Attractions at Universal Studios Florida

I'm moving on to my posts about Universal Orlando, starting with the attractions at Universal Studios Florida. This was my first visit to this park (on my previous trip to Universal Orlando I only visited Islands of Adventure), although I was familiar with a few of the attractions from Universal Studios Hollywood.

Production Central

Despicable Me Minion Mayhem - This is a motion simulator ride set in the Despicable Me universe. I haven't seen any of the movies but the plot of the ride was easy to follow and I found it quite enjoyable. This attraction probably has the longest lines of any attraction at Universal. However it is open for Early Entry. When I was there Early Entry at Universal Studios Florida started at 7am; I went straight to Despicable Me and not only did I not have to wait, but the ride room was only about 20% full.

Shrek 4-D - This is a 4D movie set after the original Shrek movie. It's fun, but I don't think it's quite as good as the 4D movies at Disney World.

Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit - For the most part, this is a regular, fairly intense rollercoaster. Its distinguishing feature is its on-ride audio, which is supposed to let you pick what music you listen to during the ride. I couldn't get mine to work though, so I ended up with a default choice. I found this ride to be very jarring and I don't think I'd bother riding it again. This ride has a very strict no loose items policy, and you have to go through a metal detector in the queue. I thought I was going in the Single Rider line but I had misread the signs and ended up in the regular queue. It didn't really matter because both lines had short waits at around 9:30am.

Transformers - Like the Spiderman ride in Islands of Adventure, this attraction goes along a track and uses a combination of real sets and videos viewed with 3D glasses. I found the plot difficult to follow since I'm not familiar with Transformers and had trouble figuring out which robots were good guys vs. bad guys. It was fun nevertheless. The ride was a complete walk-on a little before 9am (when the park opened at 8am).

New York

Twister ... Ride it Out - This was a show with a simulated tornado. The pre-show was very long and the main show wasn't as intense as I expected. This attraction recently closed.

Revenge of the Mummy - This is an indoor ride with some slower, heavily themed parts and some roller coaster sections. The theming and plot remind me of the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland, but I enjoyed Mummy more, I think because there were more unexpected elements. The queue is well themed and has a funny mock interview with Brendan Fraser but the wait was so short that I didn't get to see much of it. There is a Single Rider line but it wasn't open when I was there because the line was so short.

Harry Potter - Diagon Alley

The first part of the Harry Potter area you get to is the London Waterfront. It includes a photo op with the Knight Bus and its driver, as well as Grimmauld Place (wait for a while and Kreacher appears in the window). You then pass through a brick wall (if you don't know that the entrance to Diagon Alley is through a brick wall, it wouldn't be at all clear what ought to be on the other side of the wall) to get to Diagon Alley itself. The street and many of the shops from the movies are recreated in great detail.

Hogwarts Express - This train ride takes you from the London Waterfront over to Islands of Adventure. This direction has a more "interesting" ride than the other direction, so I would probably try to ride the other direction first. The King's Cross station theming here is really good and obviously set up to allow for a much longer wait than we ever experienced. The best part is the illusion that people are walking through a brick wall to get on to Platform 9 3/4. You can also see Hedwig waiting to be loaded on to the train.

Ollivanders - We didn't visit Ollivanders in Hogsmeade the last time we visited because we didn't think the long queues were worth it. Now that Ollivanders has opened in Diagon Alley, the queue is much more manageable (although still partly outdoors). The show was fun and I think would be quite magical for kids, and the room was very faithful to the movies.

Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts - This is the big new ride in the Harry Potter expansion. It is similar to Revenge of the Mummy in that some parts are slow or stationary with roller coaster segments in between. Most of the story is told through video; the first time through I couldn't understand how they'd achieved some of the effects because I forgot I was wearing 3D glasses. The queue includes an amazing replica of Gringotts bank from the movies, complete with animatronic goblins. The pre-shows are also good. The wait in the middle of the day was fairly long (30-45 minutes).There is lots to look at in the last 30 minutes of the queue; I wouldn't want to wait much more than 45 minutes. During Early Entry (which started at 7am) I was able to pretty much walk straight through to the pre-shows (the Single Rider line wasn't operating). The dragon on the top of the building breathes fire every 10 minutes.

World Expo

Men in Black Alien Attack - This is a shooting ride somewhat similar to Buzz Lightyear at Disney World, although you are competing against another ride vehicle and at certain points can shoot at them as well as at the aliens. The ride vehicle spins quite a lot so it can make you a little motion sick. We learnt the hard way the score is calculated as an average of all the seats in the ride vehicle; seats which score 0 aren't counted - make sure you don't touch the guns on empty seats because if they score just a few points they will bring down the average. I rode soon after the park opened at 8am. The Single Rider line was open but both lines were a walk-on so I got my own ride vehicle anyway and it didn't actually save me any time. I rode again around lunch time with a short wait.

The Simpsons Ride - This ride replaced Back to the Future and still uses the same motion simulator system. I think it was a bit of a strange move - the main issue with the Back to the Future ride was that the ride system was dated, and replacing the movie with a story about the Simpsons has done nothing to improve that. I would have preferred to ride the original Back to the Future ride. The wait was quite long even shortly after opening (I waited 15-20 minutes at about 8:15) - it seemed like it was a bit understaffed.

Kang & Kodos' Twirl 'n' Hurl - This is a Dumbo style ride themed to the Simpsons. I'm not exactly sure what the target audience of this ride is supposed to be because presumably most kids who are young enough to be into Dumbo rides are too young to watch the Simpsons. The Simpsons references were somewhat amusing but overall it was about as entertaining as any other Dumbo ride.

Woody Woodpecker's Kidzone

Curious George Goes to Town - This is a kid's play area. I came down here because my nephew likes Curious George and I was hoping for some merchandise (there wasn't any). There wasn't anything to entertain adults here.

E.T. Adventure - This is the only ride that is still around from Universal's opening 25 years ago. It's a classic dark ride that reminds me a little of Peter Pan, although it isn't quite as magical. At the beginning of the ride you are asked your name so that ET can say goodbye to you at the end; unfortunately, ET's pronunciation of names is largely unintelligible. This ride had a little bit of a wait mid-morning, and, like the Simpsons ride, the queue seemed understaffed.