With the help of some deft karate chops, a well-placed fireball hurled at ferocious villains and a set of 3-D glasses, Legoland California is hoping to upend the hypercompetitive world of theme park attractions — for now.
The 4-D dark ride Ninjago, the Carlsbad park's latest Lego-inspired attraction, is the first in North America to use hand gestures in place of physical devices to control the outcome of the action — in this case an epic ninja warrior battle. Sensory effects like heat, smoke and wind enhance the 3½-minute virtual journey through skeleton-filled caves and lava streams.
Disney's Toy Story Midway Mania may have its pie- and egg-throwing cannons and Knott's Berry Farm's Journey to the Iron Reef its freeze ray guns. But Legoland now has what some say is an even more powerful marketing boast.
Taking a page from controller-free video gaming — think Xbox Kinect — Legoland California and its parent company, Merlin Entertainments, are trying to wow a whole generation of youngsters hooked on mobile devices and high-tech games. The strategy also squares well with theme parks' growing enthusiasm for interactive elements.
"It's inevitable we'd see this type of technology in the theme park world, so Legoland is now ahead of this," said Robert Niles, editor of Theme Park Insider. "This allows them to say we're the first on this one and gives them a good connection with the younger kids.
"Right now, this is the new thing, but at some point it becomes the old thing, and you'll want to do more with this than waving your hand above the lap bar."
Warriors in training
Ninjago, inspired by the popular Lego line of Ninjago toys and a related TV series, owes its hand-gesture feature to Triotech, a Montreal company that pioneered what it's dubbed the Maestro technology. It will be incorporated into rides at all of the Legoland parks.
Youngsters and their parents, seated in four-person vehicles and wearing 3-D glasses, are instantly immersed in the Ninjago story line as motion-sensing technology embedded in the lap bars detects hand movement above it.