[Fun] Controversial opinion: Disney should have gotten the Nintendo theme park rights

[DisneySpaceAce]

So, seeing Super Nintendo World in Universal Japan has me super excited for when it's finally built stateside, bit I can't help but wish Disney made that deal. Now, I know, things like the Avatar land are already controversial, but Nintendo is basically the Disney of video game companies. Shigeru Minamoto has often been referred to as the "Walt Disney of gaming", and Mario is basically Italian Mickey Mouse at this point. The whole family friendly vibe of Nintendo feels like it would have fit in with Disney much more than the vibe Universal has been trying to create over the years.

[Disnedude]

I was originally excited to see a "Mario Land" but have been underwhelmed by what I have seen. As visually appealing as the area is, a theme park is ultimately judged by the rides that it has. My reaction to what I've seen with the Universal Mario rides is a shrug and a "meh". Possibly, Disney could have produced better but I think they dodged a bullet by not spending the money on the Nintendo IP. In my opinion, Pandora is a better land.

[DisneySpaceAce]

I was originally excited to see a "Mario Land" but have been underwhelmed by what I have seen. As visually appealing as the area is, a theme park is ultimately judged by the rides that it has. My reaction to what I've seen with the Universal Mario rides is a shrug and a "meh". Possibly, Disney could have produced better but I think they dodged a bullet by not spending the money on the Nintendo IP. In my opinion, Pandora is a better land.

Yes and no, one of the appeals of Super Nintendo World is that the entire land is the attraction (yes you gotta get the wristbands to make use of it), since there are mini games you play all throughout it, with a "boss battle" with Bowser after you collect all the keys in the land. The rides are okay looking, but I really dig the concept of the whole place basically being an interactive Mario game.

[Zorro]

Since we can now imbibe at the Blue Bayou, a Conker's Bad Fur Day attraction may be apropos.

[jcruise86]

I imagine if Disney had Nintendo it would've cheaped out on the land, and I'm pretty sure Disney would not have done such a fantastic job with Harry Potter as Universal did in Orlando.

Disney should focus on opening it's cloned Florida Tron & its Guardians attractions ASAP, and let imagineers create ORIGINAL attractions.
Let the attractions inspire movies (if someone at Disney has to have their creativity constrained), not the other way around.

[Eagleman]

IMO
Do not like the concept.....nor another outsider IP land........

[Disnedude]

Yes and no, one of the appeals of Super Nintendo World is that the entire land is the attraction (yes you gotta get the wristbands to make use of it), since there are mini games you play all throughout it, with a "boss battle" with Bowser after you collect all the keys in the land. The rides are okay looking, but I really dig the concept of the whole place basically being an interactive Mario game.

I agree that the entire land looks pretty cool and would be worth a look. For me, though, you can only rely on mediocre rides for a limited time. I think they swung for the fences with the MarioKart ride (which I applaud), but ended up with a pop out RBI. It might do OK in Orlando but they'll have to step up their game for Hollywood where they rely more on in-state visits.

[Disnedude]

I imagine if Disney had Nintendo it would've cheaped out on the land, and I'm pretty sure I don't think Disney would've done such a fantastic job with Harry Potter as Universal has done in Orlando.

Disney should focus on opening it's cloned Florida Tron & its Guardians attractions ASAP, and let imagineers create ORIGINAL attractions.
Let the attractions inspire movies (if someone at Disney has to have their creativity constrained), not the other way around.

I'm not sure that I agree. Disney spent a lot of money on Pandora and Galaxy's edge. As far as rides go, I just want a larger quantity of good rides, regardless of whether they are necessarily original or not. For example, I am quite happy to see Tron and Ratatouille at WDW, and would love Mystic Manor at all of the parks, even though they are clones from other parks.

[mickdaddy]

I think Disney has enough "outside" IP's to make lands and attractions and new theme parks that there is no need to buy another and honestly Nintendo would be the bottom of my list of IP's to purchase if they were to buy more. I would much rather see the Imagineers get the opportunity to develop new ideas for attractions and lands than always having to rely on an IP.

[Captain Andy]

I'm not sure that I agree. Disney spent a lot of money on Pandora and Galaxy's edge. As far as rides go, I just want a larger quantity of good rides, regardless of whether they are necessarily original or not. For example, I am quite happy to see Tron and Ratatouille at WDW, and would love Mystic Manor at all of the parks, even though they are clones from other parks.

I think jcruise86 is referencing the original pitch for a Harry Potter land at Disney. It wasn't as great as what Universal came up with... I think there were a lot of duplicate rides (ex. teacups transformed into sorting hats). To this day, I'm still grateful that Universal took the IP instead and brought the theming to justice.

On that note, I don't think Nintendo would do well in Disney's hands, especially in this day and age. Maybe in the 90s when Imagineering was given a little more rope, but a lot of their decisions as of recent have been "play it safe."

[Mr Wiggins]

I think Disney has enough "outside" IP's to make lands and attractions and new theme parks that there is no need to buy another and honestly Nintendo would be the bottom of my list of IP's to purchase if they were to buy more. I would much rather see the Imagineers get the opportunity to develop new ideas for attractions and lands than always having to rely on an IP.

IMO
Do not like the concept.....nor another outsider IP land........

^ These, x2.

[Spongeocto4]

I agree and yet disagree.

Disney was foolish not to collaborate with Nintendo. Two of the most family friendly icons collaborating, would of made bank. With Disney's expertise, they could of further of knocked it out of the park (No Mario Baseball reference intended).

Unfortunately, Disney no longer cares about video games, like they did in the 90s to early 2000s. Despite ironically furthering "Interactive Experiences", they appear to have no interest with video games.

But, with Disney being Disney, they could of easily sabotaged the joint venture. All it would of taken, would be Disney trying to acquire Nintendo out right. Nintendo(which was founded even before Walt Disney was born!) has no plans to be acquired anytime soon...or ever. It was recently revealed that when Microsoft proposed acquiring Nintendo in the 2000s, Nintendo did not take the offer seriously and allegedly "laughed their a**es off" at the idea. So no joining the Disney umbrella anytime soon.

[EDIT: Posted too early in the thread]

[bayouguy]

nope...just allowing ideas to fit the acquisition but no real creativity will be allowed...

[Eagleman]

nope...just allowing ideas to fit the acquisition but no real creativity will be allowed...

I Agree
I looking for acquisition for true "Real Creativity" and "Imagineering"
like it once was , at a Disney Parks........
As " Mickdaddy" share
Imagineers get the opportunity to develop new ideas for attractions and lands!
IMO

[mickeyfan42]

I was originally excited to see a "Mario Land" but have been underwhelmed by what I have seen. As visually appealing as the area is, a theme park is ultimately judged by the rides that it has. My reaction to what I've seen with the Universal Mario rides is a shrug and a "meh". Possibly, Disney could have produced better but I think they dodged a bullet by not spending the money on the Nintendo IP. In my opinion, Pandora is a better land.

mind if I ask if you were already a fan of Avatar before Disney got the IP for the parks (and now films via that Fox purchase)? I ask because I remember being incredibly underwhelmed by the movie, and then same with Pandora. For my first ever trip to Florida, Pandora had opened, and we got there like 2 days after Great Movie Ride and Ellen's Energy Adventure closed. It was also my first trip to Universal because most of the IPs that were open in Hollywood didn't interest me at that point. I was way more impressed with Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley, the Spider-Man ride, Kong, Jurassic Park, and Mummy than I expected to be, and yet at WDW I found much of the things that aren't also in DL (so not Pirates or Star Tours for example) to be very underwhelming. I did like Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, Test Track, and Everest though. But my opinion on Pandora was also probably colored by thinking the movie was boring too.

[mickeyfan42]

I think jcruise86 is referencing the original pitch for a Harry Potter land at Disney. It wasn't as great as what Universal came up with... I think there were a lot of duplicate rides (ex. teacups transformed into sorting hats). To this day, I'm still grateful that Universal took the IP instead and brought the theming to justice.

On that note, I don't think Nintendo would do well in Disney's hands, especially in this day and age. Maybe in the 90s when Imagineering was given a little more rope, but a lot of their decisions as of recent have been "play it safe."

I also think that Universal having Harry Potter and Mario forces Disney to not just do things on the cheap like they had been doing for a while pre-Iger. Galaxy's Edge, Pandora, and Cars Land all only exist as they do because WWoHP was such a massive success. Now, I think that Galaxy's Edge missed the mark and the merch is over priced compared to the HP counterparts, plus its not like you can take out your light saber and fight Kylo Ren, or have your droid interact with a socket on a wall to activate something, while at Uni your much cheaper wand will let you "cast spells" all over the area and have things actually get triggered by it. Can you imagine if you could use the force to do similar things at Galaxy's Edge?

[Karalora]

Mario is an odd choice for a theme park to begin with. When it comes to iconic video games and characters nothing else even comes close, but the platformer genre has got to be hard to adapt into a theme park in a way that is both properly immersive and safe. Invite guests to jump, climb, and avoid hazards like Mario in a playground or obstacle course-style attraction, and you'd best be prepared to watch them trip, fall, and fail to avoid those same hazards, and then sue you right into a cardboard box under the freeway.

On the other hand, there are probably ways to create a vehicle ride that produces a similar experience.

On the other other hand, the Legend of Zelda franchise would make for a fantastic and gorgeous theme park experience. The games already revolve around exploring a fantastical world divided into distinctive terrain areas which would translate readily into themed lands.

[linkeq2001]

I don't know.....A part of me says Disney could have a very good job. Imagine if the Tokyo parks had gotten ahold of the IP first and the expectation for the other Disney parks worldwide was to match what they may have created....we could have had an exemplary experience. One the other hand, it would just be another "outside" IP that Disney would shoe horn into the parks that would likely feel out of place and "un-Disney" so to speak.

[JerrodDRagon]

Disney is stupid for not getting Batman, Harry Potter and Nintendo.

People on here may not know but the Switch is killing it right now and Pokemon is the biggest single IP EVER....so yes Disney was very dumb not to pick them up

[linkeq2001]

Disney is stupid for not getting Batman, Harry Potter and Nintendo.

People on here may not know but the Switch is killing it right now and Pokemon is the biggest single IP EVER....so yes Disney was very dumb not to pick them up

They tried to get Harry Potter, they pitched and lost because they cheaped out and didn't think the property was going to be big enough to warrant an entire space in a theme park. So yes, it was their loss; and that would probably be the biggest one historically as well as it made Universal an actual competitor in Orlando.