Will Horror Unleashed Succeed? And, Is China’s Tourism Coming Back?

0:01 Welcome to this week's episode of Green Tagged Theme Park. In thirty Scott and I are back from our sojourn in the Middle East of the Ayappa Middle East Trade Summit. But right now, while you all are listening to this, we are at Transports Halloween and Trash Shows, which is the largest professional Halloween trade show in the world. So we're recording this early. So if there's some crazy news that has come out and you're wondering why we're not talking about it, that's why, because we're having to do this one early. Well, because we're both currently at the trade show. I'm teaching a seminar on something. It could be a seminars differently be Halloween, could be Christmas, could be immersive theater, could be hosting the oscars. I have no idea, but.

0:42 All of that is going on right now. So this episode we're going to talk a little bit about, of course, the Horror Unleashed opening, but then we're also going to talk a little bit about China and whether or not it is recovering. So first, Scott, you know that I was going to start with this. Of course, of course you were. It's my jam, but it's also thematic because we're at the Halloween shows. So the Horror Unleashed has announced their dates and tickets. So y'all remember, this is Universal's first full year round Hunted attraction in Las Vegas. It's located in the area of fifteen District, and they announced that it's going to open on August fourteenth. Admission will range from sixty nine to one hundred and forty nine, depending on the type and access. And it's one hundred square thousand, it's one hundred thousand, one hundred thousand square feet and they're debuting initially with four hundred houses plus themed bars and entertainment. The four hundred houses they're doing Universal Monsters, Blumhouse is The Exorcist, Texachimes on Masacre, and Scarecrow the Reaping. And in looking at the tickets, it's it's a weird I.

1:49 Mean, it's not weird. I don't know whatever. The tickets seemed to fall into like basically two buckets right now, And like bucket one is you get general admission to the area, so we assume that includes the bars and whatever, like the midway, and then you can access each attraction once. So and that's where you get the sixty nine dollars marker. And then the other option is you get unlimited access to the haunts in addition to access to the regular area. And I think that one's ninety nine and then up. So it's unclear if there's going to be express or how that any of that is going to go. It's also unclear if they're going to add stuff later or this is going to stay with four Who knows, but this is four year round haunted houses opening in Vegas on August fourteenth.

2:39 Yep, sure is okay, we'll see, well, we'll see how it flies. You know, we've we've talked about this since they've announced it, and that is it really depends on the execution. It really depends on what the the ips that they selected, because we've been talking about this since before we knew what the ips were. And uh, you know, I think that being well, first off, let's let's look, let's step into the wayback machine for a hot second. Haunted attractions burn hot and fast in Vegas, and they at least they have in the past. I don't whether this will or not, but I think they have in the past. Uh, so we know we know that they're they're kind of coming in with something to prove with this particular one. But if anybody can do it, it's going to be universal. I mean, you know, Halloween Hornites has a following that you know, they will jump off cliffs.

3:33 You know, they'll they'll they'll lemming lee, they'll lemmingley follow right over a cliff's edge. So I think that I think it's got some I think it's got some legs. What they had talked about early on in their planning was that they would also ramp up during the Halloween season and add additional content. I don't know whether that is still the case or not, but that was part of their original pitch. Just on all we have right now, we don't, Yeah, I know, so. We really don't know. On a personal level, I think they I think they chose very safe mass appeal ips and because of that, I don't I personally am not like, oh I've got to go see that. There is no must see here for me, because it's all stuff that we've seen before or that I will probably see, like for example, Universal Monsters I'll probably see executed better at Epic. So there's no absolute must see for me to go. There's no reason for me to go to Vegas to see this.

4:38 Let me put it that way, correct, that said, this could be brilliant, this could be wonderful. I think on a plus side, I think putting it in uh in Area fifteen makes a ton of sense. You know, right there with me Alwolf, that is the that has become the hub of the the atmospheric entertainment vibe in Vegas. I know the people who are involved in this and other people that I have either worked with or respect greatly, So I'm excited to see that between you know, t J and Ilo and you know those guys. They they've done great, great stuff, and I'm sure this is wonderful and lovely. I am most curious to see and I'm sure they are too, quite honestly, to see how sustainable it will be in Las Vegas and what they need to do as far as change and giving people lighting fuse as to why you should go see this now, I think there's going to be a huge influx at the beginning, because, like I said, Universal Halloween Hornet's fans are rabid and they will they'll ingest anything in that brand, which is great, and we'll see how long it lasts, you know, and maybe they have plans to change it on a regular basis. Maybe they will go to more more experimental or unique ips as they evolve. But you know, and the thing is, if I'm in Vegas, yeah I'll probably go. I'll probably go check it out, but it won't take me to Vegas.

6:06 Right. I think that you articulated most of my concerns. I don't the way this is presented now, I don't think is a good idea or a sustainable idea. I hope that I'm wrong, right, I mean, because I love Halloween and I love horn Nits, and I really you know, I want this to work out. But I again, I don't see. To me, this felt rushed. It was like we have dates and everything just kind of like plopped out at once, and it every's the website, the ticketing, it all seems rest But it also seems like I would say it's less about safe bets. And in terms of what I peas were the cheapest, is what this looks like, or IYP's that they could get the easiest? Is what this looked like to me? Like, what can we get that's guaranteed that we could have it, you know, for a year in a permanent installation versus having to because you know, if I'm sure, if they got like it or something, they would have to pay a lot more.

6:59 And it's actually and Universal Monsters they own, so you know, correct that one, that one's good. They owned, they owned Scarecrow, they own Universal Monsters. And then there's just Blumhouse and Texas Chainsaw and I'm not sure if they owned Texas chain Saw. But yeah, I don't know. But you know, that's a good point. I hadn't. I hadn't thought about easiest, too easiest to sustain for for a long period of time, or even ips that are willing to tie themselves up for a long for that long period of time. I hadn't even thought about that. Yeah, yeah, it's it's It's interesting because when this came out on social media, of course I have a lot of I share a lot of friends or followers on social media with other haunted attractions, with other haunt fans, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, And anecdotally, the comments that came across were very lackluster. Yeah it did not.

7:50 I've gotten they were excited. I've heard nothing but lackluster responses. And I think exactly your emotional take is what I have been hearing. I've been putting poles out, I've been trying to get the feedback from audiences around, and that's what it seems like. It's like the problem with again, And we said this way back, the problem with going with ips like this. They might be cheaper, or they might be. The ones they could get a longer multi year deal with or whatever. But since they've been done so many times in a universals with the Rabbit fans and even all of them last year, like just recently, it kind of just feels like this is like it's old already before it has it hasn't even open, and it's already old, and people don't seem like they're not going to make a trip to Vegas to go see it.

8:39 And so maybe they're just trying to capture foot traffic. But I will note that Area fifteen has been difficult to capture foot traffic, like that's their number one problem at Area fifteen is capturing guests visiting the strip there. Local You have to take a cab to get there, correct, correct, and there's no hotel there and a lot of people. Are not even aware it's a thing. You know, a lot of people they go into Vegas, they say on the strip. They don't know that it happens outside the strip. So it's mostly locals. And you're not gonna locals are gonna go once to this, They're not gonna go right multiple times. You know. It's interesting because I'm not certain who their target audience is me neither exactly. That's the question I have. If their target audience is die hard Haunt fans slash Halloween horrnites super fans, I this does not seem as though they've hit the bull's eye. They're close, but not quite.

9:36 If their target audience is people who aren't fans, who've heard about Halloween hornites and never really gone and just happened to be in Vegas and they're looking for something other than a Curc dosolet show to go do, then this may work. But once again, being an Area fifty one, which I've already praised them because I think it's a good location for this kind of thing. There's a lot of this kind of thing in Area fifty one. You know, this is where Meowolf is, This is Omega mart by Mio Wolf. There's there's several several immersive experiences in Area fifteen. But at the same time, to your point, Philip, it is a little bit off the beaten path. It is neither on the Strip, nor is it downtown, and it's a little tricky to get to, or it was the last time I was there. I haven't been in Vegas for a few years, but it was the last time I was there.

10:27 So yeah, I was just there and it is tricky to get to, Like I was just there a month ago, and it is. It's true, it's still tricky to get to. It's still not something that's frequented by that many tourists that are just visiting. And it also goes against the vibe to me. I don't know whatever, I guess I get. You know, we'll have to see how it performs. But I guess looking at what they my last takeaways, just looking at what they have currently now, I don't know why this is a year round thing and it's not a temporary thing, even if just to encourage able to go there, like if they're like even if they had just said we're going to open the Haunted Houses everything, but then the hont Houses are going to close November two.

11:10 I think even that fuse would have at least gotten people there. Or you know, since we both just got back from from Boulevard City, or if they had set it up and said this is going to be we are going to create this environment where we can do, in essence, pop up haunted attractions based on a rotating palette of and this may be the plan, who knows, but a rotating palette of of IPS, and both IP and non IP, because there are still those people like me who really care could care less about about the IP a perfect example, and sometimes it works to my advantage and sometimes it works to my disadvantage. When we were in when we were in uh Riod, and we did we did two hunted houses together while we were there, and one of them was your standard traditional on a house and the other one was based on the IP five Nights at Freddy's. Now, I know nothing about the Five Nights at Freddie's EP other than it exists, and because I was just looking at it as oh, here's something cool, I actually enjoyed that one more than the non IP. Philip had a reverse preference, and they were both quite honestly, they were both mediocre hunts. But but they both they both had their challenges, let's put it that way. So I think it's interesting that IP means less to me. But I'm also not the target audience. I realized the power of IP.

12:37 I know it, I understand it. It's just not me. So I get that. So again, I hope that despite all of the the nay saying that we're doing here, and I don't want it to sound like nay saying, because I'm not saying it's gonna suck. It's probably gonna be very, very high quality and a lot of fun. But is it, you know, how sustainable is it? How how long can it run? I don't know. And even though I sound like I'm being negative, I hope I'm one hundred percent wrong, And I hope that it is a smashing success and breaks open the floodgates of year round haunted attractions everywhere. I I don't know whether that's going to happen. It would be lovely if it did.

13:17 Yeah, one thing, just to clarify, a quick fact check that so the Exorcist Believer is also owned by Universal, So just fact check that really quick. So it's only taxis change on Anskar is the only ip that they don't own that is opening in Vegas, and it's. Probably one that they've had for so long that they can continue. They have a really good working relationship with that negoti. And they just they just did it also in California. So okay, so okay, that that took That took a while. Halloween, we got on our snow boxes. Okay, we're gotting not snip boxes, got to go. Halloween took a while between us. Really, Philip, that's a surprise. Acer Let's go to China. Now, let's move on to China.

13:58 So this is something that actually came up a conversation I was having with some folks in the Middle East at the trade summit. Where we were at. Our last week's episode was about that, and you know, we were talking with this group of people about how it used to be that China was positioned as like the epicenter of like the tourism, like that was the place if you wanted to, you know, get kickstart your career and you didn't want to be in Orlando, or maybe it wasn't working for you in Orlando, you could go to China. And now we were talking about how well now it's the Middle East. Like, if you want to get paid more or jump start your career, try something new, or take on more responsibility, you could go to the Middle East and work for a few years and you know, pump up your resume and get some savings. And then it brought me to thinking about how China is doing, because we haven't talked about it, and there's been a few stories recently that have come out, and I'm gonna so basically what I'm gonna do is take those stories but give you more context about how the economy has been recovering in China. And I think I have not been paying attention, but it does seem like it is rebounding relatively, not like super fast, but it's getting back to where it was. And that's no mistake because the government has been has really actually been putting money and effort into doing this. So they've been combining investment and policy changes to help the tourism economy rebound.

15:19 And the first thing they did was the easy of travel restrictions, so by late twenty twenty four, citizens of thirty eight nations could enter visa free. I remember back in the day where that was a huge deal, just getting your visa China. But yeah, so they're doing visa free stays. Twenty million foreign visitors entered China visa free in twenty twenty four, which is one hundred and twelve percent from the previous year, so that's clearly working. They've also been offering subsidies and tax breaks to investments in the tourism sector. They're doing local and regional promotions. I totally missed this, but in twenty twenty three they gave away half a million free airline tickets for people to visit Hong Kong, so to kind of lure visitors back in coming back to check out those areas. And just recently the twenty twenty four Golden Week, they saw seven hundred and sixty five million domestic trips, which is ten percent more than twenty nineteen, So at least in terms of domestic stuff for the big holidays like Golden Week is one of the biggest ones. You know, they're seeing their domestic stuff increase there. They also saw spending in and trip counts increase during Golden Week as opposed to twenty nineteen. So that's the backdrop that we're seeing not not too much increase in international trips.

16:41 But we'll get to that. But that's the backdrop for these three stories and the three new stories. First is the China's Harbin Festival, So the Harbin Ice Snow World. It's the world's largest ice and snowsinge park. And those of you that are familiar with the Gaylord Palms and they do the ice shows there, those are the carvers. Those are the carvers. They come from this thing. But imagine this, but it's an entire like theme park made out of ice essentially, and it covers one million square meters, so it's it's enormous. And this last one was the largest one they've ever had, and they saw more visitors than they've ever had there.

17:25 I believe it's three million visitors. Yeah, three million visitors, setting a new record over fifty two days, which is crazy. Three million people in fifty two days for the twenty sixth year they've done this. So and it's you know ice, there's interactive stuff, there's ice slides, all that sign of stuff going on. That story one. Story two is that the Harry Potter Studio Tours announced they're going to open a Chinese version. They're going to go to China in this. And build a studio and then to a tour of it. That's the thing that I think it's a little weird about that. It's like in classic Chinese fashion, you know, they haven't announced like what sets are going to be there, because in the back, like I was thinking that too. I was like, well, I've been to the London tour and that one is enormous and it's crazy and it's fantastic.

18:14 But also, you know that's where the studios were, right, so they're just like they're moving over sets. Well yeah, but look at the difference between Universal Studios Hollywood, Universal Studios Orlando. When they first opened, they replicated sets, they replicated soundstages, they replicated outdoor. They ended up using them in future films in Florida. But it was all just a let's build a theme park that's movie based, and let's do it by replicating what already exists. So again I'm facetious about it that they're going to build a studio that nothing was ever shot on. Yes, but quite honestly, Potter fans couldn't care less. No, I don't think anyone will care. I was going to say, because when I was doing the studio tour in London.

18:58 There were some areas where you're like, you know that this was like like recreated to make it a themed environment, you know, because it just it wouldn't work as a set, you know, when you're like walking down the alley ways or just some of the slides and some of these like this wasn't in the movie, right, But like it doesn't matter because it's so cool and it's such a themed environment and Potter fans love it, and so I think that part's going to be fine. I just think it's interesting because, you know, mostly like you know, in the past, China has really tried to focus more on making sure that they're using local ips or whatever. But in this case, you know, Harry Potter is one of the only things that actually is not censored in China and it's available there, and it's like one of the only things my Chinese friends really know it's like Harry Potter because we you know, we all have it. So it makes sense that they're kind of bending this rule a little bit to bring in this investment, you know, trying to bring in something that's foreign, but to kind of help jumpstart the tourism. So it's gonna going to be part of a the action park that's already there, So they're putting it inside of a small like local theme park that already exists.

20:09 They're just expanding it to add this section to it. Yep. And then the third story here is about the Chinese cinema. And this gets to what I was just talking about with the ips and whatnot. But basically, China debuted a sequel to one of their really popular animated series animated movies, and I want to say it's nie Ja. I don't know. Hopefully that pronunciation isn't terrible. But basically this sequel, this animated sequel unseated Inside Out Too is a world's top performing animated film in only seven months, faster than any previous title Dethrow Mint. And it's the first non Hollywood film to crack the international box office top ten and the first non English language movie in the top twenty as of Wednesday, Favorite eighteenth just a while before recording this, but it made one hundred one point sixty nine billion US dollars sart, passing the total box office of the previous record holder, Inside Out Too. So this is a huge accomplishment for the Chinese tour film industry, and looking back in the context, you can see that this is because they started investing since the pandemic in the film industry and providing incentives and subsidies like I talked about into the film industry, and it looks like it's finally paying off. But I'm sure you're going to see themed environments based off of this stuff that they're going to put there to kind of again double down. So using this mix of forum

21:42 plus local domestic stuff. So so I guess you know where does that leave us. It leaves us an interesting spot where you do see tourism is recovering, but it's not quite where it was, although it seems like the domestic stuff is recovering a little bit faster. I was just going to. Say, the one thing that has in its major advantage is and you've talked about this before, is uh, they don't because of the population, they don't need as much outside tourism as say, for example them at least because there's you know, there's there's a lot more people there. And and it was the restrictions, the the internal restrictions, travel restrictions from from one area of China to another that we were crippling for some of these experiences, at least from you know, what we've reported in the past.

22:34 So so now that they're now that they're back, the thing that I think is most interesting is not really and I mean I'm even gonna I don't want to call it minutia, but the but the smaller areas of you know, the different festivals and the potter and the and the cinema, is the the the changes of procedure and how to get into the country and easing. It's interesting because when you know, when you mentioned that that there was that there were now you know, visa free, a new visa free policy. I looked up again, being USA centric, I looked up what it is, and interestingly enough, it is visa free only if you plan to stay less than ten days and move on to another country. Yes, so you have to. It has to be a it's a transitory visa. It is not a stay visa. If you you can, you have to get a stay visa.

23:29 You can still get a stavisa if you're gonna just go there, but. It's for tourism. I mean, yeah, ten ten days or less. Like well, ten days are less and you must move to another country either before or after visiting China. So you can't go to. The US, you can't go from the US, go to China, come back to the US and use their their free uh their free visa or visa free. You have to have another stop in there. So I think that's interesting to me. That's kind of like saying, Okay, we're gonna try to bring people to this part of the world. It's sort of like it's sort of like China huddling up with its neighbors going Okay, we will give them a free visa, but they got to come visit you too.

24:11 It's it's a unique it's a unique approach, and I think it's it's it's kind of interesting actually. And also I also like the fact that they added twenty one new ports of entry. So just a minor point of clarity. I'm not sure how it works for the for other people, but specifically specifically for US citizens, you can go to China for ten days and come back. Okay, that's not what that's not what the AI overview said. On my it says exactly the is so I just got my it says US citizens. US citizens can visit China visa free for up to ten days if you are trends. If they are transitioning through the country, however, they must continue on to another country. They must continue on to another country in order to get a in order to visit China visa free. So apparently even within the own within their own system, they're still in transition and they don't quite know what's going on.

24:59 Yeah. Yeah, because I recently got a visa application for going for Ayapa. So but yeah, overall, it's good that they're trying to get the again. Making it easier to get there is a huge thing, which you would have thought they would have done previously. But the fact that it took them to twenty five to get like a you know, like a you can visit visa situation. I did. I did pull up some information on Hong Kong because in the past, and of course I'm not sure how how accurate this is in terms of, like, you know, I don't have like a government statement as to like their tourism plans. So I know in the past they were looking at making Hong Kong kind of like the tourist capital because they have the parks there. It's it's again, it's that special zoned area like we see in other areas, and it.

25:50 Was built as that, I mean before it was under before it was under Chinese rule. It was built as. Yes, yeah, And so looking at Hong Kong, I think is a good example of that. So we look at Hong Kong. They welcomed forty four million visitors in twenty twenty four, which is a thirty one percent jump from twenty twenty three, but it's still much lower than their record in twenty eighteen. So their record was sixty five million in twenty eighteen and now it's forty four. So that's kind of where the Hong Kong Tours and Board was forecasting it. It just barely missed a forecast. But so again you can still see the struggles like it hasn't quite recovered there. Hong Kong also was much more reliant on international visitors and they were, you know, people just coming from mainland China, so you can see where that's it. Interestingly, in the last report they put out, we saw a shift in traveler profiles, so they noted more budget conscious mainland visitors as opposed to luxury shoppers who came from other countries, which just exactly what we've been talking about. Like, so even in the Hong Kong area, you know, they're trying to create stuff. You know, they've seen like a sixteen percent drop in per visitor spending in twenty twenty four despite the foot traffic, just because of this kind of shift. And that all makes sense.

27:04 If you're getting more people that are coming from mainland and you're trying to incentivize them to get there with subsidized trips, you know, they're not going to be the luxury tourists that you're going to get from Europe or for other places that are planning to spend more money essentially. So I think in summary, we can see that the tourism is rebound is rebounding, but more gradually. You know, the foreign visitors are climbing fast, but they're still not you know, near where it was. But it looks like that the government is interested at least in workshopping policies and investment and changing this. So I do think it's going to get back. It's actually overall it's better than I thought, right, right, And I think it's I.

27:47 Think it's important to recognize that, you know, visa free for transition, it because you know, you just said you got a visa. Well you don't need to get a visa if you're moving on to another country. That's the point. Yeah, correct, you can go visa free. You said you got a visa, so yes, you have to get a visa to go to China and come back to the US. I think these kinds of policies, though, are important, and I don't think we can. I don't think we can toss them aside because basically it's the government doubling down or reinvesting in the tourism sector. You know, not all countries do that, and I think it is I think it is important to recognize that, you know, they're trying to find ways to get people to come to either China specifically or that part of the world. Another thing that I find I have found most interesting that is not necessarily well, it is subsidized by the government, but people who are flying through Doha. Doha is a huge is a huge hub right now. There's not many people say, oh, let's vacation in Doha. I'm sure it's lovely. I've never spent any time there other than in the airport. But what they're doing now is they are subsidizing for Star hotels to give you forty nine dollars US room nights up to four nights if you decide to spend some time in Doha. So it's it seems as though just like the transitory ten day visa free visit to China or the spend a night in Doha and get a high end hotel for a cheap price. It seems as

29:19 though areas are starting to ban together now and there's a little bit less competition between only come to China don't go anywhere else or you know, only only come to Saudi and don't go anywhere else. It sounds as though there's some some collaboration and cooperation going on there. Does this mean that China is their their tourism is recovering, well, I think it is a sign that they're certainly looking at all the ways they possibly can to make it recover and not just not just within their own country, which I think is is a unique perspective. Yeah, I think to your point that it's a little bit of a mix of both, right, like we do see the government to your point, I mean they are trying not just with incentives monetary incentives, but also with policy incentives, they're trying to encourage it, but at the same time we do see it rebounding naturally on its own.

30:11 Like you know, the Harbon Ice Festival is a great example that, like that's just a local thing. No one needs fesis, right, I'm just local thing. It's not interrational at all. That's that And that goes back to my statement earlier when I said China doesn't need the international tourism because of their their population. They just need to be able to travel within their own country. And then and then the additional the addition of international visitation. It just is another is icing on the cake, so to speak. But we've nibbled up pretty much all the cake we have for this week. So how is that for an awkward transition? But it's time for us to finish, so on behalf of Philipernande's myself, Scott Swinson. This is Green Tag Theme Park in thirty. Thank you so much for listening, and we will see you all next week.