Re: toned down version of Mission Space coming this summer


"Randy Berbaum" <rberbaum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e448os$7go$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
NickM <nickmonitto@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
: I've heard this sort of thing a few times from different people, Tom,
: and it always perplexes me. I don't mean this to be an attack, but a
: very serious wonderment. I assume your "ridden everything else
: except..." means that you've done all the [foo] Mountains, as well as
: the 3 you specifically mention [RnRC/ExE/ToT]. And while you have no
: issues during them, the teacups can mess you up.

Yep, ridden everything else, with barely a complaint... see below.

Different people are sensitive to different motions. Some people find the
"drop" motion of steep drop coasters (or ToT) to be troublesome while
spinning motions are ignorable or even enjoyable. Or there are those (like
me) that find the total opposite true. I can't even look at the teacups
without getting very dizzy and quickly this turns to nausea. On the other
hand I can enjoy ToT with only slightly wobbly knees. Coasters where the
visuals equal the sensations give me no trouble. The simulator rides that
had a rumored slight mismatch between the visuals and motions can cause
trouble for those who can focus their attention so totally on the screen
that the mismatch causes trouble. The first few times I rode Body Wars I
felt ill, but I quickly learned that if I simply looked down at the floor
occasionally or even kept the head and sholders of the person infront of
me in my field of view I never had a problem again.

That brings up a few other data points, on my motion problems. I enjoyed
riding TricerMeval SpinWhirl (whichever the coaster is) the first few trips
(only once or twice per day) but the next visit I tried it, and we happened
to pass the corner halfway thru the ride that unlocks the car spin at just
the right time, so we were thrown into a spinning frenzy that lasted through
the rest of the ride. It completely ruined the ride for me - I won't go on
it (or Mulholland Madness for the west-coasters) because of that one
adventure. Previous times I didn't get spun so badly - must have been the
balance of the bodies in the car that time.

I have no problems with Star Tours, and it's been a while since Body Wars
has been open to ride so I can't comment there.

The other one that really bothered me was the Aladdin's magic carpet
simulator game at DisneyQuest. There's no real motion involved, just the
helmet that senses where you're looking and tries to keep up with the
graphics. After about 4-5 minutes of that, I started getting queasy, and
took off the helmet and gave up on the game midway through. Turned out it
only lasted another minute or so, but I had no way of knowing I was almost
done. My son (age 6 at the time) finished it, but had complaints about the
gameplay only - no motion problems. One of the bad guys took his jewels and
he couldn't figure out what he was supposed to do.

So I figure I personally have two suseptabilities. One is to spinning
motions. And the other is to mismatches between visual and sensations. I
guess I tend to focus very tightly on what I am viewing and so I get a
kind of tunnel vision. One other problem is that it has been shown that
the inner ear picks up the initial spin starting and then if the spin
continues smoothly the inner ear fluid catches up to the spin and the
sensation is the same as standing still. Of course when the spin stops,
the ear is telling you that a rapid spin has begun in the opposite
direction.

Yesssss, that's it. I have no trouble going around corners fast, as long as
the cornering duration is less than a few seconds. I prefer acceleration (in
any direction) to raw speed, so I have more fun autocrossing in a parking
lot than I would riding at 240mph with Richard Petty. The lure of the launch
in RockNRollerCoaster is what convinced me to set aside my worries about
going upside down - and it's a must-do now. I also tried ToT this trip, with
no complaints.

And your observation answers something about my son. His first carousel ride
was at 9 months at our local Six Flags. He was fine with it until it
stopped, then he puked. That seems related to my problem with the
long-duration off-ramp.. the ear only detects a change in spin, but if the
spin is constant, the ear stops telling the brain about it, but the eyes
know better.

So since I normally don't have a spin problem immediately,
maybe if I looked outside the vehicle at the beginning and when the ear is
registering no motion then refocus to the inside of the car, I might
survive until the ride ended. Of course someone will have to carry me off
the ride since I will then be "spinning" standing still. :)

That's how I survived my LAST ride on the Teacups. I was videotaping wife
and son in the cup with me, and as long as I was staring thru the camcorder,
I knew I wasn't moving, so I was fine. Then I looked up, and saw the
landscaping whirling by, and the brain screamed "input mismatch!!!" and
crashed. I managed to survive the last 45 seconds by staring at the floor.

My boss tells a story once of driving for hours in a blowing snowstorm. He
got off the highway, came to a traffic light, could see the speedometer said
0 but the snow was still blowing at him, so his brain knew he was still
moving. Putting both feet on the brake, all the way to the floor, didn't
help. He finally had to get out of the car and stand next to it to get
things back in sync. His boss then tells a follow-on snow story, where the
snow was blowing and the speedometer read 30mph (a safe speed for the
conditions) but he started to sense something was wrong. He opened the door,
and found he had been stuck in a drift for an unknown period of time - car
wasn't moving, but the wheels were spinning, and the blowing snow added a
sense of motion.

So when I am spinning and either my visual view is stable (the inside of
the spinning vehicle) or a blur (like looking out) I get a mismatch. The
mismatch of visual and sensation also explains the fact that I can't watch
the teacups from the outside. Visual is in rapid spinning motion while I
am standing still.

On the other side of the coin I know many people who are much more
suseptable to drops. I have a family member that rarely leaves Illinois
because driving most anywhere else involves long straight roads with
gentle hill after gentle hill. But this same person loves going to the
county fair and rides all the spinning rides over and over. (shrug)

I had a girlfriend who grew up in the Adirondack mountains of NY - she had
never seen a large flat area other than a lake in her life. Somewhere around
age 10, they drove out of the mountains, and she saw A Field - flat and a
mile wide with no mountains in sight, just a horizon. She lost it in the
back seat.

tom


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Relevant Pages

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