universal and mario world

[tink89]

We are planning a quick trip to Universal at either end of July or the start of August. I know Super Nintendo World is open now and gets packed. It is not a must-do for us and rather do all the other rides, but I do have a few questions.

With the early access to Super Nintendo world do you only get access to that part or are people able to get on all the other rides and go to other areas of the park? If not how do they hold people off? I have not been since last year so not sure where the entrance to Nintendo World is and how it works.

Are there separate lines for people going to going to Nintendo world vs regular park entry?

Are we still able to go to Nintendo land at some point in the day or only with a reservation?

How much time does one spend in Nintendo land if we do decide to do it?

Any recommendations on where to stay besides Marriott and Hilton? We have stayed at Marriott but didn't love it. The Hilton there doesn't seem to be that much better either.

 

[GBRforWDW]

We’ll be at Universal on Aug 5 and I’ve purchased the early entry. Looking forward to seeing it as well.

Here’s another thread that has some good info, not sure it answers everything, but can be a good starter info:

https://www.disboards.com/threads/best-time-to-arrive-for-super-nintendo-world-early-access.3920261/

Also, if you haven’t looked, early entry is now sold out through July 28th. Seems to be consistently selling out about 2-2.5 weeks before the date.

 

[godfather927]

We are planning a quick trip to Universal at either end of July or the start of August. I know Super Nintendo World is open now and gets packed. It is not a must-do for us and rather do all the other rides, but I do have a few questions.

1) With the early access to Super Nintendo world do you only get access to that part or are people able to get on all the other rides and go to other areas of the park? If not how do they hold people off? I have not been since last year so not sure where the entrance to Nintendo World is and how it works.

2) Are there separate lines for people going to going to Nintendo world vs regular park entry?

3) Are we still able to go to Nintendo land at some point in the day or only with a reservation?

4) How much time does one spend in Nintendo land if we do decide to do it?

5) Any recommendations on where to stay besides Marriott and Hilton? We have stayed at Marriott but didn't love it. The Hilton there doesn't seem to be that much better either.

Numbering your questions for better legibility...

1) Yes, it's only SNW that is open for most of early entry. Some of the other lower lot rides might start opening around 15-25 min prior to official park open. I can say for certain that the Simpsons ride opened right at 7:45am for an official 8am park open (with SNW early entry starting at 7am.)

1b) They don't really "hold people off" from going elsewhere in the park, it's just that nothing else is open for most of the early entry hour. The entrance is to the left of Transformers when you're heading towards it from the escalators.

2) Yes, last week they had the SNW early entry lines on the left side of the main park gates and they started lining up those without early entry to scan in on the right side.

3) Depends on how busy they get that day. Once they start nearing capacity, they switch to a Virtual Line system. If that happens, you will need a VL reservation or a Toadstool Cafe reservation to get back in to the land after you've left. Without either of those, you would have to wait until later in the evening to see if they stop requiring VL reservations. For the days I was there last week, I don't recall them using VL at all but if they did, it might've been during peak hours in the middle of the days.

4) Depends entirely on what all you want to do. There's only one ride (Mario Kart), one dining location (Toadstool), and 5 mini-games. There's also coin blocks scattered throughout the land and character meets that occur every 30 min or so. To do "everything" could take anywhere from a few hours to several depending on the lines and wait times. In our experience, we didn't care as much about the character meets so we prioritized the ride and mini-games. We did the ride and all minigames and coin blocks spread out over two days (one of which was with early entry) and it took us about 4 hours or so, including a meal at Toadstool.

5) The two on-site hotels are the Hilton and Sheridan, but we decided to stay in the Hollywood area because we had some things planned elsewhere in LA on non-park-days.

 

[tink89]

Numbering your questions for better legibility...

1) Yes, it's only SNW that is open for most of early entry. Some of the other lower lot rides might start opening around 15-25 min prior to official park open. I can say for certain that the Simpsons ride opened right at 7:45am for an official 8am park open (with SNW early entry starting at 7am.)

1b) They don't really "hold people off" from going elsewhere in the park, it's just that nothing else is open for most of the early entry hour. The entrance is to the left of Transformers when you're heading towards it from the escalators.

2) Yes, last week they had the SNW early entry lines on the left side of the main park gates and they started lining up those without early entry to scan in on the right side.

3) Depends on how busy they get that day. Once they start nearing capacity, they switch to a Virtual Line system. If that happens, you will need a VL reservation or a Toadstool Cafe reservation to get back in to the land after you've left. Without either of those, you would have to wait until later in the evening to see if they stop requiring VL reservations. For the days I was there last week, I don't recall them using VL at all but if they did, it might've been during peak hours in the middle of the days.

4) Depends entirely on what all you want to do. There's only one ride (Mario Kart), one dining location (Toadstool), and 5 mini-games. There's also coin blocks scattered throughout the land and character meets that occur every 30 min or so. To do "everything" could take anywhere from a few hours to several depending on the lines and wait times. In our experience, we didn't care as much about the character meets so we prioritized the ride and mini-games. We did the ride and all minigames and coin blocks spread out over two days (one of which was with early entry) and it took us about 4 hours or so, including a meal at Toadstool.

5) The two on-site hotels are the Hilton and Sheridan, but we decided to stay in the Hollywood area because we had some things planned elsewhere in LA on non-park-days.

thank you!!. We don't visit USH often as we are mostly Disneyland people. We went last year but it was before SNW opened so i was unsure how that would work. I like that they have separate lines at the opening.

We will probably not do SNW and stick to the rest of the park. Most times we have gone we have done mostly everything by 1 pm and VL was not an option. Looks like everything is pretty much the same unless you are planning on visiting SNW

 

[godfather927]

thank you!!. We don't visit USH often as we are mostly Disneyland people. We went last year but it was before SNW opened so i was unsure how that would work. I like that they have separate lines at the opening.

We will probably not do SNW and stick to the rest of the park. Most times we have gone we have done mostly everything by 1 pm and VL was not an option. Looks like everything is pretty much the same unless you are planning on visiting SNW

On the day we didn't have early entry, we prioritized all other park rides and we were surprised at how much we were able to get done in the morning while everyone else was cramming into SNW right at park open. Simpsons and all the other lower lot rides were basically walk-ons for the first hour or two. SNW is the main draw of the entire park right now and will be extremely crowded but the crowds do tend to thin out a bit down there after 7pm or so. If you have some time at the end of your day, it's worth checking out to even just walk around and see what it's like.