CedarPoint6
Hyper Poster
My first visit to Six Flags Qiddiya came as part of their industry previews where they’re inviting partner companies’ employees to come experience the park. It’s limited attendance with limited attractions—16 of the 28 were available during this visit but others were testing throughout including the Mack water coaster, the flume, the Maurer spike, and the giant S&S tower. Because the park is at the back of Qiddiya’s lower plateau, the site is surrounded by construction. A remote parking lot is currently available for guests with busses that take everyone to the park. Offloading is actually happening on the future F1 circuit—which was a fun feature I didn’t realize initially. Escalators go up to the park itself. The entrance is a great visual with all the big ride spread out in front of you. The walkway to the ‘central citadel’ is fun—winding through rockwork with peaks at the flume and Maurer combo and other rides. You can heat the S&S from pretty much anywhere. The central courtyard is covered by a giant white canopy which has projection mapping for a nighttime show. It’s somewhat plain otherwise but there are themed buildings around the main plaza. 6 areas branch off from this, all interconnected and leading back. It’s easy to get around—wide pathways with a mix of decent theming. Some areas are more heavily themed than others, though none are going to reach Disney, Universal, or Miral type levels. Think of it as an upper tier SF/CF park. Here’s a selection of thoughts on the rides I did:
Iron Rattler:
The easy star of the show among what was open on my visit. Only Falcon’s could conceivably beat it here, I think. What an incredible ride. This is my first tilt and might as well jump in with the biggest. The feeling of the tilt is so strange, especially in the back, but the seat and restraint is comfortable throughout. The drop is huge—so much straight track with amazing floater. To me it beats every dive coaster when it comes to drop. Amazing floater and an incredible view. The rest of the layout is good fun as well. Excellent hangtime on the immelman, strong airtime throughout, great double roll inversion, and the diving barrel roll has got to be one of my favorite elements. It’s fast, smooth, and snappy, but easily repeatable. The trains light up and have gorgeous theming in general. And there’s a bit of interaction—one of the few coasters to actually do that at the park. From an operational standpoint, this ride probably had the fastest dispatches, though that’s still slow overall. But it’s important to remember this is why soft openings exist.
Colossus:
This is very much an un-GCI GCI. Using the Infinity Flyers, the negative forces can go much higher and indeed they do. The airtime feels more like an RMC in places along with the typical GCI cornering. It’s easily the most intense of their coasters though it’s definitely hurt by the trains, which are fairly tight with a seatbelt that sticks into your side. I was thankful to fit as apparently they’ve had quite a few rejections. I like the theme of this one which has kind of a retro aircraft vibe with a 1920s art deco type appearance in the station. It doesn’t really fit with anything around it, but in the queue and station is a nice feel. The biggest complaint is that this gorgeous ride just isn’t visible from the guest path. The best place to view it is the exit path. Otherwise, the ride is blocked by buildings and the Zamperla gyro swing. It’s kind of hard to tell what the entrance is even for if you don’t know what the ride is called. Definitely some things the team will want to look into as time goes on. Is it my favorite GCI? Hard to say because it feels so un-like a GCI. I think I still prefer Mystic and Thunderhead, but it’s very tough to compare.
Adrena-Line:
I love a good SFC and this is definitely one of the better ones. It’s got a great drop and some snappy corners and feels more like an adult coaster in some places. The overbank is always a cool element and there’s a surprise finale with a dive into a tunnel to end the ride. The trains are typical to the SFC’s… deep, yet comfortable and makes the whole experience very good. Unfortunately sight lines are once again impacted here with a super tall ride restricted fence blocking the main view—a bit more water and this could be lowered to create a great presentation. The queue itself runs right down the middle of the layout and is super interacted, but followed on either side by a very prison-like fence, part for ride restrictedness and part to prevent queue jumping from the path I assume. It again limits the sightlines of an otherwise very pretty coaster. This is probably my favorite SFC layout.
Twilight Express:
This is the Vekoma Horus layout, which effectively replaces the popular 207m junior. It’s a great family coaster with the super accommodating trains and will be sure to be popular with families. I got asked 3 separate times if I had heart or back problems before riding—I guess my health is being looked after!
Dark Rides:
There are 2 dark rides in the park—the first is The Enchanted Greenhouse, an ETF/Alterface trackless system where you go through a garden to “spray dew” on the magical plants to make them grow and transform. In one section of the ride there’s a separate vehicle purely for scenic, which is a cool element to the experience. It’s generally on the shorter side, but the queue is themed very nicely. The second is called Into the Deep as a Triotech/ART combo with 2 vehicles of 4 across seating that’s quite comfortable. They can spin and actuate forwards and backwards and the ride itself was pretty good though fairly unrefined in terms of transitions from screens to scenic and sometimes nothing in particular. Both rides struggled on stacking up vehicles because the throughput wasn’t quick enough, but hopefully this will improve with time.
More thoughts:
There’s obviously a lot more of the park to open, with many rides still to come. It’s a good collection in general and will continue to feel more complete. There’s lots of food and beverage options and the food I had was very good and reasonably priced. There is SO MUCH merchandise. More that I’d ever expected (including shot glasses which I found odd). The biggest issue with the park is overall master planning and sightlines. I mentioned some of this above, but multiple rides are hidden from guests and not very well integrated to the guest paths—there’s path features the block views, and some of the entrances barely line up with the ride itself. Falcon’s station seems very understated for what it is. And you can’t even get close to that ride in general because it’s almost all back of house. With some fairly simple changes, I think the park could have fixed this, but some of those are far too late at this point. Hopefully future expansions will open up sight lines.
Operations will be a struggle for a little while—there’s great progress being made, but the US or European hurried, regimented approach of loading doesn’t really exist here, both from the operators and from the local populace. It’s best described as unhurried, and is not really seen as an issue from a guest perspective, but western visitors will surely notice it. I think efforts are being made to improve this, but for now the park is definitely a fastpass park. This is not really any different from how things are the UAE also, so it shouldn't be a huge surprise- but UAE has had a few years to work on it. Give Qididya the same and it'll be much improved. Leadership definitely knows what they're doing.
I’m excited to see more of the rides and the park open up and the little adjustments and fixes continue to come in. The 12/31 opening does feel a bit premature, but checks the mandated 2025 opening box. They’ll be in good shape at least, but it will also only improve with time and experience. I’m very much looking forward to my next visit-- the park is really nice, the employees were super friendly, and the team has done a very good job getting it ready to go. I'm very thankful for my opportunity to visit this week.
All my photos are here:
Six Flags Qiddiya City 2025 (Riyadh) - Brian Andrelczyk
Saudi Arabia's newest and biggest theme park. The park officially opens 12/31/2025 and is in previews during December 2025.
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