5. Alice Ride (Blackpool Pleasure Beach, UK)

If any park has a right to rip-off Disney creations, it's Blackpool Pleasure Beach. The park's classic River Caves ride, for example, pre-dates Pirates of the Caribbean and is often held up as one of the inspirations for Disney's classic boat ride.

It's only fair, then, that Disney returned the favor by allowing its long-time partner Arrow Development to build the Alice Ride at Blackpool Pleasure Beach under license. It opened three years after Disneyland's own Alice in Wonderland ride, and was built on a fraction of the budget (around £50,000).

The Alice Ride is a dark ride through scenes from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. Guests are seated in Cheshire Cat-themed carriages, some of which contain models of characters from the books. The interior scenes are lit up by ultraviolet lights, resulting in vividly colourful settings. They are populated by animatronic recreations of popular characters from the books, such as the White Rabbit and, of course, Alice herself.

While it's not a par with Disney’s own Alice in Wonderland ride (it has an unmistakeably cheesy “British seaside” feel to it), the Alic Ride is still better than most family dark rides in the UK. Kids will enjoy the colourful scenes, and even all-adult groups will find the psychedelic theming amusing.

4. Eurosat (Europa Park, Germany)

Here's another ride that manages to rip-off two Disney attractions in one. And, once again, one of those two attractions is Epcot's Spaceship Earth. Eurosat is housed inside a geodesic sphere that is undeniably similar to the landmark at Walt Disney World's second theme park.

The ride itself is an indoor roller coaster themed around space travel, similar in style to Space Mountain. However, it features longer trains (with 8 cars per train), as well as a spiral lift hill. A techno soundtrack accompanies riders on the coaster, which was built by Europa Park's owner Mack Rides.

The ride experience falls somewhere in-between the "wild-mouse"-style Disneyland and Walt Disney World versions of the ride, and Disneyland Paris' more intense take on the concept.

3. It's a Small World (Suzhou Amusement Land, China)

One of the most-copied Disney rides of all time is It's a Small World, which took the New York's World Fair by storm in 1964 and has since been installed at Disneyland, the Magic Kingdom, Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris and Hong Kong Disneyland. Perhaps the most intruiging and hilarious copycat is this one at Suzhou Amusement Land in China.

As usual, the amazing folks over at Theme Park Review have tracked down the ride and caught it on video. Our favorite features? The zombie-like dolls and the soundtrack, which somehow manages to be even creepier than the Disney original.

2. Global Village (Everland, South Korea)

It sounds like a rip-off of Epcot's World Showcase, but in fact Global Village is another It's a Small World clone. Being housed at one of South Korea's top theme parks, Everland, it is however a much better attempt than the Chinese versions.

The official description of the ride could almost have been lifted straight from a Disneyland guidebook: "Take a journey to the world in a small boat! An exhibition of dolls dressed in folk clothes from 18 countries around the world welcomes you with songs. Enjoy the distinct features and atmosphere of each country and lively facial expressions and gestures of countless dolls."

1. The Black Hole (Alton Towers, UK)

Alton Towers marketed 1984's new addition, The Black Hole, as the UK's equivalent of Space Mountain at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom, which it would resemble both in its space travel theme and its enclosed location. The reality was somewhat less spectacular. Disney’s Space Mountain had been a custom "wild mouse"-style coaster packed with high-tech special effects, built at a cost of $15-20 million in 1975. The Black Hole, meanwhile, was an off-the-shelf Jet Star II model designed by Anton Schwarzkopf, identical to existing coasters at several other parks (the first was built in 1974).

The trains were pulled up a spiralling lift hill towards a model of a spaceman, before plunging down the 27 foot first drop. They then raced through a series of short drops, tight corners and helices before hitting the final brake run. What would have been a relatively tame roller coaster mutated in the pitch black surroundings to become something much more menacing, with guests unable to anticipate the twists and turns. The only lighting came from the few stars and nebulae that comprised the “special effects”.