Skip the Preshow For ROTR
Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, Disney’s newest attraction to open at Galaxy’s Ede land in Hollywood Studios, is making headlines yet again. Some of the preshow components of the ride were malfunctioning yesterday and riders were directed backstage directly to the hangar sequence, skipping the shuttle scene. Some of the in-ride effects were also not working. This sparked a debate on social media of whether Disney should have closed the ride. Disney’s decision to keep the ride open may be related to what happened a few days ago when the ride had to close for technical issues. There was even more displeasure at Disney for that incident, and many guests were directed to Guest Relations for compensation. Overall, guests have been very pleased with the ride. It is quickly becoming one of the favorites in all of the Orlando area theme parks.
Chip Readers at Epcot
Our reporter at Epcot yesterday learned Disney has added machines with chip readers to the check out registers of some of the shops and eateries, including MouseGears. One Cast Member said the readers had been in use for several weeks in some Epcot locations. Disney has been slow to adopt the new technology, which allows patrons to use their chip reader instead of having to swipe their credit and debit cards. The chip reader speeds up the check out process and is supposed to offer guests more protection against fraud. A Cast Member said a wider roll out is forthcoming. The Jotter found the readers in some places, like Les Halles Boulangerie-Patisserie and the France pavilion festival booth, but not at the shops and ice cream counter in the France pavilion. One of the reasons for the slow rollout may be that Disney added a completely new point of sale (POS) system with the chip readers. A POS includes the hardware and software needed to complete a transaction.
Universal Passholder Entrance Coming
Universal Orlando Resort offers quite a few perks to its annual passholders, including their own lounge and annual passholder themed merch. Now the theme park is set to open a special entrance line for passholders at the front gates of their parks. According to Universal, the lines could open as early as January 4, but the Jotter was just at Universal Studios and saw no signs of the separate queue. We’ll let readers know when we find out the passholder lines are open.