I was browsing the ACN (America Coasters Network) forums today and came across a thread about the best Six Flags park. Normally I do not reference other forums, but I felt you guys might be interested in how others view our park since most of us are usually biased towards our homepark .... This review was posted by the administrator. He reviewed six other Six Flags parks... ours scored a 49/50, the second highest was a 42/50.
Six Flags Great America Coaster Collection:WOW is all I haveto say. Coaster for coaster I don't think any park has a better collection! While rides like S:UF and American Eagle were painfully average, they were far from "bad". Demon is superior to most arrow loopers in smoothness and forces. Ragign Bull was overbraked like crazy, but still a damn good ride. I can only imagine how good it'd be without the damn trims brakes all over it! I lvoed Iron Wolf despite the roughness. Damn that ride packs a punch! B:TR was nice as usual, better theming than most of em. And lastly theres the parks crowning achievement- VIPER! What an amazing wooden coaster! Beats the hell out of most woodies in means of smoothness, airtime and forces! Whizzer was cool too, totally different than what I expected. V:2 was- well... V:2! Luckily Deha Boo was closed so it doesnt count against them in my book. 9 out of 10
Thrill Rides: They've got this category nailed too! Tons of fun and well themed flats all over the park! And I visited before the massive flat ride upgrade that took palce last season! 8 out of 8
Family Rides: Thier Loooney Tunes was superb, as were the water rides. 8 out of 8
Landscaping/General Upkeep: I couldn't belive I was at a SF park! Everything was painted and the midways were clean. The queues were trash free and the landscaping was amazing. SFGAm is by far the best kept up and landscaped SF park I've ever been to. 8 out of 8
Park ops/capacity: I got alot of "have a nice day" and "enjoy your ride", something you don't normally see at a SF park. Thier food service was nice too, we actually ATE at a SF park! (something I never do). Mooseburger was tasty... and it wasnt shut down for Roaches like SFMM's Mooseburger was. 8 out of 8
General Atmosphere: Yeah, the park felt like a DIsney park! Nice employees all over, the clientelle was fine and the atmosphere was just aamzing for an SF park! 8 out of 8
Total score: Grade A+ 49 out of 50 (98%)
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The verdict SFGAm is just a damn near perfect park, so it obviously gets my vote! Honorable mentiones go to SFNE and SFA. Bottom of the barrel go to SFMM and SFGAdv. WoA and MW are in the middle. Heres my ranking of all of em-
Overall Park Rating- 1. SFGAm (Amazing park, a model for the industry!) 2. SFNE (Consistantly getting better, once they bring in another big coaster it'll be a complete park). 3. SFA (Ok, thier coasters are bad ass, and the park itself is decent all around, I bumped it up 2 spots since I really do think SFA is better than WoA and MW reguardless of my stupid formula!) 4. SFWoA (Meh, SF dumped too much money into it without upgrading the simple things, and they paid for it dearly. 5. SFMW (Sadly I'd cosider the park in better shapce right after Medusa opened compared to today). 6. SFGAdv (Lots of average coasters, half the park was closed and the clientelle is downright nasty!) 7. SFMM (My worthless POS homepark...)
Ok... Finally done!
His reviews of the other parks are available at the link below and many others also offered their opinions: ACN Forums -> Best Six Flags Park
Here are some more:
Six Flags Great America
Last but certainly not least my home park and the best park that I have been to and apparently thought of as the best by more then just me. I have had a Six Flags season pass since 1993 when I was 4 and been to the park at least 7 times every year since I can remember. It is a shock if you go to the entrance and on the may not be operating list see more then 2 rides, and if you see a coaster on there you might need glasses thats how rare it is(Deja Vu naturally does not count as a coaster because it isn't one ). 2 train ops are EXPECTED here unlike some parks. 95% of the time all rides run the full amount of trains except for Demon which only runs a 3rd train on very crowded days, usually from June on you will see 3 train op on Raging Bull unless it isn't nessecary. The thrill rides are top notch Gaint Drop, King Chaos, and Revolution are among my top picks to ride. The childrens areas are both fairly new being updated in 1998 and they are fun which I would know from personal experience because I was still able to go in them in 1998 because I was 10 and over 54" but my brother was only 6, I loved Looney Tunes Lodge, I used to litteraly stay in there for 3 hours at a time . The food is great, I always eat in the park, the only complaint I have with the park is.......yeah I don't have a valid complaint except I live so damn far from the park a whole 30 minutes so I think that sums it up A+.
My order 1. Six Flags Great America 2. Six Flags Over Georgia 3. Six Flags Magic Mountain* 4. Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom 5. Six Flags Fiesta Texas**
1st. Six Flags Great America. (Based on visits 1998-2004)
Great America easily wins this. All of their rides are run at capacity during peak season, and even in May and October, they make sure, to the best of their ability that the main rides are still run efficiently. The park is very well kept (now if they would just paint American Eagle) I rarely see excessive garbage on the midways. The rides are well maintained, even Deja Vu had a significant increase in uptime.
I found these interesting... nobody had anything negative to say about our park and it is just nice to see what others think that are not all from Illinois. Post your comments!
I would agree that SFGAM is the best SF park that i have visited and i when you read reports it seems to be the best of the bunch.
As for feeling like a disney park, there is no comparsion at all between SFGAM and disney parks of Universal Studio parks.
SFGAM has done a good job, but needs major improvements to get up to the quality of PKI or BGW before even being compared to the major world class theme parks .
How does SFGAm need major improvements to get up to PKI? As far as I am concerned, both parks are on even ground especially now that we have a waterpark which will be included with admission.
PKI has it right with the kid's area, heck they have it better then any other park I have been to.
SFGAm has the better coaster selection. PKI's coasters while fun just aren't as good as SFGAm.
I finally retired the Sarah Palin signature because she is now 100% irrelevant.
That's awesome to see!! I've only been to 2 Six Flags parks and Great America has way more rides. From looking at http://www.sixflags.com and looking at the other parks sure some of the others has a awesome looking ride here or there but we seem to have a huge collection of awesome rides! I'm proud to call SFGAM my home park
I wouldn't have minded the first article if the author bothered to run some spell check on it!!! I hate reading crap that doesn't use proper english that is spelled right... especially ride names. In any case... yea SFGA is a great park. Makes me afraid to go to others for fear of being disappointed
I've only been to two Six Flags parks, Great America and Over Georgia. I was really impressed with SFOG, but when it comes to capacity, ride options(especially flats), and customer service... Great America wins hands down.
Chi-town-PK's kid area's are AWESOME for kids!!!!! SFGAM cant compete at all compared to what PKI offers for kids and they also offer a family type dark ride. And when one has a family this is a mjor deal!!! And spongebob/rug rats etc are more beloved by kids and the spnogebob 3d is alot better than the joke that space shuttle america has become. Also no scam system where guests are encouraged to spend extra money to skip ahead in lines on rides that arent run at full capacity.
I will have to wait and see SFGAM's water park too see how it compares to PKI's and if the comparsion is good or not.
I find the food to be much better at PKI and while i think the employee's at both parks are similiar i find PKI to have a much better atmosphere. I find SFGAM to be more of a baby sitte for foul mouthed teenagers than i find at PKI which detracts from my enjoyment of the park.
SFGAM does have a much better roller coaster selection, but to me a park is alot of different things and roller coasters isnt always the be all/end all.
I think SFGAM has improved alot over the past few years but needs improvements.
Increase the quality of the food and lower the prices you pay for it. Get rid of the scam pay to skip the lines and offer it all to everyone like disney or get rid of it. Put in a family dark ride and improve the kids area's they do have, and if you are going to have crawl thru area's have the whole thing open and in total repair so its not blocked off due to not enough employee's or ther net is ripped and not repaired for months/weeks at a time.
And if you are going to allow your parks to be used as baby sitters due to cheap season passes then you need to properly supervise them and immediately kick out people use skip lines or use profane language.
My aunt lives in maryland like five inutes from Sixflags America and she is always there with her kids and when she came out here again she was talking about how she used to go when it was mariots great america, so i said lets go now.. so you can how much it has changed. Once we got there she was so suprized to see how much had stayed the same, and how much had changed. She kept saying it was soooo much nicer than her home park and she wishes her park was this nice. Its soooo clean is all i heard from her. So i guess we do have a really nice park. I never really thought about it untill i went down to sixflags st. louis last year. I realized how lucky we are to have such an awsome selection of rides and stuff. Although i do have to say that st. louis' park is about a gajillion times nicer to look at.
---------2006--------- Raptor Crew Wicked Twister Crew ---------2007--------- Maverick Crew Mantis Crew Cad Cars Team Lead
^ And that is a shame. Sure, Sfgam is not the world's best, but is does diseverve more attention than it diserves. I somewhat blame this on SF advertising. Why are they putting Sfkk ads in the Indianapolis market against big names like Cedar Point and King's Island, and quite good regional parks like Indiana Beach and Holiday World. Indianapolis is the 12th largest city in America, and it is in the center of Indiana, so the channels are recived in many parts of the state, so why are they not advertising! This is my personal complaint, and proabably many of you don't care.
Well, I don't know if I agree with the admin's ratings but whatever. I think SFGAm is a very well rounded park. With the addition of the water park we really have a little of everything for everyone. I know I can still spend over an hour in Looney Tunes Lodge (when they let me in) shooting balls at aggravated parents. Theme parks are all about having fun, and SFGAm gives you a very good chance to do that.
Top 5 wood-5-Goliath 4-Ravine Flyer II 3-Phoenix 2-Voyage 1-El Toro Top 5 Steel- 5-Velocicoaster 4- Maverick 3- Fury 325 2-Steel Vengeance 1-X2 Coaster Count: 444
that's good to hear! Now maybe the park will get noticed by Discovery Channel or TLC and have a special during Thrills, Chills & Spills on OUR park, not SFMM or Cedar Point ('cause they get that all the time)...not to mention that Hurricane Harbor will help get SFGAm on TV....just a thought
DejaVu The Ride's comment is further supported by another quote on the ACN board:
And a coaster collection doesnt make the whole park, y'know? SFGAm has hardly any unique coasters yet they're the top rated SF park no matter who you ask. I mean only 3 of thier major coasters are actually unique.
Ive been going to six flags great america for about 10 years now, and up till about 2 years ago the park looked horrible , the upkeep and landscaping was poor and the security of out of control guests was not there, but these last 2 years have been a total turn around. I give these guys a lot of credit, the park has gone into a total turnaround for the best.
Not allowed to say what site im the administrator for due to forum rules!
I have been to a few parks, not many. I have been to IoA, USF, CP, SFGAm, and Adventure Dome in the last year, and after visiting them all, SFGAm gives the customer the best selection of rides in a certain amount of space. Basically, SFGAm is a small compact park that is filled with attractions for the whole family, and you dont have to walk very far to get from attractrion to attraction. While IoA has very good theming and good rides, SFGAm's rides are overall, better, however, the theming is another story. SFGAm needs to improve in that area. Also, the food at SFGAm is the best that I have had at any park thus far, the funnel cake sundaes are amazing.
I really can't agree with the guy's ratings for coasters. He complains about IW, D Vu' (which he doesn't call a rollercoaster), and RB brakes.
Are they the best selection out there? In my opinion, it really depends on your standards. If a park had blah, and blah, I would think that was the best selection. I do think that SFGAm does have a really good selection of rollercoasters, but not the best.
For flats, I don't agree that SFGAm has the "best" flats such as Revolution, and King Chaos. Compared to other SF parks that I've been to, SFGAm has the most flats which is an upside which increases our capacity. I think rides like Triple Play, East River Crawler, and Ricochet should definitely be at every SF park. Also, SFGAm has the good time restraint at the end of the day along with double trains on non-crowded days.
I guess the landscaping and other things he said are not the bad.
If in your description you write that there are some bad things (annoying at that), how can you give a place 49/50. That's a 98% for goodness sakes!!
"I've been staring at the world, waiting. All the trouble and all the pain we're facing. Too much light to be livin' in the dark. Why waste time? We only got one life. Together we can be the CHANGE. So go and let your heart burn bright"
SFGAM has everything, but what really makes it extrordinary is the scenery! I mean all of the water and trees are amazing! I think our park would be nothing without yankee harbor because the water under v2 really stands out!
In terms of SFGAm's coaster selection, they offer at least one of almost every type of coaster that exists. I mean, we have a kiddy, mid-sized, mouse, flyer, invert, launched, boomerang, stand-up, wood racer, wood twister, sitdown looper, and hyper. That is a very diverse collection, and the amount of flats we have is more than most other parks out there.
Now add on Hurricane Harbor, and our park's great service, cleanliness, and awesome operations/capacity, and you'll see why SFGAm is one of the better parks out there.
Yes, I do realize that SFGAm has something good, but SFGAm is not perfect. However, when compared to many other parks, it seems very, very good. I always like to point out other SF parks by there selection of rollercoasters/flats, and the thing is that SFGAm is very priviledged in the amount and the quality.
For instance, Elitch Gardens has a Flyer (according to rcdb) that only last 48 seconds. I know Vekoma is cheap (compared to other companies), but SF is plagued by this company. The Vekoma at Fiesta Texas (Jokers Revenge) has been "sitting" for a number of years. I can only wonder why?? Mind Eraser seems to be at a number of parks, and if this is anything like T2 (SFKK), no wonder why no one is flocking to some of these parks.
SFGAm has Intamin, Schrokchoft (Who knows how to spell it?), B&M, Arrow, Vekoma, and Revchron.
"I've been staring at the world, waiting. All the trouble and all the pain we're facing. Too much light to be livin' in the dark. Why waste time? We only got one life. Together we can be the CHANGE. So go and let your heart burn bright"
.... This review was posted by the administrator. He reviewed six other Six Flags parks... ours scored a 49/50, the second highest was a 42/50.
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