The New Revolution, What’s Old is New Again
The Great American Revolution roller coaster opened on May 8, 1976 at Magic Mountain in Valencia, California. For its time, it was a cutting edge, state of the art thrill ride that featured the world’s first vertical loop on a coaster. It was recognized for this feat by the American Coaster Enthusiasts who awarded the coaster its prestigious Coaster Landmark award, the placard for which is displayed proudly at the coaster’s entrance. Well, it’s a long time since 1976 and roller coasters have come a long way. A coaster that doesn’t twist and turn and do 18 loops with a 220 foot drop is quickly forgotten, until now. The Revolution has been reborn and re-purposed. What’s old is new again, and with the advancements of virtual reality The New Revolution has burst forth like a phoenix from the ashes of a coaster that has long lost its lustre. A bit dramatic, yes, but hey that’s what I’m supposed to do.
Since its debut, The Revolution has undergone a few face lifts in regards to its name, but nothing much further than that. When it opened it was named The Great American Revolution as a celebration of the United States Bicentennial, and the ride operators wore Continental Army styled uniforms. In 1979, when Six Flags officially purchased the park, they renamed the coaster to La Revolución as they celebrated the Mexican Revolution. Later, the ride was simply named The Revolution and as it aged, the line ups got shorter and shorter. On the brink of being torn down, the wonders of virtual reality were looked at as a way to make the coaster great again (just like America, but with 100% less douchebag Donald Trump), and suddenly the line ups were back on April 21, 2016.
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“What’s old is new again, and with the advancements of virtual reality The New Revolution has burst forth like a phoenix from the ashes of a coaster that has long lost its lustre.”
The ride has seen its fair share of fame over the years with its most notable screen time coming in National Lampoon’s Vacation, as the hapless Griswold family does a victory laop on the ‘Whipper Snapper’ while they hold amusement park security guard Russ Lasky (played by Canadian great, John Candy) hostage. For this reason alone, I couldn’t help but hum a few bars of ‘Chariots of Fire’ as I sat through the 90 minute plus line up to the ride. With Southern California seeing a heatwave with temperatures of 43 Celsius/100 Fahrenheit I was glad to have waited until the sun had set as there’s no shade to be found anywhere. One of the biggest downfalls to the new experience is the extremely low turnover rate. It takes a much more significant amount of time to load and unload as people adjust the headets, replace sets that aren’t calibrating, and have the staff help them get settled into the seats. Hitting the park on a weekday seems like a much better idea than ever attempting this on a weekend.
The experience is powered by Samsung VR and Oculus Rift, and while it doesn’t support the most insane graphics (it is just a phone after all) it certainly feels real enough as you feel the lap bar come down across your knees. Once the headset calibrates, you find yourself a pilot of a fighter jet of sorts and are sitting in the hangar of a launch facility. By touching a pad on the side of your goggles you can shoot lasers as you look all around the room. This is a full 360 degree VR experience, and can be particularly odd as you know someone is strapped in beside you, but obviously can’t see them as you look over. My wife was riding to my left and was thoroughly fascinated with the hangar space and the shooting. Sure this part was neat, but the real action begins when the ride starts to actually move.
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“What would have been a fun, but middling experience, instead had the adrenaline turned all the way up to 11.”
Once the train leaves the station and you start making the first climb, the VR experience simulates that of your fighter jet being raised up an elevator. The visuals paired with actual movement sells the experience in a big way and to say that my heart was racing is an understatement. What would have been a fun, but middling experience, instead had the adrenaline turned all the way up to 11. The hangar roof opens and you are off over the rooftops of a city besieged by aliens and giant, monstrous robots. Not knowing which way the track was heading at any moment made the ride insane, and never knowing when that loop was going to come was especially cool. Diving and swerving out of danger, smashing into buildings, shooting at everything in your path, it all felt more real than any other virtual reality I’ve experienced based on that movement alone.
Sadly, one of the downfalls to a ride like this, is the potential for equipment failure. While my wife was fully immersed in her VR hangar and could look around, the unit failed to recognize that she had actually left the station at all. After one particular turn she was left staring at the back of her seat, which she could peek around, but the rest of the experience passed her by. Screams of “I’m still in the room! This is bullshit! What are you seeing?” came from my left for most of the ride. That’s a tough pill to swallow after 90 minutes of waiting and no re-rides as the park was closing.
As an experience I couldn’t recommend The New Revolution any higher. As we see advancements in VR continue to climb I can only imagine that experiences such as this will become more commonplace and even better in their presentation. I’ve got to hand it to whoever thought of this, because this makes an extremely dated ride feel brand new again. Six Flags did it when they re-purposed the wooden coaster Colossus into the Twisted Colossus (amazing ride, by the way), and they’ve done it again with The New Revolution. If you make your way to Magic Mountain, the ride is worth the wait.