Disney Genie Is Now Live Post Your Hints and Tips

[mommabo]

I think you are right about Maxpass. I only heard positive things about it when reading these sites. It must have been a great way to do it.
I wonder why WDW didn't try a version of maxpass instead of genie?
It's just so crazy that it's hated by so many at WDW and liked by most in DL?
Oh well, I guess we will find out for ourselves this Spring. thanks for answering.

Genie+ IS MaxPass albeit a watered down version.

I think the reason it works better at DL is simply the fact there are more attractions in one place (yes, DCA & DL are essentially one place since they are so close) that provides so many more options to book your next LL pass.

 

[dieumeye]

Watching how the weekend shaped up via the app, and curious to continue monitoring as the holiday rush intensifies, I've been having thoughts as a chronic min/maxer.

Seems like many attractions, at least for the moment, are not "selling out" by evening. I suspect that this is because most people who get Genie+ use it as quickly as possible and with the one ride per attraction limitation in play, by evening many folks have already used their rides. Many of the lightning lanes seem to have almost immediate LL return times in the evening. Of course some have very short stand-by waits which would make Genie + superfluous, but some are 30-45 minutes or more at certain times with a nearly immediate return time for Genie+

It seems like none of the DL attractions on Genie+ are selling out. Guardians seems to be the main one that runs out over at DCA, though to be fair I didn't monitor DCA quite like I did DL.

This present an interesting puzzle for the min/maxer - Instead of steadily booking G+LL, it may behoove us to hold off on certain attractions which are likely to have a substantial wait in the evening, but a near immediate return time via LL. Using time during the day to do other stuff and/or judiciously ride stand-by and saving G+LL rides for the evening may prove to be an efficient use of time.

Under Maxpass, without any restriction of how many times one could book for a certain attraction, we didn't really try to optimize. We wanted to 1. Get them before they were gone and 2. Get them as soon as possible because the sooner we got one the sooner we could book another. This often meant that we'd happily book a pass to skip a 20 minute line, because once we scanned in we could book another one, so nothing was really lost, even if we only saved 10 minutes total by doing so. Now, booking early has a cost. I could now wait in that 20 minute line stand by, and book that ride later on when it would save more time, whereas if I booked the time now, later on when the wait was longer I would have to ride stand-by if I wanted to go a second time. I suspect that I will start plotting the delta t between stand by and return time (minus some differential wait between LLQ and SBQ) to figure out the most efficient use of lightning lanes.

Anyway, half baked ideas and not fully formed strategies and limited data with less than a week of G+, but if the trends continue I could see some interesting touring strategies emerging where high demand (Guardians, Indy?) LLs get booked early in the day to avoid getting skunked, shorter stand-by lines are enjoyed throughout the morning, Food, shows, and rest are enjoyed in the busiest hours of late morning/early afternoon, and then attacking attractions in the evening with Genie+.

I thought about this a lot when I was at the park last Saturday. In the old days I had MaxPass on my AP and would consider myself a MaxPass expert. Having to pay daily (and more for the ILL$) and with the one ride restriction, Genie+ definitely feels different than MaxPass in terms of strategy.

A lot of it comes down to what your goals are and what you value in the experience.

If your goal is to ride every ride (or many of them) one time, you’ll favor a different strategy than someone who is attempting to ride as many rides as many times as possible.

And for me, I am someone who values being able to do what I want when I want. That’s more valuable to me than any perceived “savings” vs the length of the standby line. For example, I was happy to use my LL to walk onto Space Mountain even though the standby line was only 15-20 minutes. I’d much prefer that instead of, say, booking a LL that requires me to come back in an hour even if I’m getting more “savings“ because the standby line is 60 minutes at that point.

This is why I was really happy to see that many attractions had an immediate return time, or at least a return time within 5-10 minutes. Again, me personally, I value the immediate return, regardless of how short the standby line is.

Saturday morning at 8:00am I did Buzz, Space Mtn, Haunted Mansion, Matterhorn, Small World, Smugglers Run, and Rise. I walked off Rise at 10:20 am. (I took a leisurely pace, there was a snack break in there and some inefficient ride choice since Matterhorn, Big Thunder, & Indy were all down!) In each case I used the LL, and practically walked onto each ride. I did save at least some time over the standby line for each ride with the exception of Buzz and Small World (both standby walk ons).

The funny thing is though, I could’ve had a very similar morning without Genie+. Sure, my waits would’ve been a little longer at each attraction. And Smugglers Run and Rise both had long lines when I rode them, but swap them for Pirates and Star Tours, and you could’ve had just as good of a morning as I did without buying Genie+.

At 2:00 I was ready to leave. Incredicoaster had an immediate return time, so I could’ve done that. But Soarin’ return time was an hour out, and Midway Midway was two hours out. I wasn’t interested in staying that long.

So, yeah, Genie+ hits different than MaxPass. It’s definitely not something I’m going to buy every visit. But I’ll buy it occasionally. And this, I assume, is probably what the Disney folks have intended.

As long as return times remain fairly immediate for a good portion of rides for a good portion of the day, I think it’s a pretty good value. However, if it starts to get very popular and more difficult to get immediate LL return times, it’s going to be less valuable, at least to me.

Just some more half formed food for thought and ramblings!

 

[MonocularVision]

DL also sees a bigger local crowds who are less likely to spend the upcharge amount or come later in the day, so more availability throughout the day for those that did purchase.

I think this is the key difference and what I am most afraid of. If Disney offers a “buy it once” option for MK’ers, I think the “mostly immediate return times” at DL would disappear.

 

[bcassidy]

Correct it is a G+ perk

I think you are correct that it’s a Genie + feature .

 

[dieumeye]

I think this is the key difference and what I am most afraid of. If Disney offers a “buy it once” option for MK’ers, I think the “mostly immediate return times” at DL would disappear.

Are locals less likely to spend the upcharge? Probably. At least I know I am not going to spend $20+ each time I visit every week.

BUT lots of locals paid $125 to add MaxPass to their AP, so I don’t think it’s correct to assume that locals are totally unlikely to pay for the up charge. $125 is equivalent to SIX purchases of Genie+ throughout the year.

That’s a decent amount of money that any local former AP-now-Keyholder could theoretically be willing to spend. Besides, once you’ve paid off your Key, every visit is “free”, right, so what’s another 20 bucks?

If Genie+ is like other new things that Disney introduces, chances are it will be great in the beginning when not many people know about it, but then will become overburdened once it starts to become popular and heavily used.

 

[MonocularVision]

Are locals less likely to spend the upcharge? Probably. At least I know I am not going to spend $20+ each time I visit every week.

BUT lots of locals paid $125 to add MaxPass to their AP, so I don’t think it’s correct to assume that locals are totally unlikely to pay for the up charge. $125 is equivalent to SIX purchases of Genie+ throughout the year.

That’s a decent amount of money that any local former AP-now-Keyholder could theoretically be willing to spend. Besides, once you’ve paid off your Key, every visit is “free”, right, so what’s another 20 bucks?

If Genie+ is like other new things that Disney introduces, chances are it will be great in the beginning when not many people know about it, but then will become overburdened once it starts to become popular and heavily used.

I think you and I agree. If they add it for MK’ers, many will purchase it because their actual cost per visit will be pretty low. And adding all of those folks to the pool means the slots will go much faster pushing out the return time.

Better to keep the price the same for everyone so it can remain high-value.

 

[mommabo]

I think you and I agree. If they add it for MK’ers, many will purchase it because their actual cost per visit will be pretty low. And adding all of those folks to the pool means the slots will go much faster pushing out the return time.

Better to keep the price the same for everyone so it can remain high-value.

I agree, don’t offer as an add-on to MK passes. And I say this as a magic key holder this year.

 

[ThistleMae]

I was confused about the return time for Genie+ because it gave me a return time under the tips board but I had to go to my day to get the actual time I was supposed to be there. The guest service people were very helpful in answering questions.

 

[starlite_]

I agree, don’t offer as an add-on to MK passes. And I say this as a magic key holder this year.

Agree too, and I think this is the reason they are allowing to only book things after park entrance too. To keep things fair and equal between MK'ers and all other guests.

 

[thenicefamily]

Loving all the valuable info on this thread! Thanks all.

A Genie+ feature that I haven't seen mentioned often though is the PhotoPass. Have the opportunities for photos throughout the parks increased? i.e. as in the "before times"

 

[gelatoni fan]

Loving all the valuable info on this thread! Thanks all.

A Genie+ feature that I haven't seen mentioned often though is the PhotoPass. Have the opportunities for photos throughout the parks increased? i.e. as in the "before times"

I last visited during the Halloween season pre-Genie+ so it may be a bit out of date but PhotoPass photographers seemed to be around longer than in the before times. So it's easier to find photographers still working places like train station, castle, pumpkin/christmas tree/etc rather than be there and just happened to miss the photographer. But when you subtract the photopass photographers that would normally be with characters, there's fewer PhotoPass overall.

 

[NotTheBatesMotel]

Re: Why WDW-er’s seem to hate Genie+: We are AP holders at WDW. I can’t speak for others but I can share my experience. We tried Genie+ in early November right after it rolled out at WDW. My family didn’t like it overall because the headliners (not the ILL’s but rides like Big Thunder) had return times several hours in the future and the smaller rides weren’t much better. Many of us used to be wizards with the FastPass+ system “refresh” method and made that work way better than Genie+.

There was no such thing as immediate return times with Genie+ at WDW when I went. Even rides like Magic Carpets didn’t have an immediate return time. We’re trying Genie+ at DL tomorrow and I’m super interested to see how it goes compared to WDW. No doubt we will all adjust in the future no matter what. It was just a huge change from a much more effective (not to mention free) touring strategy that many WDW veterans were used to.

 

[GBRforWDW]

Re: Why WDW-er’s seem to hate Genie+: We are AP holders at WDW. I can’t speak for others but I can share my experience. We tried Genie+ in early November right after it rolled out at WDW. My family didn’t like it overall because the headliners (not the ILL’s but rides like Big Thunder) had return times several hours in the future and the smaller rides weren’t much better. Many of us used to be wizards with the FastPass+ system “refresh” method and made that work way better than Genie+.

There was no such thing as immediate return times with Genie+ at WDW when I went. Even rides like Magic Carpets didn’t have an immediate return time. We’re trying Genie+ at DL tomorrow and I’m super interested to see how it goes compared to WDW. No doubt we will all adjust in the future no matter what. It was just a huge change from a much more effective (not to mention free) touring strategy that many WDW veterans were used to.

Good luck at DL! I was on the tip board last night at 6pm PT and saw either immediate availability or within an hour return for nearly every ride, so I think you'll love using G+

 

[WebmasterMaryJo]

Making this thread a sticky thread at the top of the forum

 

[Wesley815]

We’re trying Genie+ at DL tomorrow and I’m super interested to see how it goes compared to WDW.

Any feedback? Looking forward to how your day went, esp with someone who can compare G+ at DL vs. WDW. Hope you had fun!!

 

[e_yerger]

I've pretty much written off G+ for WDW, but after booking a trip to DL I think it may be worth it... We're going the end of January (when crowds are predicted to be really low, Wed - Sat park days). I'm thinking we may buy G+ just for Fri & Sat, or just Sat depending on crowds.

 

[MonocularVision]

Treat yourself today and read this entire Twitter thread of a guy allowing Genie to guide his DCA experience.

I am not joking. Go read this now. It will make your day.

 

[mdmost]

Treat yourself today and read this entire Twitter thread of a guy allowing Genie to guide his DCA experience.

I am not joking. Go read this now. It will make your day.

There are some great videos on YouTube of WDW fan sites doing this at the 4 parks there. They were pretty hilarious, especially Epcot, because they had the person going from one end of the parks to the other repeatedly. Nothing made much sense. The only one that did well was Animal Kingdom and I believe that more because there's just not as many options in AK.

 

[NotTheBatesMotel]

Any feedback? Looking forward to how your day went, esp with someone who can compare G+ at DL vs. WDW. Hope you had fun!!

We loved Genie+ at Disneyland and DCA! It was so worth the $. Return times were nearly immediate every time we used it. It was night and day difference compared to WDW's return times. My only complaint with it is that Photopass photographers were much more scarce in the CA parks compared to FL parks. I didn't see a single Photopass photographer at Disneyland which I assumed was due to the rain, but when we went back that night (once it stopped raining) we still didn't see any. We saw a couple at DCA. Even with the lack of photographers I think it's worth the $ with the quick return times.

 

[avalon451]

Is RotR running out of LL+ at opening? I haven’t seen them available the last few days when checking from home.