Greenlawler
10-13-2008, 02:28 AM
Let me start by saying we had a wonderful time in all the parks. DL and DW are so different! I was very surprised just how different they were. I realize this may be long but I tend to be very detail oriented.
As far as the characters go there is no doubt that Disney World has the numbers. There are two more parks after all, but CM's at DL told us one reason they had less characters out was the economy. Apparently many characters have dissapeared from DL and DCA lately. Of course we were also there during the "off season". During our stay on a typical day at California Adventure they only had 10-16 characters out total in the whole park. At DL we could see 25-30. To put that in perspective during our stay on a typical day, just from our experiance at DW: at Animal Kingdom we could see 20-25 characters, 20-25 at Epcot, 25-35 at MK, and anywhere from 30-40 at DHS, (if you catch the late afternoon meet and greet character bonanza by the hat) just a rough estimate. There were no characters at all in the entire Boardwalk area at DCA, an area that is almost half of the park. DCA needs more character! Although the villains area was a nice touch, I wonder how many characters would have been out if not for Halloween. I do remember from our last trip to DL that there were more characters out in Sunshine plaza other than the VIP'S, but because of the Halloween decorations they only had the VIP'S out there, so maybe during other times they have more characters out in Sunshine Plaza?
As far as the characters themselves however, the DL characters tend to to more playful with more interaction. It did not matter how long the line was (if there was a line) the characters here spent a lot of time with each person.
Also the signatures are more eloborate. Just one example: Pooh in spite of the long line spent a full two minutes decorating his sig with bees.
The characters at DL also have no specific location you can rely on. The characters just roam about from spot to spot. I did like this a little as you really had less of an idea who was coming out when and where. At DW I feel like we know who is going to be out and where before we arrive. They do have a phone line similar to DW's, where you could call to ask about where characters where and if they would be out, but we found it was not very accurate.
Back to those lines. As reported here before the lines are less organized at DL, sometimes there was no attendant with the character, making it impossible to ward off line breakers. I cannot count how many times some mom jumped in fornt of us with her kids. Sometimes one CM would be standing in an area with three or four characters by themself.
Things seemed much less organized at DL but that is not always bad.
I did ask if there was an area like the teardrop at DL and was told they use DL Town Square when they do this, we never saw this during our brief stay.
One last thing, character integrity seemed overlooked at DL just one example, once we ran into Minnie Mouse in farmer attire as we were leaving DCA, whose entrance is only a few steps away from the DL town square, there we saw her in town sqaure in Halloween attire only to find her a few minutes later in different clothes again at Toon Town. This happened several times with multiple characters. It seems to me this is rare at DW. Also we saw a very short Cruella De Vil in DCA only to see a tall Cruella in DL an hour later. That may seem ticky tack but I doubt that would happen at DW.
Over all I prefer the randomness, and interaction at DL but we love the characters so much I have to give the nod to DW just for the sheer numbers. But once again both parks are great character wise for different reasons.
As far as the characters go there is no doubt that Disney World has the numbers. There are two more parks after all, but CM's at DL told us one reason they had less characters out was the economy. Apparently many characters have dissapeared from DL and DCA lately. Of course we were also there during the "off season". During our stay on a typical day at California Adventure they only had 10-16 characters out total in the whole park. At DL we could see 25-30. To put that in perspective during our stay on a typical day, just from our experiance at DW: at Animal Kingdom we could see 20-25 characters, 20-25 at Epcot, 25-35 at MK, and anywhere from 30-40 at DHS, (if you catch the late afternoon meet and greet character bonanza by the hat) just a rough estimate. There were no characters at all in the entire Boardwalk area at DCA, an area that is almost half of the park. DCA needs more character! Although the villains area was a nice touch, I wonder how many characters would have been out if not for Halloween. I do remember from our last trip to DL that there were more characters out in Sunshine plaza other than the VIP'S, but because of the Halloween decorations they only had the VIP'S out there, so maybe during other times they have more characters out in Sunshine Plaza?
As far as the characters themselves however, the DL characters tend to to more playful with more interaction. It did not matter how long the line was (if there was a line) the characters here spent a lot of time with each person.
Also the signatures are more eloborate. Just one example: Pooh in spite of the long line spent a full two minutes decorating his sig with bees.
The characters at DL also have no specific location you can rely on. The characters just roam about from spot to spot. I did like this a little as you really had less of an idea who was coming out when and where. At DW I feel like we know who is going to be out and where before we arrive. They do have a phone line similar to DW's, where you could call to ask about where characters where and if they would be out, but we found it was not very accurate.
Back to those lines. As reported here before the lines are less organized at DL, sometimes there was no attendant with the character, making it impossible to ward off line breakers. I cannot count how many times some mom jumped in fornt of us with her kids. Sometimes one CM would be standing in an area with three or four characters by themself.
Things seemed much less organized at DL but that is not always bad.
I did ask if there was an area like the teardrop at DL and was told they use DL Town Square when they do this, we never saw this during our brief stay.
One last thing, character integrity seemed overlooked at DL just one example, once we ran into Minnie Mouse in farmer attire as we were leaving DCA, whose entrance is only a few steps away from the DL town square, there we saw her in town sqaure in Halloween attire only to find her a few minutes later in different clothes again at Toon Town. This happened several times with multiple characters. It seems to me this is rare at DW. Also we saw a very short Cruella De Vil in DCA only to see a tall Cruella in DL an hour later. That may seem ticky tack but I doubt that would happen at DW.
Over all I prefer the randomness, and interaction at DL but we love the characters so much I have to give the nod to DW just for the sheer numbers. But once again both parks are great character wise for different reasons.