does any one know anything about this?

[Tink#64]

OMG! I think this would be totally amazing! Both of my DS's have DS's! How cool! That would really change the touring plans wouldn't it! DH carries a small sling style back pack & DS would fit in it no problem! I would love for this to be up & running for our trip this fall!

[shadowden]

...those of us who do not already own one, nor have any intention of doing so. If they integrate this technology to allow for ressies and FPs, it puts those guests who don't own these (and I am quite sure there are more of us then there are of you) at a HUGE disadvantage when visiting. Seems more like an inhibitor than anything else.

Besides, a little exercise never hurt anyone!

[Cinderelley]

I would love it if they did this. The kids have one and I even have my own. It would make life so much easier when they want to go do something and then meet up with us again. We could whip them out, say "okay it should take you about x amount of time, and then we'll meet at such and such place" That would sure beat the current system -
Scenarion - we're in frontierland

Kids "Mom, we're going to go ride Space Mountain. Then we want to go on Pirates with you again."

Me "Okay. Call me and let me know how long you'll be when you get to Space Mountain."

15 minutes later the phone rings - "We'll be there in about 45 minutes"

Me "I'll be waiting there for you."

30 minutes after that I'm nervous that they'll get done early and just head to PIrates. In actuality, it takes an hour and I spend 30 minutes doing nothing but waiting for them until they call me and tell me they're done with Space Mountain and they're on their way.

I don't think making ADRs with a DS would be an unfair advantage. It would be just like pulling out a cell phone in the park and calling for an ADR. What would be really great with the ADRs would be the ability to have all the ADR information that you've already made come up on the DS screen. That way everyone would know when and where you're eating that day.

[thrillme]

This would be AWESOME...I'm quite certian it'll be a "bring your own" DS. Some people have Pal Mickeys, some people have cell phones, some people have PDA's...If the technology is there and you want it. Oh my...we have a DS for each member of the family. It's wonderful if we have a LONG wait somewhere. It really makes the time go by a LOT faster.

Be sure to bring ZipLock Baggies for these puppies.

[mjstaceyuofm]

Call me old school... but I don't like it. I don't want my kids carrying around their DS's to potentially get lost or wet. Not to mention the fact that this just adds a whole other level of complexity to touring the parks....

Does anyone else think that Disney is over-doing it with these types of things?

First fastpass, then crazy dining scenarios and now (potentially) this. Oye vay.

[MegaDisney]

It will be a less anoying Pal Mickey based on the description.

Except when the guest next to you in the Hall of Presidents (insert any show or attraction) is busy checking the wait times and FP times at various attractions. I am sure the illuminated screen will be distracting in dark rides, etc.

I think this is just silly. I want to relax when I am on vacation, I don't need another electronic device to keep me from enjoying the park and the company of the friends and family I am with, but thats just me.

[MegaDisney]

We have a DS for each member of the family. It's wonderful if we have a LONG wait somewhere. It really makes the time go by a LOT faster.

What happend to talking to your friends and family while in line?

Maybe I am just a cranky old man, but all this technology does nothing to bring people together.

[Grizz16]

I don't like to carry anything in the parks, I fold my guidemap and put it in my pocket. I also don't buy any souvenirs until I'm ready to leave for the day.

[Cinderelley]

Maybe I am just a cranky old man, but all this technology does nothing to bring people together.

I really have to disagree with this statement. Just one example - when I take my kids to the doctor, we take a DS with us. While waiting in the waiting room, we can draw pictures on the DS where each person adds a little to the picture. We usually laugh & joke about how bad my drawing is. We can play a game against each other or try to solve puzzle games together.
Even if you have separate DSs, you can send things to each other (kind've like e-mail), and laugh about them while you're standing there. Having a DS doesn't necessarily mean that each person is wrapped up in their own game.

[WDWfanatic742]

Just as a note, they are now testing the system at the Magic Kingdom. From what I have read, if you enter the park on the right side you have a better chance of testing it. The system is still in the beta stage however...

[DisFan01]

This is awesome! That really is a great idea! I'll try to enter on the right the next time I go...

[elmjimmlm]

I hope that this would also work on the shows...Last year we waited in line for Fantasmic for an hour only to walk thru and be told that it was at capacity...That is such a waist of time...It would be nice to know about these things beforehand...

[Cinderelley]

Just as a note, they are now testing the system at the Magic Kingdom. From what I have read, if you enter the park on the right side you have a better chance of testing it. The system is still in the beta stage however...

Are they giving guests a DS or are people bringing their own into the park or is it both?

[Figment!]

Here's a run-down of the device and the testing based on recent Guest reports:

Disney's Magic Connection

This new interactive park offering is currently in a Guest test mode. Guests entering the Magic Kingdom are randomly selected to test this interactive Guide. Selected Guests are given a modified Nintendo DS that has the Disney Magic Connection loaded on it.

While the DS unit itself reportedly operates like other devices, the device appears to have been modified to only work with the Disney Magic Connection software. The device has also been configured to go into sleep mode at the end of most ride queues to prevent their use by Guests during attractions.

When Guests first turn the device on they are asked to enter the names and age ranges of all of the members of their group.

Disney's Magic Connection offers Guests 5 main interactive services: Park Map, Park Offerings, Characters, Wish List and Games and Trivia.

Park Map

Guests can use this feature to browse an interactive map of the park that shows and select icons for general information about individual locations around the park. When Guests select individual attractions they are shown the current wait time, FastPass Distribution period, if the ride is closed for rehab and any height restrictions. The map feature also shows Guests where they currently are in the park on the map.

The park map also serves as the main screen of the device. From this screen Guests can select 4 icons to acsess the four other services.

Park Offerings

This service lists the park's Attractions, Shows, Dining locations, and Guest Service locations. Guests can select specific offerings from these lists and inact a "path" feature that will produce a dotted line on the map starting where there Guest is and ending at the attraction or closest offering of that type.

The attraction list notifies Guests of the current wait time on the main list. If a Guest selects an attraction from the list they are shown the current wait time, FastPass Distribution period, if the ride is closed for rehab and any height restrictions when an individual attraction is selected. Guests may also select attractions to add to their Wish List.

Characters

This service lists all of the Characters that may appear in the Magic Kingdom. Although selecting a Character from the list does bring up the time period in which the character may appear that day, it refers Guests to see a Cast Member for actual appearance times. Guests may also select Characters to add to their Wish List.

Wish List

The service allows Guests keep track of attractions and characters they have added to their Wish List and check them off after they have experienced them. If Guests are near an attraction or character meet & greet that is on their Wish List, the device will notify them that they are near an offering they wanted to experience with scrolling text on the screen.

Games & Trivia

This service allows Guests to play games based on Jungle Cruise, Space Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and answer Fantasyland Trivia. In order to "unlock" each of the attraction themed games, Guests must be standing near the attraction or in the attraction queue. That Fantasyland Trivia is immediately available to play and keeps score for each member of the party. The trivia questions are selected based on the age group selected for each member of the party when the device was turned on.

[EPCOTBoy]

Hey gang! I had the privelage to test one on Saturday and although I didn't know anything about it going into it, I was very excited because I love Disney, technology, AND my Nintendo DS. At first I thought that I would need mine at the park with me (which I didn't) but much to my delight, I was informed that they provide the unit and necessary software. I learned about it by approaching a CM just inside the MK main entrance. There were a couple CMs standing around in the "old time" Main Street costumes (not the front admissions costumes). I saw them holding a clipboard with a flyer on the back which showed a Nintendo DS. Being the curious person I am, I asked them what it was about and was invited to try one for the day. It's called the "Disney Magic Connection" right now but the name could change.

My guests and I were escorted to an area in the old Kodak Picture Shop on Main Street (opposite of City Hall) to sign up for the testing. They took down my credit card number and personal info as a precaution in case I didn't return the Nintendo DS since the entire unit is about $300 with the added accessory and software. (There was no charge or hold put on the card and they gave me back the sheet with the info when I returned the unit.) I was provided a white Nintendo DS with an attached gray housing that added features and prevented the user from taking it off of the DS and altering the software or playing other games. It included a soft neck strap which made it easier to carry around since the unit is too bulky to fit in any pocket. Fortunately the unit is fairly lightweight (about the weight of a medium sized camera) and having it hanging around your neck makes it easily accessible throughout the day.

After a brief instruction period, I was off to enjoy the park with my new interactive guide map. Now here's a little rundown about the unit and it's physical features.

-For those unfamiliar with the Nintendo DS, it has two bright and crisp screens and one of them is a touch screen where the finger or an included stylus can be used.
-The Nintendo DS also has WiFi (wireless internet) capabilities like that of laptop (although you can't access the internet on these units).
-The added peripheral appears to contain the Magic Connection software which is probably similar to a game cartridge. This is likely what runs the main program.
-The added housing also provides what I believe is a GPS navigation unit and two infrared sensors.

The main feature of the unit is its ability to act as an in-park GPS/Navigation. The on-screen map will show a small red dot to represent where you are in the park. If there is a particular attraction, restauant, restroom, ATM, or other location you would like to visit, you simply select the destination from the menu and touch a travel button. This will then create a path of red dots showing you on the map the best way to travel to your destination. I did not use this feature often because I am very familiar with my way around the park. Others that are familiar would probably not use this feature much eaither; however I could see the benefit to a new guest who wants to maximize their ability to get around the park. In my experience when I did try it, I found that it worked well most of the time. The only problems I had with locations were in Frontierland. For some reason, the unit would not recognize that I was in the area of BTMRR (which created another small prroblem to be mentioned later).The unit also will give you information on when certain shows and parades are performing.

Another main feature of this unit is the ability to provide summaries on rides and restaurants. Although restaurants typically show a list of a few menu items, the ride information was much more helpful. If you clicked on Space Mountain, not only would it describe the ride, but it would also show you the current stand-by wait time and the current FastPass distribution times! This allowed my guests and I to see which attractions we wanted to go to based on the wait times without walking to it first. I did use this feature often and always found the wait times on the unit to correspond with the times posted at the rides. The FastPass distribution times were normally accurate as well with only one exception encountered. We went to Space Mountain to get fastpasses thinking we could return at 2:30-3:30 but found when we got there about 10 minutes later, the times were actually 4:10-5:10. That was defintely a considerable difference but we didn't let it bother us.

One of the most beloved featues of the unit amongst our group (six men & women in mid 20's) was the unit's games, particularly the trivia game. The unit itself has 5 playable games included. But when you first pick up the unit, the only one accessible is "Fantasyland Trivia" which is a trivia game about general Disney knowledge. Some questions are kinda easy and some you just have to guess on so there is a decent balance to the game. What makes the game so much fun is that it includes everyone in your group. (When you initially setup the unit, you enter the names of everyone in the group.) The game will allow you to use the guest names in your unit to have everyone participate. The questions are multiple choice and it is designed to have the unit passed around the group with each person getting to ask AND answer questions. When the park is busy and the lines are long (like they were for us on Saturday), this is the PERFECT relief for the frustration and boredom of waiting in lines. Depending on what they will eventually charge for this amenity, this feature alone could make it worth the rental price!

I did mention that there are 4 other playable games locked inside the unit. The games are: Winnie the Pooh, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Space Mountain, and Jungle Cruise. The way to unlock these games is to physically visit and ride the attraction corresponding with the game while wearing the unit. Unfortunately, I did not get to test all of the games. I tried unlocking Winnie the Pooh by just standing in the entrance but it did not work. Since I did not go on the ride, I don't know where in the attraction it would have unlocked this. However, when I was standing at the entrance of Space Mountain to get my FastPass, I noticed that the Space Mountain game became unlocked even though I didn't go on the ride. I did not go to the Jungle Cruise and since my unit was having trouble orienting itself around Frontierland, the BTMRR game was never unlocked even though I went on the ride.

So the only additional game I unlocked was Space Mountain. the game itself was OK. It was a generic spaceship game in which you had to navigate a spaceship to specific points and past certain obstacles. There are only three levels but two of them are challenging enough to keep a child (or adult) occupied for a several minutes. I was more frstrated with the game than entertained so I didn't play it much.

Well, that about sums up my experience with the features of the Disney Magic Connection. When leaving the park, I returned the unit back to where I had gotten it. I took a 5-minute survey of my experience with the unit and was not charged for using it. For being a tester, I was given a Disney pin and a voucher for each guest in my party to receive a free 5x7 photo through the PhotoPass website (shipping + handling free)!

I think that this is a great program and I am thrilled to see Disney embracing technology and implementing it in the parks. There is little information available regarding the future of the unit since it is only in a testing phase. I don't think that it will be likely for them to rent out just the necessary attachment if you already have a DS. I think they will keep it on their DS units only to avoid compatibility and technical issues. The unit appears to be designed for the purposes of Information, Orientation, and Entertainment and although I only spent a few hours with it, it looks like it's off to a great start and it can do all of those things moderately well (especially entertain while in line!) I hope that it will be developed for use in all of the parks (not just MK) as I think that this would help people find their way around MGM & Animal Kingdom better and help guests find all of the great forms of entertainment Epcot has to offer. Hopefully they keep the rental price at or under $25. If it's much more than that, I could see it being overpriced with it's current set of features. I really enjoyed using it and for a regular park visitor, I was impressed.


Here are some ideas (of mine) for other features that the unit could do:
-Information regarding seating availability for the sit-down restaurants (possibly even the ability to wirelessly make a reservation).
-Make a "resort-wide" unit that could be used while away from the parks. (Think about picking it up when you check in and using the same one throughout your stay and just checking out a park-specific cartridge is necessary).
-More trivia questions (not just Disney specific). And particularly more attraction specific questions. So say you go to Hall of Presidents, you could unlock a set of U.S. History questions, animal questions at Jungle Cruise, space questions at Space Mountain, international awareness questions at IASW, pirate questions at PotC, etc.....
-Unlockable rewards such as virtual fastpasses, VIP seating, Hidden Mickey guides, etc...
-Instant message chat to other units in the park (to use as a means of communication if there are mutliple units amongst groups that are split up from each other.)


I hope that all of you will get the opportunity to use this someday! I know this was a long read but I was very excited about sharing my experience with you all. Please let me know if you have any questions!

[fielin]

Moderators, feel free to delete this message if it does not agree with the terms of service, but I thought this might be of interest for fellow Disney/DS lovers.

Joystiq has an short article about the Magic Connection, and there are a few photos !

http://www.dsfanboy.com/2008/01/22/t...sney-ds-guide/

Looks exciting !

[meldan98]

On a similar note, I was emailed a survey recently that asked about a similar service for the Disney Cruise Line. This would be cool if they could make it interactive, to include a service to be notified when you have a kid in the kids program.

[magicofdisney]

Moderators, feel free to delete this message if it does not agree with the terms of service, but I thought this might be of interest for fellow Disney/DS lovers.

Joystiq has an short article about the Magic Connection, and there are a few photos !

http://www.dsfanboy.com/2008/01/22/t...sney-ds-guide/

Looks exciting !

That is so cool! I can't believe no one thought of this sooner (maybe they did...). I can't wait to find out when it's active. I just got a GPS for Christmas and I love using that thing. Those screen shots are very intriguing.

[poohbearlover15]

That would be awesome! I have a DS and it would be very cool to have a disney map on it! I hop they go through with this!

[MickeyChick]

We tested it on January 27 and it was awesome. It didn't cost us anything to use it for the day, though we did leave a credit card number in case our unit was damaged. I scanned the little directions booklet thingee they gave us with it.

For filling out a survey at the end of the day, they gave us codes for 4 free 5x7s from photopass and a limited edition pin.