The Biggest WINNERS & LOSERS in the Amusement World (2024)

2024 was a rough year for a lot of parks and companies, but we also saw some entities hit it out of the park. Let's run down the winners and losers of the past year.

Music in this video:
IDCIDK
Black Vulture
Cover - Patrick Patrikios

[josiahsimmons]

Honestly, SFGAV's 2024 year seems like it'd crack the top 10 worst years of all time, excluding years when parks were completely closed.

[GRGeorge]

We already know who’s #1 for loser, even before watching the video

[mulinhuan]

As a NJ local, Great Adventure's 2024 season started off VERY bad with one train on El Toro and many other rides for a couple months (salvaged somewhat by the amazing operators, you guys are awesome and check restraints incredibly fast). And then of course Flash got delayed.
The only silver lining at that time was how the park was seemingly refurbishing Kingda Ka and restore the ride to its former glory with all the train paint jobs and maintenance (I've also heard from some people at the park about them wanting to restore 4 train operations and using both sides of the station again). But we all know what happened after the merger went through: corporate FORCED the park to close down Ka and did not allow them to say anything to the public.
What a horrible season. Welp I guess it can only go uphill from here.

[urbex_coasters]

Had you told me Cedar Point and Zamperla wouldn’t be #1 on the bad list back in August I would have called you a Cedar Point fanboy sucking up to anything that place does, good or bad. But sure enough I agree with putting them only at #2. A double coaster removal plus several flat rides with ZERO sendoff? That’s so bad I didn’t know it was possible.

[darock]

CP Exec's - We're going to be #1 in Airtime Thrills Loser List with this TT2 disaster.
Zimmerman - Hold my Beer
SFGA Execs - WTF do you mean we gotta close Ka?

[FryGuy]

adding to great escape's wins is them renovating flashback with new paint and trains plus redoing their story town houses

[alantrotter]

B&M should actually be a loser. All three new B&Ms in the US don’t track well. B&Ms use to be smooth but that seems to be changing.
Voltron and Europa park is the biggest winner. What a great coaster.

[generaldoof]

My choices for this year:

Winner: Kings Island. We went near the beginning of Haunt when it rained all day Friday and the beginning of Saturday. We left Cedar Point and drove through the pouring rain, it clearing as we were arriving to KI. Walked up to the park with dense fog and death metal over the speakers. The coasters were walk on most of the night and i was able to take my son on all the coasters he could ride for his first rides and first night rides. Beast, Bat, Banshee, Racer, Backlot, Mystic Timbers and the kiddie coasters. He's just tall enough for Banshee, so hopefully Diamondback and Orion next time we go if he hits 54"

Loser: we all know. Cedar Flags really chopped a lot from Great Adventure.

[TheWolfXCIX]

2024 was definitely Macks year. Love to see them make insane attractions like Hypieria and Voltron

[Splater]

Me to how six flags treated great adventure this year: “Stop! He’s already dead!!”

[DaanBruins]

yeah number one loser was a given, such a shame.
Btw Efteling also pulled huge crowds with their new Danse Macabre attraction

[DJJODolla]

Great vid. Haven’t seen you do a quiz in awhile. Those were fun to watch and test my knowledge, being a low key enthusiast that I am.

[pdkev]

Great Adventure also lost Zumanjaro and their B&M record. Just brutal.

[kOwlz]

Thanks for recognising our UK parks, most American youtubers don't do that so thanks!😀

[derailedcoasters]

To add some more salt in Great Adventure's already DEEP burning wound..
- Big Wheel/Log Flume were promised to reopen by Memorial Day Weekend, Neither opened until Labor Day weekend.
- Nitro was supposed to be repainted -> cancelled and Goliath at Over Georgia got it instead.
- Zumanjaro was closed for most of the season and then confirmed to be getting removed.
- Houdini did not open for the season until Fright Fest.
- 6 of the Fright Fest houses being built were not ready on time for Fright Fest and delayed 6 mazes from being open for Fright Fest for 3 weeks, leaving the start of Fright Fest with only 3 houses.
- The sale of the Dream Street bricks fell way below what the expected income was supposed to be leaving 90%+ of the brick midway with blank bricks.
- Skyway never opened this season leaving the park with absolutely 0 transportation rides.
- Nearly half the coasters at the park was down to one train ops all spring and summer long due to budgeting issues and lack of staff capability on the maintenance team. (Jersey Devil has 4 trains and has only run with 2 all season, Medusa ran 1 train until fright fest, Nitro only 2 trains most of the season when it normally consistently runs 3 but varied on and off with 1 train ops, Toro was 1 train a large portion of the season)
- Superman went down for an entire month due to complications with electrical upgrades required by the state of NJ.
- Skull Mountains iconic skull on the building had the jaw of its mouth break completely off and likely will never get fixed.
- Hardly any special events took place to "celebrate" the 50th anniversary season, and wasn't advertised much throughout the park that it was the parks 50th anniversary.

TL:DR I love my home park, but unfortunately this season is far from anything to be proud of, so many things hit below the bare minimum this year and so many different factors being involved makes this one of the roughest seasons the park has ever seen. I also just want to state that none of these things are the fault of the Park Management level, and a lot of this stuff came to be because of Corporate. Brian is a fantastic park president and I cannot wait to see what he does with the park in the future.

[coasterkraken]

With Great Adventure being my home park, season was incredibly disappointing. Flash was delayed, the Ferris Wheel renovation took forever. The log flume took even longer to renovate and that opened right at the end of the summer. Then they remove 2 coasters and 4 rides. I only went to the park twice this year, would have been once but I had to get final rides on Kingda Ka. So much for a 50th anniversary celebration

[SlimFury]

Grizzly at Kings Dominion is a winner for 2024. The work done by the Gravity Group made it much better. It is off my worst list.

[Huntly]

SFGA had a crazy run of L’s this year like how do you mess up that bad 😭😭

[collinparsons]

Great Adventure isn't my home park, but I have visited regularly since 2007. I don't see myself returning anytime soon. This season could be the worst seasonal effort on the part of Great Adventure in the 15+ years I have been visiting, and they have been going downhill for years. Their operations and services have steadily declined to my breaking point. Whether it be running rides at reduced capacity with one train and ultra slow operations, rides closed, broken, or delayed for reasons under the park's control, failure to complete off-season projects even close to schedule, tight-lipped and delayed communication practices, serious food and beverage deficiencies, lack of transparent and consistent pricing, reduced operating hours, and unannounced closure and demolition of 6 rides, the product they have settled on simply isn't worth it anymore. I am disgusted with what Great Adventure has become.

[Jason_Maier]

Well Zamperla shit the bed with TT2 (should've gone with Intamin).

And we all lost with Kingda Ka closing (fuck you Cedar Fair)