My two cents worth on USS - Harminder Kaur

Hello there! My name is Harminder Kaur and today I will be blogging about Universal Studios Singapore, commonly known as USS. The park opened in March last year, 2010. I visited USS early this year, in March. It was extremely fun as I had visited the place with great company. It is easily accessible by transport. You can take the MRT to Harbourfront Station. From there, you may take the Sentosa Express (monorail train) to Universal Studios. The park is fully operational now and there are 18 rides. I believe one or two of these are under maintenance at the moment. The park is small but well designed with many high quality attractions and rides. 

        The famous USS globe

World Premiere at New York City, USS

One of the main highlights of the USS is the sensational ‘live’ water show with daring stunts and real explosions. It brings the silver screen to life! The photograph below depicts the scene that can be seen at the “WaterWorld” show.

            However, some put-offs about the USS is that it gets too crowded during public holidays; every ride has exceptionally long queues. USS has tried to overcome this problem by providing express passes. These passes cost more than usual price, but the queues for rides are relatively shorter. Conversely, the Universal Studios in Orlando had relatively shorter queues and it is much bigger. It took my family and I an entire day to cover the park in Orlando. In Singapore, you can walk the whole park in 10 minutes and to cover all the rides, it will only take you approximately 4 hours.

I love shopping! Ironically, I did not go wild in the shopping department at USS. Things are generally expensive for us locals and items there are not attractive at all. Most visitors bought t-shirts, magnets and key chains. The customer service at USS was commendable! The employees were extremely friendly, reminding us to ‘enjoy our ride’ and ‘be careful to watch our step’ before and after getting off every ride. The food at USS is reasonably priced and drink stations are located everywhere around the park. This is a good idea because the humid weather in Singapore can put anyone off!

I visited Universal Studios in Orlando when I was 12. It was certainly a very fruitful experience for me. I have to comment that a lot of effort has been made by the government of Singapore to match up to the standards of the Universal Studios around the world. Although USS is a lot smaller than the Universal Studios in Orlando, the setting is similar and the rides are equally exciting. As Singaporeans, we do not have to travel far away just to experience the world-class theme park in Japan or the United States. 

There is a Universal studios in Japan as well. The park opened on March 31, 2001. 11 million guests entered Universal Studios Japan in its first year of operation! Conversely, Singapore only managed to hit 2 million guests in its first 9 months of operation.

According to the Tourism sector in Singapore, 11, 638 663 people visited Singapore in 2010. However, roughly 2 million people visited USS in 2010. I find it hard to believe that many tourists have visited our beautiful Island but have not visited USS. Singapore tour groups should make visiting the USS a must. Tour guides must plan extremely exciting tour itineraries so as to encourage more tourists to visit USS. Have you visited USS? Purchase your tickets today!

Hope you enjoyed today’s post. Stay tuned!

Signing off,

Harminder Kaur

*photos taken from www.travelfolio.com

Aw Yu Qi

Singapore was the second Universal Studios Theme Park to open in Asia (Japan being the first), and the first in Southeast Asia. As ccompared to other countries Theme Park such as Hong Kong and Shanghai, it will affect Singapore's economy. However, I do not think that Singapore will totally lose out to other countries. Be it Singapore, Hong Kong or Shanghai , each of every Theme Park do have their strength and weakness.

Indeed, Hong Kong or Shanghai are bigger than Singapore. It can allow more variety rides and  while Singapore only have a limited spaces. I think that what made tourists coming over to visit Singapore was because Singapore was just a small red dot. Yet, they could build a Theme Park with a total of 24 attractions, of which 18 are original or specially adapted for the park.The park consists of seven uniquely themed zones which surround a lagoon. Each zone is based on a blockbuster movie or a television show, featuring their own unique attractions, character appearances, dining and shopping areas. One of the main attractions was the world's tallest pair of dueling rollar coaster, at a height of 42.7 metres which attracts tourists to personally experience it.

Other than those rides and shows in Singapore Universal Studious, Tourists are able to watch the Lake Hollywood Spectacular an incredible new pyrotechnics show set to a brilliant musical score that will burst across the night sky right in front of you. Therefore, you could see that Singapore Universal Studious are different than other countries Theme Park which make tourists to visit Singapore.

Beside the Theme Park, foods was one of the reason why tourists would choose to come over Singapore.  As Singapore is known for multi racial with the different types of local foods such as Chicken Rice , Laksa and a lots more. All those foods could be found in Singapore Universal Studious.

Based on those points, Singapore will still able to attract Tourists to visit Singapore Universal Studious. As Singapore Universal Studious are located at Sentosa. It is convince for tourists as hotels, shopping mall and other entertainments are just all at Sentosa.

To conclude, even though other countries Theme Park will affect Singapore's economy. I still think that Singapore will still able to attract tourists to visit. Because it had attracted more than 2 million visitors in the 9 months from its opening. Also more jobs opportunities are give to peoples since its opening and hence it boosts up Singapore's economy. I went to Singapore Universal Studious once. Even though the ticket was a bit expensive. But overall, I still think it is worth to buy the ticket. Singapore Universal Studious is a fun and enjoyable place for family and friends. And I will want to go back the second time because those rides and shows are exciting. Thus, I believe more and more tourists will keep coming over to Singapore.

Tiffany Ng

The newly addition of the Universal Studio which is open on 19 April 2007 in Singapore have contributed to the boost of economy in Singapore. Despite its limited space, numerous attractions have been included that is family orientated. Some examples of the family orientated rides are King Julien's Party-Go-Round, Magic Potion Spin and Shrek 4-D Adventure.

However, I strongly believe that Singapore's tourist industry will be greatly affected by the upcoming themepark that will be built in Shanghai as the variety of attractions in Universal Studio Singapore is very limited as compared to oversea's themeparks. The limited variety of attractions is due to the constraint in space to include more rides. Thus, tourists would prefer to visit oversea's themeparks. The high prices of tickets will also be a minus point as some tourist will feel that the money paid is not worth the limited rides available.

In addition, the limited tourist attractions in Singapore will also affect the tourists interest in visiting the Universal Studio. Some of the tourist attractions in Singapore are Singapore Zoo, Night Safari, Jurong Bird Park and etc. This tourist attraction will not be enough to fullfill the hungry demand for interesting attractions from the tourists.

If the tourist industry is negatively affected by it, a lot of employees working in Universal Studio will lose their job. Not only that, other companies that rely greatly on the tourist industry will also be badly affected. Hence, the negative impact on Singapore's economy impact will be very great.

In conclusion, i feel that more improvements should be made to prevent the negative economy impact. Improvements such as building more attractive rides should be included in Universal Studio so that they can put the spaces available into good use. More tourist attractions should also be built along with the Universal Studio so that it will be a plus point and keep the flow of tourists coming.

Individual opinions on USS - Regina Jiang

In my opinion, i think that the Singapore Universal Studio lose out to other countries by the weather, variety of rides and food.

Firstly, the weather in Singapore cannot be compared to the weather in countries like shanghai and china. In Singapore, the weather is mostly warm with occasional rainfall. however in countries like shanghai and china, they have four seasons. with these four seasons, it actually caters to all the other countries. Singaporeans are used to the weather in Singapore, however, tourist may not be used to the weather in Singapore. thus, it will affect their choice to come to Singapore as they have a better choice that caters to their environment.

Secondly, theme parks in shanghai and china have more variety of rides and is more spacious as compared to Singapore. Thus tourist would normally want the best bargains and again Singapore would lose out. Although some tourist would chose to come to Singapore, it would most probably be only for a one time experience.

lastly, the food in Singapore are limited. to cater to the majority, most of the food in Singapore are Halal certified. thus it does not contain pork. Also, Singapore does not have a culture to consume food like insects. So naturally the variety of food in Singapore has already lose out to countries like shanghai and china as they cater to more culture.

in conclusion, the Singapore universal studio may not be as attractive to tourist as the theme parks in shanghai and china as we are already at a losing end. Thus i think that the Singapore universal studio is build not to attract tourist to its theme park but to its casino instead.

Have you been to Universal Studios Singapore? If you have not, it is about time you visit that place!

Just a little background information
Universal Studios Singapore opened in early 2010. Universal Studios Singapore is a theme park located within Resorts World Sentosa. Construction of the theme park and the rest of the resort started on 19 April 2007. It is the second Universal Studios Theme Park to open in Asia (Japan being the first), and the first in Southeast Asia. Universal Studios Singapore has attracted more than 2 million visitors in the 9 months from its opening. After almost three years of construction, the park opened on 18 March 2010. Universal Studios Singapore was opened for sneak peek week in view of the Chinese New Year Celebrations, from 5 pm to 9 pm every night between 14 to 21 February 2010.Though visitors had to pay SGD$10 to enter the park despite rides not operating, tickets for the week were sold out in 2 days.