News Project 2026: NightFlight Expedition (Mack Rocking Boat Dark Ride)

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themeparktribune said:
The Kingda Ka rumors were specific and had substance, i.e. "The ride is going to close at the end of the season." There was definitive, clear information being conveyed in those rumors that could not just be an educated guess.

The claim above was vague, lacked any substantive, definitive claim, and smells like an attempt at an educated guess. "I know from reliable sourcing that there is a decent chance at this point that the ride ends up slipping into being a 2027 opening. Nothing is known for sure and it's still hoped to be a 2026 opening but there is an interal date listed that If they can't open by they will move it. Delays on the project are astronomical right now."

Blather on all you want about protecting sources -- since I'm an actual journalist in my day job, I don't need the lecture from amateurs who can't spell -- but there's no useful, specific information here to protect.
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You're a journalist yet you completly glossed the reasons why sources a lot of times arn't mentioned. 🤣 Eltororyan and colliwood had their insider stuff on Ka closing and didn't name them despite the deniers wanting proof and were in denial.

P.S not caring enough to spell on a theme park forum has 0 purpose to my knowledge/smartness in daily life. I run a professional company and gladly will use my spelling/grammar when it deems necessary, but go on chief
 
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MrBradferd said:
You're a journalist yet you completly glossed the reasons why sources a lot of times arn't mentioned. 🤣 Eltororyan and colliwood had their insider stuff on Ka closing and didn't name them despite the deniers wanting proof and were in denial.
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What are you even talking about? None of this has to do with identifying sources, it's about how the earlier post offered nothing of substance that couldn't have just been an educated guess by anyone paying attention to the construction progress.

This is a continuing problem within the theme park/coaster communities. People claiming to have some insider info and all it is vague guessing like "maybe this ride will be delayed if they don't have it done by some internal date that I won't mention, but no one knows for sure, says my source."
 
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themeparktribune said:
What are you even talking about? None of this has to do with identifying sources, it's about how the earlier post offered nothing of substance that couldn't have just been an educated guess by anyone paying attention to the construction progress.

This is a continuing problem within the theme park/coaster communities. People claiming to have some insider info and all it is vague guessing like "maybe this ride will be delayed if they don't have it done by some internal date that I won't mention, but no one knows for sure, says my source."
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Not all of us need/care to put a in depth coherent sentence just to say a ride looks like it's going to be delayed. Especially if we already know that said person has a decent track record of being right
 
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For what it's worth, I think it's good that people just post what they're hearing through the grapevine here. I think that's a strength of spaces like this, not a weakness. If anyone reads a single claim by a single person on ParkFans and takes it as gospel, I think that's a condemnation of the reader's ability to navigate an open, public discussion space, not a failure of the platform in allowing the claim to be posted. If someone can't navigate conversations with strangers with even just an absolute bare minimum level of skepticism, that person is lost to reason whether it's on ParkFans, on Facebook, or in a queue for a coaster at their local park.

I'm a big advocate of journalistic standards in this industry and think @themeparktribune is consistently one of the few outlets who actually takes such things seriously in this space. I just also think that the bar for reporting on something via an outlet like @themeparktribune's and the bar for someone sharing a rumor they've heard on a discussion board are two very, very different things.

That being said, that's just my opinion and I do think there is a super interesting meta discussion to be had here about how evidence-free claims should be handled on a discussion board like this. If people want to have that meta discussion, start a thread in the ParkFans node and I'll happily engage.
 
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I still think its very possible that this ride will open in 2026, just so they keep up the promise to passholders on some level, but its likely to be around late summer or early fall. The ride is indoors and intended to operate year round, even if it's a water ride. It is definitely not going to open for at least another few months though.
 
For an indoor darkride at a seasonal park to not even have its track complete or building enclosed by mid-May of its planned opening year, I'd say things have to have gone very sideways. Feels very reasonable for Dollywood to push this off to next year if you ask me.
 
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Dollywood have seemingly abandoned the possibility of this being a spring opening, but they're still advertising this as a 2026 project. Also according to this post, the final pieces of track have been installed.

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themeparktribune said:
Accusations of using AI art get thrown around a lot nowadays, and in this case, there's no way to even attempt to verify it until any of us see the finished product.
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If I remember correctly everyone was clowning “the Daredeviler” art for being ai and the park had to come out and verify that it was done by an actual artist.
 
ThoosieTube said:
If I remember correctly everyone was clowning “the Daredeviler” art for being ai and the park had to come out and verify that it was done by an actual artist.
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Yeah, and despite that, I would bet VERY good money that the artist and/or the park lied and AI was, in fact, used. Way too many telltale signs of AI use to ignore in my opinion. I genuinely cannot explain the Daredeviler piece WITHOUT believing AI was used. If someone is buying what Canada's Wonderland is selling, I'm happy to make my case more completely in the Daredeviler thread.

Zooming out a bit from the incredibly sloppy Daredeviler situation, I do believe we're currently staring down the barrel of a universe now where the truth is likely to become truly unknowable re: the origins of artwork like this. Without parks citing specific artists with positive public reputations for not using AI or without a literal camera pointed at the artist as they produce the entirety of a piece, we are on the verge of having no way of assessing what pieces are or are not likely AI generated—and, of course, the parks will benefit from this impending unknowability massively. Expect every player in the industry to jump far, far down this hole very, very quickly. Feel free to bookmark this post—5 years from now I expect the vast majority of visual art produced for parks to involve very significant AI use. We simply will have no option but to accept that reality, in my expectation.

I'm, sadly, very doomer on this topic. Happy if I'm proven wrong, but we're entering dark, dark days re: jobs in the visual arts if you ask me.
 
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Zachary said:
Yeah, and despite that, I would bet VERY good money that the artist and/or the park lied and AI was, in fact, used. Way too many telltale signs of AI use to ignore in my opinion. I genuinely cannot explain the Daredeviler piece WITHOUT believing AI was used. If someone is buying what Canada's Wonderland is selling, I'm happy to make my case more completely in the Daredeviler thread.

Zooming out a bit from the incredibly sloppy Daredeviler situation, I do believe we're currently staring down the barrel of a universe now where the truth is likely to become truly unknowable re: the origins of artwork like this. Without parks citing specific artists with positive public reputations for not using AI or without a literal camera pointed at the artist as they produce the entirety of a piece, we are on the verge of having no way of assessing what pieces are or are not likely AI generated—and, of course, the parks will benefit from this impending unknowability massively. Expect every player in the industry to jump far, far down this hole very, very quickly. Feel free to bookmark this post—5 years from now I expect the vast majority of visual art produced for parks to involve very significant AI use. We simply will have no option but to accept that reality, in my expectation.

I'm, sadly, very doomer on this topic. Happy if I'm proven wrong, but we're entering dark, dark days re: jobs in the visual arts if you ask me.
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I think the counterpoint here (SIL is a graphic designer, wife as a BA in Graphic Design and we all talk about this a lot lately) is graphic artists have always made mistakes, and now people are going over everything with such a fine tooth comb to discredit at the people who do this work leave. (Note not defending use of BAD ai creations)

Makes me think of this years old Target ad snafu:

I’ll try to find the video, but there’s a YouTube guy who goes by “The Sketch Monkey” who does design with cars and he had one where he briefly touched on the subject and talked about how an artists confusing slightly the light source, trying to flip an image (to mirror), or resizing, and being just off can create a visual who people will think are AI. He had a good idea where there should be a regulation that makes AI put in some sort of “hidden” watermark that cannot be removed or “covered” by any other editing program so you can spot it.

Like you said, the challenge is unless employers start hiring people to film and put out videos proving it wasn’t AI, people will be very skeptical, even if you don’t see AI trademark mistakes. But that becomes more steps and expense to do. So some companies might decide that if you are going to think that anyways might as well save more money and just do AI art anyways.

Heck that doesn’t even get into the unethical potential of companies that offer graphic design then just do something AI to pump out huge numbers of art while claiming people are doing it.

I really think that’s the full on AI challenge facing the world as it gets used more, right? Easy to accuse someone of what they worked hard on being AI, impossible to defend it wasn’t when you really didn’t use it.
 
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Lck630! said:
I’m glad they delayed it instead of rushing bc it’s very ambitious of Dollywood to be making this ride in the first place but August will be here in no time
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Looking at the progress, August seems mighty ambitious. They were unloading theming elements yesterday. Good news is that a lot of scaffolding has been removed from the building, but the bad news is construction continues. Pair that with the required testing phase, and Labor Day weekend seems like a more reasonable expectation. (Though even that seems optimistic). They'll likely join its opening with their 2027 season pass sales.
 
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