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I’m really not sure who this is going to cater for. The extreme fans will never be satisfied unless they can converse with the actors freely in all sorts of obscure lore, which I doubt will happen. Lesser fans will not be willing to buy in at the high price.

I also presume that this is set in the realm of the first order. You know, the time period nobody cares about.

Hard pass.
 
I hate it.

When the concept art popped up a while ago, the hotel looked cool from a theming perspective, and could be worth a premium Disney hotel price (not the price they're going with), but all the forced fun looks extremely tiresome.
 
I'm a huge Star Wars fan going all the way back to '77. Disney Star Wars has gone out of their way to alienate the long time fans to the point that many have simply walked away. Had it been themed to the original trilogy or even the Mandalorian time period, I would consider it. This experience is only targeted at the "new" fans who like the sequel trilogy. It will be a hard pass for me.
 
As an old fan that likes the new sequels and the prequels, I would 100% be fanboying my way round every activity! If it wasn't 4 grand.
 
When I posted the pricing details I hadn't yet seen the hotel room you get for $1200 pppn, but it was in the link that @Matt N provided.

I mean - look at it! Positively pisspoor for the money. I'd honestly prefer a half decent Super 8 motel to this tiny cubicle...

Passenger-cabin-at-Star-Wars-Galactic-Starcruiser-1024x683-1.jpeg
 
I can’t put my finger on why, but it reminds me a bit of Thorpe’s Thorpe Shark Cabins… that’s not a criticism, however, and it looks very well themed!
 
FarleyFlavors said:
When I posted the pricing details I hadn't yet seen the hotel room you get for $1200 pppn, but it was in the link that @Matt N provided.

I mean - look at it! Positively pisspoor for the money. I'd honestly prefer a half decent Super 8 motel to this tiny cubicle...

Passenger-cabin-at-Star-Wars-Galactic-Starcruiser-1024x683-1.jpeg
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This looks like it was designed by somebody who's heard of Star Wars and knows the general idea, but has never actually seen the films.
 
The whole concept just seems like a claustrophobic hell from start to finish? Reminds me of that conversation we were having a few weeks back about immersion - when does the idea of immersion overtake, y'know, comfort and things actually being fun/good? Every image whether it be sneak peeks or concept art of this whole thing just looks beyond dystopian. And I once again maintain that I don't know about everyone else, but when I'm on holiday I cba to actually DO stuff and 'get involved', play a character and all that bollocks. I want you to perform for me and I will watch and enjoy. Stop making me work to become 'part of the story', I'm perfectly happy being a fairly passive partaker in the action. I'm so tired.

Seriously...do families/people actually want this? Or am I just really lazy and cynical? You get what I mean, I'm happy to walk through a world and interact with stuff a la Potter and Nintendo, but I don't want to have to play a character and earn things. Overall I just think Universal do this stuff way better because they don't get bogged down in the immersion trap and seem to understand where to draw the line.
 
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nadroJ said:
The whole concept just seems like a claustrophobic hell from start to finish? Reminds me of that conversation we were having a few weeks back about immersion - when does the idea of immersion overtake, y'know, comfort and things actually being fun/good? Every image whether it be sneak peeks or concept art of this whole thing just looks beyond dystopian. And I once again maintain that I don't know about everyone else, but when I'm on holiday I cba to actually DO stuff and 'get involved', play a character and all that bollocks. I want you to perform for me and I will watch and enjoy. Stop making me work to become 'part of the story', I'm perfectly happy being a fairly passive partaker in the action. I'm so tired.

Seriously...do families/people actually want this? Or am I just really lazy and cynical? You get what I mean, I'm happy to walk through a world and interact with stuff a la Potter and Nintendo, but I don't want to have to play a character and earn things. Overall I just think Universal do this stuff way better because they don't get bogged down in the immersion trap and seem to understand where to draw the line.
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From a personal perspective, I definitely hear you. As someone who doesn’t like forced participation at all (in one of those attractions where the cast member is asking for volunteers from the audience, I’m the one cowering at the back thinking “please don’t pick me”), this doesn’t appeal to me in the slightest.

I certainly agree with you in thinking that I’d much prefer to participate in an attraction in a more passive way; I prefer attractions that let you just sit back and relax while they whisk you along on their adventure without you needing to play much of an active role. I do quite like things like interactive dark rides when they’re done well, but on the whole, active participation is not something I especially enjoy in theme parks. I apologise if that makes me sound boring, but I’ve never been into the active participation stuff, personally. In particular, after a long day at a theme park, I’d rather just relax and get on with writing my trip report from the day, or update my Captain Coaster rankings, or whatever you do after a theme park day, as opposed to wanting to do all these activities and all this “Story Moment” stuff. Especially considering the price point they’re selling it at, this doesn’t really sound like my cup of tea at all.

However, the thing to remember is that for every person out there like you and me who prefers to experience attractions more passively, there is a person out there who relishes this kind of thing. Admittedly, I think the market for this particular experience might be quite niche, but I think it’s certainly a sizeable niche that would happily pay this kind of money for a fully immersive Star Wars experience. And to be honest, I think stuff like this is probably the way theme parks are headed, as much as it doesn’t appeal to me. It’s worth remembering that we live in an era where theme parks are competing for people’s leisure time with things like escape rooms and such, where you have a more active role. I dare say theme parks are even competing with forms of home entertainment, like video games; again, video games let you take on an active role. So for theme parks to keep up with this competition, they ultimately need to give their guests an active role in the experience, hence why we’ve seen things like interactive dark rides increase in popularity, as well as things like Smuggler’s Run effectively being built to be like a giant video game.

I think the type of experience this hotel is offering will be quite marmite, but there are certainly people out there who this will appeal strongly to. Admittedly, I’m not entirely sure who (other than die-hard Star Wars fans, I’m struggling for a particular demographic), but there will be people out there who will love this sort of thing.
 
I think that’s kind of what my post was getting at - to me this feels **really** niche, to the point where I find it hard to believe there’s mass appeal for such an experience?

I’m sure I’ll be proved wrong, I don’t think Disney would do all this without having the research to back it up, I just find it hard to believe (not just because I personally wouldn’t like it, but because there’s tons of people with kids I know who are big into Star Wars who are just like lol no at this. I’m yet to talk to anybody who seems genuinely excited at the concept, enough so to cough up the price tag).
 
nadroJ said:
I think that’s kind of what my post was getting at - to me this feels **really** niche, to the point where I find it hard to believe there’s mass appeal for such an experience?

I’m sure I’ll be proved wrong, I don’t think Disney would do all this without having the research to back it up, I just find it hard to believe (not just because I personally wouldn’t like it, but because there’s tons of people with kids I know who are big into Star Wars who are just like lol no at this. I’m yet to talk to anybody who seems genuinely excited at the concept, enough so to cough up the price tag).
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I don't think they're aiming for mass appeal or for big Star Wars fans, to be honest. At a minimum price of $750 per person per night, it doesn't take much patronage to run a surplus. I suspect they started in the other end, by estimating how many people there are out there with so much cash to burn it makes no difference whether they pay $2000 for two nights in a hotel on property, or $6000 for this "experience". The type of people who go on holiday with a budget of a million and already buy the platinum passes and the tour guide and the whatnot. After all, Disney World is a pretty common holiday destination for the super-rich, so this sort of spending isn't really uncommon for the place. My cousin worked as a waiter there for three years, and he had many chats with customers who came to the parks for three weeks every year. The Mouse might just have figured that even if they can only sell this to one percent of the richest one percent of the people who visit the resort, they'll still have an attendance of 6000 persons per year. At the prices they're asking, that should be enough for it to run a surplus.
 
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