first GCI, and was totally blown away with the Timberliner trains and non-PTCness of the coaster. :p
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Erm. What? Do you mean Millennium Flyer trains? ;)

Twister at Grona Lund totally blew me away with how much it packs in in such a tiny footprint.
 
Ethan said:
Could somebody in the know shed some light on how Tennessee Tornado was originally meant to have been? I didn't know it was designed to be longer!

As for this topic, I'd say Desert Race at HP was surprisingly smooth and gave some airtime. I also quite enjoy Th13teen however the theming and second half let it down for me.
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When it does the overbank thing toward station, it was actually supposed to go farther back into the hills, but due to budget reasons, it had to make a return back. It was significantly more than they were expecting it to be when building so they had to scale back.

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The Ultimate- If you look at photographs of it you'd think it's pretty tame, but oh my word it's aggressive but amazing at the same time.

Dragon Khan as well, so good, especially at night.
 
tomahawk said:
Ethan said:
Could somebody in the know shed some light on how Tennessee Tornado was originally meant to have been? I didn't know it was designed to be longer!

As for this topic, I'd say Desert Race at HP was surprisingly smooth and gave some airtime. I also quite enjoy Th13teen however the theming and second half let it down for me.
Click to expand...
When it does the overbank thing toward station, it was actually supposed to go farther back into the hills, but due to budget reasons, it had to make a return back. It was significantly more than they were expecting it to be when building so they had to scale back.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G920A using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

Ah thank you! Wonder what more it could have done, I assume some corkscrews and the like.
 
The top 10 park topic has reminded me that I had rather poor expectations for Steel Dragon 2000. I'd been on Steel Force and thought it was poo with hardly any airtime. I'd also done Steel Eel, which I secretly quite like but which is brutal. I was expecting SD 2000 to have no airtime or to be so painful on the spine that it detracted from the ride.

First ride, I was blown away. So much airtime, especially in the glorious final bunny hops.

Are there any other good Morgans out there I'm missing?
 
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