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The UNIVERSAL STUDIOS JAPAN (Osaka)
When we talk about very cool theme parks which are worth to visit, Universal Studios Japan (USJ) is one of the most popular theme parks in the world. Universal Studios Japan consists of 9 areas of attraction including Hollywood, New York, Minion Park, Amity Village, Jurassic Park, Water world. Wonderland, and not to be forgotten, Harry Potter the Magical world.
Correspondingly, USJ draws attention from tourists around the world on average 13 million people each year! We are going to share with you the best rides in USJ and some valuable tips!
Ticket Purchase
The park ticket can be purchased on the day at the ticket booth inside the park or do purchase in advance available in services mentioned in ticket information.
Universal Studios Japan entrance ticket is, just the same with Tokyo Disneyland or Tokyo Disney Sea ticket, 7,400 yen per adult person. This is the main reason why you should consider a tour to Universal Studios Japan a major obtaining. Organized suitably, you will entirely experience the park’s attractions and make the best out of your time.
First and foremost, we’d like to enlighten that because of the park’s fame, each ride has extraordinarily long queue, particularly the popular ones and your waiting time could be more than 200 minutes. But there are constantly several methods to escape from remaining in a long queue!
Tips 1
By purchasing the Express Pass, which can be bought along with your ticket. Using Express Pass could reduce your waiting time to 20 to 30 minutes.
Tips 2
Use the USJ crowd prediction calendar.
Though this calendar is not associated to Universal Studios Japan, this crowd prediction calendar updates the crowd forecast of the theme park for the recent month. Therefore, if you are staying several months in advance, you will not get a precise forecast. For your reference, the USJ crowd calendar is only an estimation.
Here is the color code means:
Blue – Almost empty
Green – Lightest crowds
Yellow – Light crowds
Orange – Moderate crowds
Red – Heavy crowds
Maroon – Heaviest crowds
Black – Don’t bother going
Tips 3
Basically, escape the weekends, Japanese school holidays, and public holidays. Japanese schools have 3 kind of holidays:
Winter Holiday – Starts from last week of December to the first week of January.
Spring Holiday– Starts from last week of March to first week of April.
Summer Holiday – Starts from last week of July until the end of August.
Five Recommended Rides You Should Try!
Harry Potter and The Forbidden Journey
For this ride, you may need to be in line for quite a long time, but it is totally worth waiting for. Before, we were given 3D glasses while riding the ride, but recently they’ve omitted the 3D glasses for us to experience their upgraded 4D ride! 4D experience will make you feel like getting into the real wizard world.
The Flying Dinosaur
Absolutely amazing roller coaster in this park! If you want some thrilling experience, we highly recommend you this ride. Flying Dinosaur is a steel roller coaster opened to the public as the world’s longest flying coaster. In addition, this ride allows riders to fly above the skyline of the park.
Hollywood Dream Ride – Backdrop
Hollywood Dream is perhaps the most memorable coaster in the park apart from the Flying Dinosaur. The awesome music is a huge part of that. The backdrop which has a cutting-edge technology to run backward! You can feel the unusual thrill of being powerless to see what will come afterwards.
The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man
Don’t miss to ride one of the best 4D experience attractions! Fantastic impression that puzzles the fantasy with the reality, and series of special effects over 100, will give you an unbelievable, immersive experience. You’ll encounter an all-new kind of excitement!
Despicable Me Minion Mayhem
This ride is opened in Universal Studios Japan on 21 April 2017. You can enjoy and be entertained by a 3D motion simulator to riding. With an immense dome screen and hyper-realistic projection system, you won’t know what’s up and what’s down!
Food Service
Unfortunately, there isn’t any Halal/Muslim friendly menu inside the theme park. But since the number of Muslim tourists are getting higher year by year, now the Muslim tourists are able to exit the park temporarily by getting the invisible stamped on your hand from the theme park staff at the exit gate. The Red Lobster which is located merely right in front of the park has started to provide Halal menu for the USJ Muslim visitors.
Do watch the video below:
Prayer Space
At the moment, USJ do not have any official space for Muslim to pray, however they are providing a free space at the information center near the entrance gate. At the information center, you need to inform the staff and they will guide you to a space we can use to do pray.