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How Disney is making the DisneyQuest mistake again

Image: Disney

So, then, what's the moral of the story? How could Disney learn from its failings in DisneyQuest to build a stronger product with the rest of its parks? What are the lessons worth learning? Unfortunately, it doesn't seem as though the executives in charge of the company ever asked themselves these questions.

By now, Disney executives should realize how fickle technology is. In the time since DisneyQuest opened, the primary home video media has shifted from VHS to DVD to online streaming. Phones have gone from homes, to cars, to pockets. The internet went from being a new way to send mail to an ever-present body of infinite information. That's a lot of change in not a lot of time.

The lesson of DisneyQuest, then, is that building a theme park experience around technology, rather than story or personal interaction, is setting that theme park up for staleness and, eventually, obsolescence. Technology changes quickly, and if you're married to older technology while the newer stuff passes you by, that dampens the entire enterprise.

But, for some reason, Disney executives have opted to spend billions of dollars connecting the Walt Disney World resort to a single piece of technology: an RFID sensor system called MyMagic+.

There are a million reasons guests don't like MyMagic+, and there are just as many reasons it's helped make Disney vacations easier. However, in hitching itself to this bit of technology, Disney may have made a sizable miscalculation.

For MyMagic+ to work, Disney presupposes two things: The first is that guests will have smartphones with them in order to make their reservations for dining and FastPass+. The second is that those guests would willingly wear a MagicBand for the duration of their trip.

However, as technology continues to grow, we see that those two goals actually are incompatible. As more and more guests bring their smartphones to the parks, the need for MagicBands actually declines – the phone itself has much of the same functionality and can actually be used in place of the bands. This is actually an issue the company ran into in building Shanghai Disneyland, which will not use the MagicBand system precisely because of the large proportion of guests with smartphones. Additionally, the number of guests willing to wear a MagicBand may decline slowly over time. Yes, it seems cool now – “You mean all I have to do is walk around with this thing on my wrist and it does everything for me?” – but with the advent of wearable computers like the Pebble Watch and the Apple Watch, among others, MagicBands may soon feel like something extraneous or even annoying.

Consider this: Guests wearing Apple Watches likely wouldn't want to take them off when touring the parks. Plus, these watches already let you pay for a great many things out in the real world using Apple Pay, and so not only will the novelty of using a wristband to pay not seem so amazing, but in fact, it would be an annoying extra step that many watch wearers would circumvent, using their watches to pay instead. And, further down the line, if such wearable computers catch on at an even higher rate, the relative simplicity of the MagicBands will frustrate users used to a richer technological experience on their wrist. If the answer to guests is simply to wear both, that's likely not a very satisfying answer in the Florida humidity.

And so, here we see the towering shadow of DisneyQuest come into sharp relief. What sets Disney apart from its competitors isn't its use of technology, and it never has been. Yes, Walt was always on the cutting-edge of attraction and industrial design, but it was always used in service of story and efficiency. Now, that's not the case – there's an awful lot of technology being used simply for technology's sake. With DisneyQuest, we saw how that kind of design could disconnect guests from the theme park experience, promising them an innovative experience, but instead disappointing them with dated infrastructure. MyMagic+ makes a similar promise – “We're going to use technology to make your vacation simpler” – but if it fails to live up to that promise, either by not working or by falling into relative obsolescence, it will also leave guests feeling disappointed.

Disney should know by now: You don't build something that relies solely on technology to be successful. Instead, you build things that rely on story and on people. The reason guests still love attractions like the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean isn't because of the mechanisms that operate the ride behind the scenes, but rather, how those mechanisms are used to tell a compelling story. They aren't returning to Walt Disney World year in and year out because they were amazed by MagicBands or RFID technology. Instead, they come back to relive those memories they shared with loved ones, or because the cast members made them feel so welcome, they knew they had to return. That's always the danger of technology – it has an alluring coldness to it. Unfortunately, that coldness is the antithesis of what Disney does well.

DisneyQuest's legacy

Image: Disney

And yet, for all its faults, a great many of us out there will miss the place when it's gone. While it's hard to link together technology and nostalgia, it exists in that way for many of young adults who fondly remember the silly arcade-style experiences from when they were kids. Even if they didn't go every year, or even every two, it was nice to know it was still there – like an old game console you just can't bring yourself to sell or give away.

So now, DisneyQuest is closing. In 2017, it will shutter its doors for good, and that will officially be the end of the Disney Regional Entertainment experiment. It will be replaced, ironically, by another entity which enjoyed its greatest success in the 1990s: the NBA. Who knows what the new NBA experience will be like, or if it will live up to the fascinating trajectory of the building's previous tenant. What we do know is this: At long last, after 18 years in operation, DisneyQuest is finally getting its long-hoped for renovation. Unfortunately, that renovation will see it turn into something completely different. But you know what? 18 years was a pretty good run. That's longer than Michael Jordan spent in the NBA – so I guess DisneyQuest will always have the upper hand there.

 
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Comments

I agree with the previous comment about MagicBands. It's quite a stretch and not only that, but a smartphone is NOT the only way to make reservations for dining and FP+. You can also call the disney reservation number or go online using with your computer to make them well in advance before even arriving at Disney World. Even then when you're at Disney World you can access a FP+ kiosk at any park to make your reservations. Thus not requiring a smartphone.

Also, your comparison to Apple Watch and MagicBands is entirely inaccurate and not factual at all. You can't take your Apple Watch to the water park and get it wet, but you can with the MagicBand because that's how there designed. Do you expect every parent to buy their kid a $349 Apple Watch? The MagicBand is simple, cheap and cost effective for everyone.

Lastly, I did enjoy reading the article on DisneyQuest up until the last page.

I think down the line the magicband may be replaced (or interchangeable) with other options, such as a smart watch linked to your Disney account. It makes sense down the line when these items are more common place that this is implemented. I don't see Disney just allowing their own 'tech' to be the only option available to use, but at present it's understandable as MyMagic+ is still very much in its infancy, and as we have already seen it is adaptable to evolve over time.

How is being in operation for 18 long years failed? It was fun for kids on a rainy day. Just a big arcade is really what it was. It did not fail, it is just time to move on. Disney has been undergoing many changes and upgrades, this is just one of them. :)

Great article! I never got the chance to visit DisneyQuest myself, but I've seen similarities with the problems Innoventions has had in EPCOT. Technology is a moving target - a state-of-the-art attraction only has a year or two before it becomes outdated! I wonder if the DisneyQuest idea might have worked better had it, focused on excellent games based on current technology, instead of trying to wow people with the cutting edge.

Your comparison to MagicBands is quite the stretch, in my opinion. I enjoy the simplicity of the bands - it keeps me focused on having fun in the parks, instead of fumbling with my phone every time I want to ride an attraction or have a meal. A MagicBand is evidence you've done something special, in a way no phone app ever could. Besides, as you emphasized, technology changes awfully quickly! Not everyone has a high-tech phone, you'd have to pour money into developing new apps every time a new operating system or phone/watch style came out. Better to have a simple, special, streamlined experience with Disney's proprietary tech!

Innoventions is definitely an apt comparison, and it's telling that the team that dreamed that up was the same team that put together DisneyQuest. Additionally, many of the attractions that wound up in DisneyQuest were actually based on technology demoed at Innoventions first, most notably the VR helmets.

Well, the thing with the MagicBands is this: I definitely enjoy them, and have found that they've improved my vacation. However, they cost the Disney company well over a billion dollars to design and implement. That's an awful lot of money that could have gone to other projects, such as revamping Epcot. As you say, an app might eventually become outdated as well, but it only costs a few thousand dollars to build an app.

To me, it's about cost and benefit, and I think the enormous cost of the MagicBands doesn't cover up for the fact that the benefit is only minor and might be deemed obsolete in the near future. The fact that Shanghai isn't even using them is a red flag that suggests WDW spent a billion dollars on a gimmick.

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