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Well, it’s been two weeks since I’ve gotten back from my Starcruiser voyage and the experience is still very much at the forefront of my mind. I think of it often, have spent time speculating on what a second voyage would look like and have even had dreams about it! To say it was a singular experience that I will not soon forget would be a gross understatement. With only a few very small nitpicks, my overall impressions were extremely high. In short, it was a complete blast and I’m delighted that I went.
On a personal level, I traveled with two of my oldest friends right after a milestone birthday, so there was that extra sentimental element which made the voyage all the more memorable and special.
But as to the experience itself, really the company deserves enormous credit for what they were able to achieve, a truly unique and utterly immersive experience. On the stated goals of the Starcruiser, one would have to admit that the company hit a bull’s eye.
The Story: Set during the same time frame as Batuu on Galaxy’s Edge, the era of the Starcruiser is, of course, smack dab in the middle of the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy. While it’s few people’s favorite era in Star Wars, only the biggest of cranks could possibly find a reason to complain about that on the starcruiser. Sure, as with the rest of Galaxy’s Edge, it might be nice to imagine it if was set during the “classic” Imperial era of Star Wars. But functionally that would make almost zero difference in terms of the actual experience. After all, the majority of the characters aboard the ship are original to the story of the Halcyon. Only a couple of familiar canonical faces pop up briefly. The rest of the adventure is all new and is there for the passenger to discover and participate in.
The intent behind creating the land of Batuu as the setting for Disney’s Star Wars theme park land was to create a new environment that was the guests to discover. Rather than appealing strictly to nostalgia by recreating an existing setting from the Star Wars canon, the intent behind Galaxy’s Edge was to create a new canvas onto which guests could experience their own unique adventure, one that evoked classic Star Wars stories and settings while also being its own thing.
And that philosophy certainly carried over onto the Halcyon, where we’re introduced to over half-dozen original characters that are there to interact with. For Halcyon guests, the experience creates that blank canvas of familiar Star Wars elements that are theirs to explore and make their own.
How the Game Works: This part may be slightly spoilery, only in terms of the mechanics of how the experience works. I won’t reveal any specifics about the actual characters or the stories that unfold.
The entire voyage is essentially a large interactive game that is there for you to join and take part in. But the level of involvement you have is entirely up to you.
Basically there are a little over half-dozen characters on the ship (in one instance, there is an organization that is comprised of several members, but they are functionally interchangeable.) And there are multiple storylines that exist and will unfold across the two days of the journey that center around or are driven by those characters. All of the characters are involved in different story threads and it’s up to you to choose who you want to interact with the most and which stories you will end up following.
As a guest/passenger, it is incumbent on you to seek out the characters and actively choose to participate in the stories. The actors will endeavor to engage people, to talk with them, to bring them into the story, but really the onus is on the individual to participate and get involved. It’s entirely possible that you could go on the voyage and have almost no involvement with the game, with the stories and characters. If you sit back and literally do nothing, almost nothing will happen. The characters do make an effort to reach out to you at least a little. And the cruise itself is definitely keeping track of what you’re doing at all times, so I’m sure if you were truly not involved at all, they’d probably make more of an effort. But really it’s up to you.
The app is a huge part of the experience and is an essential tool and part of the gameplay. The characters you approach and interact with will pull you into their individual stories and make you a part of it. They will give you assignments, invite you to meetings and events. As you go about this, events will show up in your itinerary on the app that the characters have invited you to. Messages from the characters will appear, asking you questions, arranging meetings, and giving you assignments and/or missions.
These meetings and events will happen at the ship’s various locations across the two days. Some of these missions/assignments will be on your Batuu journey. This was probably the weakest element of the experience. The missions on Batuu are very similar to the app-based games you can play on Batuu as a regular visitor. Basically it’s a lot of going places, doing little puzzles and whatnot. This took more time for me than it should have as the GPS on my phone was glitchy and the game requires you to be in certain areas to activate those game elements. I had to walk around in circles on more than one occasion until it finally recognized I was in the right place.
I wound up participating in basically two different story paths with two different characters at the center of each. There were numerous characters I literally didn’t interact with once and entire storylines and events that I had almost no knowledge of whatsoever. As you go through your story and get involved with the characters, you will actually be excluded from participating in certain events/scenes that you are not a part of. There are some instances where you will be forbidden from accessing a certain room or area for a character interaction or scene if you weren’t already part of that story.
In one instance, I did kind of gate crash a scene that I wasn’t invited to. There were a large number of guests milling about in one area. I asked them what they were doing and absolutely none of them would tell me. (I’m sure at least some of them knew what direction my allegiance was evolving towards.) When the character showed up to begin the meeting, he asked me what I was doing there. I felt bad because, at that moment, I was kind of sucking the air out of what should have been a meeting for this character and all the properly invited guests. However, the character didn’t actually kick me out (which isn’t surprising. I’m sure the cruise doesn’t want to objectively be ***** to people), so he played up being begrudging about me sticking around. When he revealed the plan and the mission the group was about to undertake, I observed it for a little while, but then floated away. This really wasn’t “my” story and I did feel a little bit bad about being an interloper. I had my own stuff to attend to, though, with the stories I was actively participating in.
In another instance, two of us did actively crash another scene we weren’t supposed to be at, although one of my travel partners told a story about how he was expressly prevented from getting access to another scene he wasn’t invited to it. So it seems the policies were inconsistently enforced. And I had a frustrating moment where I just barely missed attending a scene that I was verbally invited to by a character, although the invitation didn’t post to my app (and therefore I wasn’t on the official guest list.) While trying to convince the crew member to let me into the meeting, the door to the room closed and I was told that once closed, the door couldn’t be reopened until the meeting was over. Sigh.
The Immersion/Interaction: This is one area where the experience truly soared. And, full disclosure, I was informed that our cruise was only at approximately 30% capacity. So it’s entirely possible that people on more crowded, cruises might have different (i.e., lesser) experiences. But I personally found the level of immersion and interaction to be extraordinary.
As I said, it’s up to you to engage with the characters. But once you do, you will quickly find yourself pulled into the story.
Here’s one example. At dinner, my friends and I witnessed two characters having a conversation near our table. Then they left. And my friend turned to me and said, “You know, if this was a movie, one of us would follow them!” And that was all the encouragement I needed. I lept from my seat and followed the character into the hall. Only one other guest was there and the character had a long conversation with us during which she gave us a mission to complete. And that was the beginning of an entire story path that threaded through the rest of my trip.
On another occasion, I had (one of many) one-on-one meetings with one of the characters, who was at the center of one of my two evolving storylines. We then walked down the hall and ran smack dab into another major character, whose appearance on the ship was a complete surprise. For a moment, these two characters literally argued over which side I should choose and, in that instance, I literally felt like I was the most important person on the ship, in the story. It was an amazing and delightful moment.
I really gave it my all in terms of trying to play my part (or parts) and I was truly impressed by how well the characters remembered everyone and everything and kept it all straight. I decided, just to maximize my experience, to play two different characters, one on each day. On Day 2, one of my characters asked me if I was going by a different name. I felt bad, as he had done such an amazing job at memorizing my character’s alias on Day 1 and bringing me so fully into the story that I didn’t want to burden him with the silly detail of learning a new name. But he leaned into all and said, “Well, okay, I’ll call you by your new name, but between you and me, I still remember who you really are.”
The actors were basically amazing at everything. They were consummate pros at playing their characters, they were master improvisers, they all had a deep knowledge of Star Wars lore and they would meet you at your level and then raise your game. It was exhilarating trying to keep up with them and watch as they matched and then one upped you, pulling you that much deeper into your story and making everything feel that much more “real.”
The Food: The food ranged from “okay” to “fine” to “pretty good.” Nothing spectacular, but it was sufficient and there was always plenty of food on hand if you needed it. There were always plenty of snacks on hand, endless free coffee/espresso drinks available in the bar and even blue and green milk on tap (made fresh daily!) I took ample advantage of all, but I really should have had more blue and green milk than I did. Alas!
The cocktails were better (though I ordered one drink at dinner that I found utterly bland and swapped it out for another.) I actually drank far, far less on the cruise than I expected. Part of that was due to not wanting to rack up a huge bar bill.
It was also partly due to the fact that the late night party atmosphere I assumed would be in play both nights never really materialized. The Sublight Lounge was very subdued both nights after the day’s activities, with only a handful of patrons present. I did manage to meet a handful of people in the bar each night and enjoy some conversation, particularly on night two. However, my travel companions turned in relatively early both nights. While I did stay up later, I certainly didn’t close down the place. In fact, on night 1, I think the lounge was virtually deserted by the time I left while there were only 2-3 groups still out and about on night 2. While I was expecting the bar to be a source of lively, late night carousing on both evenings (and have heard from others that this was the case on their own cruises), I can’t say I felt disappointed by that. The days were so full of activity and stimuli, calling it a (relatively) early night wasn’t the worst idea.
The Other Passengers:
As I said, the cruise was at very low capacity and the rest of the passengers, on balance, didn’t seem to be playing as hard as I was. With my experience with regular visitors to Galaxy’s Edge, I had assumed that the guests on the starcruiser would be hardcore. One of the reasons why I brought silly gifts to give away was because I figured the other guests would have trinkets and do-dads to give away themselves (I have been given many such gifts from other guests in galaxy’s edge the past year: pins, necklaces, credit chips, both plastic and metal, etc.) Sadly, none of that was happening on my ship, although a crew member did gift me with a necklace once she heard I was giving away freebies and we had a nice little trade. I was also given a small gift by one of the characters after the finale that related to my story and, while it was a small gesture, I was over the moon getting it.
That said, at least 40 to 50% of the passengers were in cosplay, which certainly helped with the immersion. Many people have asked if having people in “regular” clothes would spoil the experience, but they really don’t. They just kind of fade into the background and are very easy to ignore.
Part of me was a little disappointed there wasn’t more playing with the other passengers (as opposed to the outstanding level of play experienced with the cast.) But that really is going to vary voyage to voyage. The downside of having a somewhat less involved group was that I was able to get that much more personal attention from the characters who, as I said, really did make me feel like I was the most important person there on numerous occasions.
The Environment: The Halcyon itself is lovely and comfortable. It’s big, but not too big. You can’t really get lost in it and it can feel intimate at times. The Sublight Lounge is a good place to hang with a lightly “classy” vibe. It’s not all that big, but was certainly big enough to accommodate our passengers and was never truly crowded (I do shudder to think how it would be on a cruise with 3 times the passengers, though.) There’s the “holo sabacc” table, which only seats 4, but again, it was easy to find time to sit and play and the game was an amusing diversion, though the “holo” effect isn’t all that great.
The main dining room is a little bit plain looking, unfortunately. It definitely feels a little bit more like a cafeteria than an elegant dining room, but it gets the job done.
The main area of the ship is the atrium, which is lovely and is where a lot of the action in the story unfolds. It is expansive and comfortable and also includes a concierge desk and gift shop. The bridge is attached in front and is actually empty for large swaths of time, with vast views of space out the large windows.
We were in a standard cabin which was definitely just a little snug with three people, but you don’t really spend any time in the room beyond sleeping. The cabin is equipped with a window to space, two berths (which I was very excited to sleep in) and a bed. There’s an interactive droid console on the wall, but all of us found the droid to be more annoying/frustrating to interact with and barely spoke to her. Although I have had friends tell me they enjoyed interacting with it more than we did. I guess you can even get assignments or missions from the droid, but we didn’t bother.
There are probably 3 or 4 other important themed rooms in the ship where storylines and interactions unfold, like the engine room, a cargo room and the lightsaber training room. The theming and set design in all of these is consistently quality.
The overall vibe is that the Halcyon feels like a comfortable and expensive, but not quite first class cruise. It’s elegant and lovely but not overly intimidating or posh.
Other Events: There are a number of random games and events during the cruise that you can participate in if you wish. The only one we joined in was the sabacc tournament, but I was knocked out fairly quickly. One of the other games is similar to Bingo, another is like a Newly Wed type game. There was also a droid race, which I would have enjoyed, but showed up just as it ended. But I was plenty busy with the business of my stories that I didn’t have time for most of this stuff (and much of it, like the Bingo and Newly Wed games, didn’t interest me, anyway.) But there are other ways to pass the time if you aren’t going hardcore into the immersion.
Overall: At the risk of repeating myself, the level of storytelling, immersion and interaction was really top notch and absolutely delivered on the promise of the experience. The experience culminates in an impressive finale sequence during which all of the passengers are gathered to watch the stories come to their epic and thrilling conclusion. While this is all very delightful and the showmanship is impressive, I found the smaller moments of interaction to be even more meaningful and entertaining along the way. And for all of the technical accomplishments that Disney achieved with the experience, really it was the actors who were consistently the single most impressive element in the entire experience.
While the cost is certainly quite high, I actually would consider going back. I had such a good time and there are many more unexplored pathways I could choose on a second voyage to make the experience quite different from the one I had the first time. I really think you could go three times and have enough new and different elements each time so that you wouldn’t feel like you were repeating yourself. Ultimately, it was a complete blast, but the experience really is what you make of it. I tried hard to really buy into the artifice and the immersion. I was definitely playing a character (or characters) and I wanted to believe I was really “there.” And once you start, the experience makes it easy for you. The Halcyon will meet you at your own level of enthusiasm. So you’ll get back what you put into it. Go in with the right attitude and it’ll be a playground like no other.
On a personal level, I traveled with two of my oldest friends right after a milestone birthday, so there was that extra sentimental element which made the voyage all the more memorable and special.
But as to the experience itself, really the company deserves enormous credit for what they were able to achieve, a truly unique and utterly immersive experience. On the stated goals of the Starcruiser, one would have to admit that the company hit a bull’s eye.
The Story: Set during the same time frame as Batuu on Galaxy’s Edge, the era of the Starcruiser is, of course, smack dab in the middle of the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy. While it’s few people’s favorite era in Star Wars, only the biggest of cranks could possibly find a reason to complain about that on the starcruiser. Sure, as with the rest of Galaxy’s Edge, it might be nice to imagine it if was set during the “classic” Imperial era of Star Wars. But functionally that would make almost zero difference in terms of the actual experience. After all, the majority of the characters aboard the ship are original to the story of the Halcyon. Only a couple of familiar canonical faces pop up briefly. The rest of the adventure is all new and is there for the passenger to discover and participate in.
The intent behind creating the land of Batuu as the setting for Disney’s Star Wars theme park land was to create a new environment that was the guests to discover. Rather than appealing strictly to nostalgia by recreating an existing setting from the Star Wars canon, the intent behind Galaxy’s Edge was to create a new canvas onto which guests could experience their own unique adventure, one that evoked classic Star Wars stories and settings while also being its own thing.
And that philosophy certainly carried over onto the Halcyon, where we’re introduced to over half-dozen original characters that are there to interact with. For Halcyon guests, the experience creates that blank canvas of familiar Star Wars elements that are theirs to explore and make their own.
How the Game Works: This part may be slightly spoilery, only in terms of the mechanics of how the experience works. I won’t reveal any specifics about the actual characters or the stories that unfold.
The entire voyage is essentially a large interactive game that is there for you to join and take part in. But the level of involvement you have is entirely up to you.
Basically there are a little over half-dozen characters on the ship (in one instance, there is an organization that is comprised of several members, but they are functionally interchangeable.) And there are multiple storylines that exist and will unfold across the two days of the journey that center around or are driven by those characters. All of the characters are involved in different story threads and it’s up to you to choose who you want to interact with the most and which stories you will end up following.
As a guest/passenger, it is incumbent on you to seek out the characters and actively choose to participate in the stories. The actors will endeavor to engage people, to talk with them, to bring them into the story, but really the onus is on the individual to participate and get involved. It’s entirely possible that you could go on the voyage and have almost no involvement with the game, with the stories and characters. If you sit back and literally do nothing, almost nothing will happen. The characters do make an effort to reach out to you at least a little. And the cruise itself is definitely keeping track of what you’re doing at all times, so I’m sure if you were truly not involved at all, they’d probably make more of an effort. But really it’s up to you.
The app is a huge part of the experience and is an essential tool and part of the gameplay. The characters you approach and interact with will pull you into their individual stories and make you a part of it. They will give you assignments, invite you to meetings and events. As you go about this, events will show up in your itinerary on the app that the characters have invited you to. Messages from the characters will appear, asking you questions, arranging meetings, and giving you assignments and/or missions.
These meetings and events will happen at the ship’s various locations across the two days. Some of these missions/assignments will be on your Batuu journey. This was probably the weakest element of the experience. The missions on Batuu are very similar to the app-based games you can play on Batuu as a regular visitor. Basically it’s a lot of going places, doing little puzzles and whatnot. This took more time for me than it should have as the GPS on my phone was glitchy and the game requires you to be in certain areas to activate those game elements. I had to walk around in circles on more than one occasion until it finally recognized I was in the right place.
I wound up participating in basically two different story paths with two different characters at the center of each. There were numerous characters I literally didn’t interact with once and entire storylines and events that I had almost no knowledge of whatsoever. As you go through your story and get involved with the characters, you will actually be excluded from participating in certain events/scenes that you are not a part of. There are some instances where you will be forbidden from accessing a certain room or area for a character interaction or scene if you weren’t already part of that story.
In one instance, I did kind of gate crash a scene that I wasn’t invited to. There were a large number of guests milling about in one area. I asked them what they were doing and absolutely none of them would tell me. (I’m sure at least some of them knew what direction my allegiance was evolving towards.) When the character showed up to begin the meeting, he asked me what I was doing there. I felt bad because, at that moment, I was kind of sucking the air out of what should have been a meeting for this character and all the properly invited guests. However, the character didn’t actually kick me out (which isn’t surprising. I’m sure the cruise doesn’t want to objectively be ***** to people), so he played up being begrudging about me sticking around. When he revealed the plan and the mission the group was about to undertake, I observed it for a little while, but then floated away. This really wasn’t “my” story and I did feel a little bit bad about being an interloper. I had my own stuff to attend to, though, with the stories I was actively participating in.
In another instance, two of us did actively crash another scene we weren’t supposed to be at, although one of my travel partners told a story about how he was expressly prevented from getting access to another scene he wasn’t invited to it. So it seems the policies were inconsistently enforced. And I had a frustrating moment where I just barely missed attending a scene that I was verbally invited to by a character, although the invitation didn’t post to my app (and therefore I wasn’t on the official guest list.) While trying to convince the crew member to let me into the meeting, the door to the room closed and I was told that once closed, the door couldn’t be reopened until the meeting was over. Sigh.
The Immersion/Interaction: This is one area where the experience truly soared. And, full disclosure, I was informed that our cruise was only at approximately 30% capacity. So it’s entirely possible that people on more crowded, cruises might have different (i.e., lesser) experiences. But I personally found the level of immersion and interaction to be extraordinary.
As I said, it’s up to you to engage with the characters. But once you do, you will quickly find yourself pulled into the story.
Here’s one example. At dinner, my friends and I witnessed two characters having a conversation near our table. Then they left. And my friend turned to me and said, “You know, if this was a movie, one of us would follow them!” And that was all the encouragement I needed. I lept from my seat and followed the character into the hall. Only one other guest was there and the character had a long conversation with us during which she gave us a mission to complete. And that was the beginning of an entire story path that threaded through the rest of my trip.
On another occasion, I had (one of many) one-on-one meetings with one of the characters, who was at the center of one of my two evolving storylines. We then walked down the hall and ran smack dab into another major character, whose appearance on the ship was a complete surprise. For a moment, these two characters literally argued over which side I should choose and, in that instance, I literally felt like I was the most important person on the ship, in the story. It was an amazing and delightful moment.
I really gave it my all in terms of trying to play my part (or parts) and I was truly impressed by how well the characters remembered everyone and everything and kept it all straight. I decided, just to maximize my experience, to play two different characters, one on each day. On Day 2, one of my characters asked me if I was going by a different name. I felt bad, as he had done such an amazing job at memorizing my character’s alias on Day 1 and bringing me so fully into the story that I didn’t want to burden him with the silly detail of learning a new name. But he leaned into all and said, “Well, okay, I’ll call you by your new name, but between you and me, I still remember who you really are.”
The actors were basically amazing at everything. They were consummate pros at playing their characters, they were master improvisers, they all had a deep knowledge of Star Wars lore and they would meet you at your level and then raise your game. It was exhilarating trying to keep up with them and watch as they matched and then one upped you, pulling you that much deeper into your story and making everything feel that much more “real.”
The Food: The food ranged from “okay” to “fine” to “pretty good.” Nothing spectacular, but it was sufficient and there was always plenty of food on hand if you needed it. There were always plenty of snacks on hand, endless free coffee/espresso drinks available in the bar and even blue and green milk on tap (made fresh daily!) I took ample advantage of all, but I really should have had more blue and green milk than I did. Alas!
The cocktails were better (though I ordered one drink at dinner that I found utterly bland and swapped it out for another.) I actually drank far, far less on the cruise than I expected. Part of that was due to not wanting to rack up a huge bar bill.
It was also partly due to the fact that the late night party atmosphere I assumed would be in play both nights never really materialized. The Sublight Lounge was very subdued both nights after the day’s activities, with only a handful of patrons present. I did manage to meet a handful of people in the bar each night and enjoy some conversation, particularly on night two. However, my travel companions turned in relatively early both nights. While I did stay up later, I certainly didn’t close down the place. In fact, on night 1, I think the lounge was virtually deserted by the time I left while there were only 2-3 groups still out and about on night 2. While I was expecting the bar to be a source of lively, late night carousing on both evenings (and have heard from others that this was the case on their own cruises), I can’t say I felt disappointed by that. The days were so full of activity and stimuli, calling it a (relatively) early night wasn’t the worst idea.
The Other Passengers:
As I said, the cruise was at very low capacity and the rest of the passengers, on balance, didn’t seem to be playing as hard as I was. With my experience with regular visitors to Galaxy’s Edge, I had assumed that the guests on the starcruiser would be hardcore. One of the reasons why I brought silly gifts to give away was because I figured the other guests would have trinkets and do-dads to give away themselves (I have been given many such gifts from other guests in galaxy’s edge the past year: pins, necklaces, credit chips, both plastic and metal, etc.) Sadly, none of that was happening on my ship, although a crew member did gift me with a necklace once she heard I was giving away freebies and we had a nice little trade. I was also given a small gift by one of the characters after the finale that related to my story and, while it was a small gesture, I was over the moon getting it.
That said, at least 40 to 50% of the passengers were in cosplay, which certainly helped with the immersion. Many people have asked if having people in “regular” clothes would spoil the experience, but they really don’t. They just kind of fade into the background and are very easy to ignore.
Part of me was a little disappointed there wasn’t more playing with the other passengers (as opposed to the outstanding level of play experienced with the cast.) But that really is going to vary voyage to voyage. The downside of having a somewhat less involved group was that I was able to get that much more personal attention from the characters who, as I said, really did make me feel like I was the most important person there on numerous occasions.
The Environment: The Halcyon itself is lovely and comfortable. It’s big, but not too big. You can’t really get lost in it and it can feel intimate at times. The Sublight Lounge is a good place to hang with a lightly “classy” vibe. It’s not all that big, but was certainly big enough to accommodate our passengers and was never truly crowded (I do shudder to think how it would be on a cruise with 3 times the passengers, though.) There’s the “holo sabacc” table, which only seats 4, but again, it was easy to find time to sit and play and the game was an amusing diversion, though the “holo” effect isn’t all that great.
The main dining room is a little bit plain looking, unfortunately. It definitely feels a little bit more like a cafeteria than an elegant dining room, but it gets the job done.
The main area of the ship is the atrium, which is lovely and is where a lot of the action in the story unfolds. It is expansive and comfortable and also includes a concierge desk and gift shop. The bridge is attached in front and is actually empty for large swaths of time, with vast views of space out the large windows.
We were in a standard cabin which was definitely just a little snug with three people, but you don’t really spend any time in the room beyond sleeping. The cabin is equipped with a window to space, two berths (which I was very excited to sleep in) and a bed. There’s an interactive droid console on the wall, but all of us found the droid to be more annoying/frustrating to interact with and barely spoke to her. Although I have had friends tell me they enjoyed interacting with it more than we did. I guess you can even get assignments or missions from the droid, but we didn’t bother.
There are probably 3 or 4 other important themed rooms in the ship where storylines and interactions unfold, like the engine room, a cargo room and the lightsaber training room. The theming and set design in all of these is consistently quality.
The overall vibe is that the Halcyon feels like a comfortable and expensive, but not quite first class cruise. It’s elegant and lovely but not overly intimidating or posh.
Other Events: There are a number of random games and events during the cruise that you can participate in if you wish. The only one we joined in was the sabacc tournament, but I was knocked out fairly quickly. One of the other games is similar to Bingo, another is like a Newly Wed type game. There was also a droid race, which I would have enjoyed, but showed up just as it ended. But I was plenty busy with the business of my stories that I didn’t have time for most of this stuff (and much of it, like the Bingo and Newly Wed games, didn’t interest me, anyway.) But there are other ways to pass the time if you aren’t going hardcore into the immersion.
Overall: At the risk of repeating myself, the level of storytelling, immersion and interaction was really top notch and absolutely delivered on the promise of the experience. The experience culminates in an impressive finale sequence during which all of the passengers are gathered to watch the stories come to their epic and thrilling conclusion. While this is all very delightful and the showmanship is impressive, I found the smaller moments of interaction to be even more meaningful and entertaining along the way. And for all of the technical accomplishments that Disney achieved with the experience, really it was the actors who were consistently the single most impressive element in the entire experience.
While the cost is certainly quite high, I actually would consider going back. I had such a good time and there are many more unexplored pathways I could choose on a second voyage to make the experience quite different from the one I had the first time. I really think you could go three times and have enough new and different elements each time so that you wouldn’t feel like you were repeating yourself. Ultimately, it was a complete blast, but the experience really is what you make of it. I tried hard to really buy into the artifice and the immersion. I was definitely playing a character (or characters) and I wanted to believe I was really “there.” And once you start, the experience makes it easy for you. The Halcyon will meet you at your own level of enthusiasm. So you’ll get back what you put into it. Go in with the right attitude and it’ll be a playground like no other.
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