But people exist that check the building permit sites in the Orlando area, so even if they were sitting around, talking about ideas, it was those plans people find and talk about that really started the excitement.
One would HOPE that they sat around talking about it, LOL.
But announcing at the start of that sit around process, like it seems Disney does, is just silly.
(And honestly they need to get away from thisLand and thatLand in terms of naming. Avatarland and StarWarsLand just sound silly.)
(but then I think the HK and Nintendo and etc stuff at Uni sounds silly, too)
(and I'm still in mourning for what Gringott's COULD have been...every time we watch HP7 inside Gringotts I remember what I thought Gringott's was going to be and I get sad again...)
They did get away from "Avatarland". That's the boards nickname for it the real name is
Pandora: The World of Avatar. I'm sure Star Wars will get a similar name. But to the GP it will be Avatarland and Starwars Land.
Like you said, the difference with Universal's mode of operation is by the time there are plans to be pulled they are reasonably close to being finished. For example, if the after the fact rumors are true, Diagon Alley was on the drawing board the day Hogmead opened (along with a couple of smaller HP phase 2's). The plan to go big with Diagon Alley supposedly got green lit shortly after Hogsmead opened. Instead of announcing and taking away from Hogsmead, they finalized the plans, closed Jaws, Demolished Jaws, and started construction before announcing Diagon Alley.
Yes, As soon as plans started show up the boards, especially Orlando United, were a buzz of excitement about what is it going to be. And it wasn't until Diagon Alley opened that we knew exactly was Gringotts was going to be. In the case, the rumor mill may have hurt Universal. Like you said, people were expecting more from Gringotts. People knew who the builder was and saw some of their concept videos and assumed Gringotts would be more roller coaster. By comparison, we had an entire Ridethrough of 7DMT before it opened so more people knew going in what the ride was going to be.
With HK and Nintendo, I think Universal is looking at going more towards Disney's core audience of younger kids. With Nintendo, it done properly, it has the possibility of being current to the younger crowd and nostalgic to the parents at the same time. Mario Brothers was originally launched in 1983. So, a lot of the parents the parents grew up on Mario. The latest Super Mario game is coming out this year with 20 Super Mario games in between not even counting the Mario Karts and other related properties. Zelda has 16 games spanning from 1986 to the present. At this point, almost everyone under 50 was school age (under 18) for at least part of this franchise.
From a synergy perspective Nintendo combined with some Play Station and Microsoft (Xbox and PC) IP's would make a strong core for a third gate. USF for TV and Movies, IOA for written works- books, comic book, funny papers (I know the new Kong doesn't fit) and the new park for video games. Unfortunately, most people don't think that's going to happen.
