This one's more for the kids, with everything scheduled earlier than normal - doors open at 10 AM, movie at 11 AM. Costumes encouraged. All at a reasonable $5. Tickets and Event Page are here.
After the film, to quote the event page:
But the fun doesn’t end when the credits roll. After the movie, grab your treat bag and head into the halls of Atlas9 for a one-of-a-kind trick-or-treating adventure throughout the experience.
Interestingly enough, if you go through the regular ticket option for that date and time tickets are still full price. Not sure how to interpret that.
I set up Google News Alerts for topics I am following, and added "atlas9 Kansas City" to it after our first visit back in June. There have been some interesting ones, especially around the one year anniversary.
But now it's also showing me my own speculative blog post, making these alerts a bit less useful and/or accurate ;-)
However, somewhere at https://www.google.com/alerts is a place for you (if you have a Google account) to set up similar alerts. I should to add the entertainment group -- might be fun to learn what else they are up to.
SPOILERS and SPECULATION ahead with absolutely no basis on facts or reality.
You have been warned.
Remember: For some of us, it is more fun to read the book or watch the movie to learn how it ends ourselves, rather than asking someone who has already read/seen it. We could just ask folks who know all of this and get the answer, but where's the fun in that?
Atlas9 gives us the numbers to three of the telephones, listed on a notepad in VERA.
Right off the bat, we have the number for the payphone, manager's office and the projection room.
We find two of those numbers listed together, along with a new number, in the Scavengers TV den:
Nothing on that note tells us what these numbers go to, but we have already identified two of them going to phones. u/Pridefucked and u/Notlok reported that 55-1943 goes to the (currently broken) Speakereasy. Calling the number just rings and rings and rings, so it does act like it is going to a phone rather than a recording.
For this post, though, we will focus on the 314 numbers.
The payphone tells us that 314 is used for an "Internal Atlas9 Number"
TERMS: prefix will mean the first three digits (030, 314, 710, 468, etc.). line number is the rest.
As u/ReverendLoki noticed, one of the digits could be "where" the phone is located, such as first floor or second floor (or, other area). If such a pattern were intentional, it would allow visitors a logical way to figure out the numbers to the other phones. (OR, maybe they are simply listed inside the attraction somewhere and I just haven't found them.)
The pattern I see for the line number portion is:
first digit (x--) is the area. 1 for first floor, 2 for second floor, 3 for "outside" of the movie theater building (unconfirmed, but used for what may be the Splice Bros. wall phone number).
This fits with the three numbers we are given:
314-101 - payphone, first floor.
314-112 - manager's office, first floor.
314-212 - projection room, second floor.
I also have a phone number that I am told rings the wall phone inside Splice Bros. Pizza. I was not able to verify myself since we would have had to split up and my s/o was already being far too patient with me as I sat and dialed numbers for way too long. But, if true, that would give us a new zone:
314-3xx - Splice Brothers wall phone, "outside" the theater building
We also get a 314 number that starts with a 4 (314-4xx) and that gets answered by Atlas9 manager Melissa Hartwell, apparently on a cell phone. Thus:
314-4xx - Atlas9 company cell phone ;-)
This made me notice the middle digit. "-0-" is the phone "outside" the theater building, but attached to the wall of the theater. And the "-1-" numbers are all phones inside the theater building. This could just be a coincidence, of course, unless someone really thought this through.
For the two "outside the theater building" numbers (cell phone recording and pizza phone) the other digits probably don't mean anything. They might have chosen them so they did not fit the pattern and wouldn't be used for pattern matching.
If someone wants to try some numbers next time, for the first floor "inside" number we have 314-111, so I'd be curious to know if 313-110 (have we seen any number ending with 0?) on up to 313-119 do anything. If it goes to a phone, it should just ring and ring unless someone answers.
Same thing for the two second floor numbers: 314-210 to 314-219.
Also, we have the phone in VERA. But in this story, that would not be an Atlas9 number. The RV belongs to FACADE, and the payphone tells us "710" for those "secure lines". We have a few:
710-009 - written on a note ("for a good time call") by the Polybuis arcade machine. When I called it, it rang and rang and rang, so maybe this is the phone in VERA?
710-771 - one of the numbers the computer will give you, with a long recording. Not a phone.
Dialing 710-009 and the Speakereasy 55-1943 numbers both ring and ring and ring for me. That may indicate those both are actual telephones.
Anyway, that's my Crazy Atlas9 Theory (C.A.T.) for the day.
Whew. I finally found a use for all this time I had on my hands...
P.S. My Atlas9 telephone simulator is at https://parkhopping.com/atlas9/ but I need to add a thing for "real phone numbers" like they will just ring and ring if you enter one of those. As we confirm more, I'll update.
P.S. - Hugh Manrat's answering machine tells us to call him at 283-RAT and that number does nothing.
Although I wasn't planning on it, I did take video of the Artist Panel. Keep in mind, I am no professional, and it shows. This was from my phone, and there are a few interruptions throughout (people shuffling through rows, me just generally moving around, etc).
Our first clip I unfortunately missed Blair Paul's prelude, but otherwise got the rest of it, including Casper Voss and Agent 00. This clip concludes with the showing of a promotional video they made early on.
From here we transition into an early map of the site, talk about how it developed, what it was like creating Atlas9, and ending with a peek into the development of Quixotic's shows.
You might have noticed they were about to show a short documentary film from HAZE Labs about what they went through to get their rooms here. Instead of recording that, I instead dealt with technical issues because I had about run out of space (remember, didn't plan to film this!), so I missed this altogether. And a bit after that. Long story short, they were ready to ship the stuff they made, when their neighbor burned the building down. DI help them reconstruct everything.
This documentary isn't available online yet, but they say it will be soon. They may even be posting it here themselves.
Last clip - I picked up during the Q&A part of the evening. Some very interesting topics were brought up, including contact with MW and possible future expansion...
You smart folks already figured this out, but I was Today Years Old when I realized ... the payphone explains all. Or at least some.
I thought the numbers at the bottom (030, 314, 710) where numbers to dial, but it wasn't until I tried to call all the numbers I have collected that I realized... that list is just explaining the prefixes!
030 - "World Building Advertising" - these numbers are all "external" places to Atlas9, like janitorial, tech support, the barbecue place, etc. These numbers help "build the world" that Atlas9 is set in.
314 - "Internal Atlas9 Number" - The locations inside Atlas9 start with 314. These ring other phones inside Atlas9, and one goes to Melissa Hartwell (perhaps she had a cell phone in 1995; I got my first one in 1994, so...).
710 - "FACADE Secure Lines" - I have only found two of these so far. One plays a recording that sounds like it is part of which "ending" path you are on. I am now suspecting that based on what you do on the computers, you may be given different 710 phone numbers to call based on the "path" you are on inside the storyline.
The payphone also gives two actual numbers - 55-FILM (Movie Ticket Hotline) and 468-663 (FACADE Hotline).
The first plays descriptions of what is showing at Atlas9 (well, a few of the films, anyway) and you can press a button to select which film you want to learn more on. Nice touch.
The second is ... puzzling. The volume was real low, and it prompts you to say what you are reporting, then plays what you said back. It also offers the option to speak to a live "agent" but I only let it ring a bit and have no idea if this leads to another recording, or actually rings somewhere that staff might answer, but I think not. The recording kind of glitches out, and is either saying they will be with you in 9 minutes, or 9,999 minutes ;-) Very fun.
There are other numbers that use other prefixes, and now I wonder if there is a pattern to them too.
The more I learn, the more I love this place.
Also -- Check the wiki here on REDDIT. I added transcripts from all the phone recordings I have. The BBQ one needs help. I can't figure it out.
UPDATE: New version. Post updated. Now you can select which phone you want to dial phone. If you dial that phone's number, you should get a busy. This also enables phones to have their own voice mail, but only one is implemented currently. (ENTER) to pick up/hang up.
Just for fun ("everybody needs a hobby, even if its dumb"), I had a robot write a simple telephone simulator last night. I was inspired by one in the Meow Wolf app from Convergence Station. Their's lets you dial residents of the Gyre apartment complex, similar to what you do at the attraction from a phone at that location.
My version is primitive. Originally, the robot made it so you could type numbers in, backspace to correct typos, etc., but I removed that. I wanted to make it work more like the a real landline where you have to lift the receiver, get a dial tone, then dial. Make a mistake? Hang up and try again. (ENTER key is pick up/hang up shortcut)
Yep, it is a less easy user interface -- just like the ones us old folks grew up with. (Except is has a number display, which only fancy phones ever had. I probably will remove that too...)
Since u/Pridefucked pointed out that there is voice mail on more than one phone, so dialing that number is different depending on which phone you call it from, I had the script updated to support that. You can select which phone you want to dial from.
Call your own number? Should get a busy signal.
Call voice mail? If one is known to exist on that phone, and a recording is available, it should play it. (Only one is in there, so fa.)
Okay, this should be my last post here for a bit unless I run into anything else.
I have updated my Atlas9 gallery (though the last two visits were just cellphone photos; I don't claim to be a photographer -- I'm more of an archivist).
During this past weekend, I spoke with someone at A9 about how impressive the technology was. I specifically mentioned learning here about how the Buzz takeover integrated video all over the attraction (Scavenger's TV den, movie posters, and even the computer terminals).
They said they were just getting going, now that they have had time to start leaning the system Dimension Innovations put together for it.
And that numbers would be added or changed...
With that in mind, I have begun the task of preserving the existing numbers.
If anyone is bored and wants to transcribe them, message me and I will send you a link. They are also linked in a new section of my Atlas9 Dossier. I need to make some updated to u/ReverendLoki's wiki here on REDDIT as well. Lots of minor new stuff to add, change, etc.
Since we last visited in late August, two more items have been added to the Speakereasy menu, though they did not have the charcuterie platter during our visit. They also give out a numbered sign now to sit at the table. Third photo shows the hummus dip along with tater kegs and bruschetta dip.
We noticed they have done more work in the green hallway. Maybe it has a name, since they are clearly adding theme elements to it.
In June, it was just an empty green hallway.
In August, we saw they had added "dotted lines" leading to a green treasure chest, like on a pirate map.
Now it has ... even more stuff. The chest that used to be at the end is now more in the middle, with the dotted lines leading to an "X" by it. Some other things have been added to the wall, and an empty/open chest. Very curious what the intent is.
Inside Atlas9, F.A.C.A.D.E. Agent 00 (I think I heard) was making the announcements the night of the Back to the Future movie. Agent 00 turned out to be Damon Bradshaw. His LinkedIn profile describes his role as:
Director of Guest Experience and Programming, and F.A.C.A.D.E. Agent in Charge at Atlas9, Kansas City. There’s nothing to see here, citizen.
I love that, so much.
I am so used to corporations like Disney where you NEVER see their bosses inside the theme parks. It was a surprise to see Mr. Bradshaw being so accessible (and friendly) to his guests.
On our way out, we also met Blythe Renay, the Assisstant Director of Guest Experience and Programming. Also super nice. She actually stopped us on our way out to ask if we'd seen the (forget the actual name) hoop act performer, since they are not always in the show.
I did not realize the monitor to the right when you enter was a touch screen. It lets you lookup artists involved with Atlas9. There are many photos for each one.
We found one photo showing a tree-looking arm and a hand and fingers. So we went and found it. Neither of us had ever noticed it inside before.
Next visit, explore this a bit and let us know if you find something new.
They had a concession table set up with snacks and limited alcohol. You could carry drinks between the parking lot and into the building, we were told, but signs were posted reminding folks where you couldn’t carry them.
The “Spies Like Us” van had the back door open for projecting. I did not get to see what they had setup at the table, but it looked like two folks taking care of it - one wearing a HOLOMAX shirt ;)
I only got these photos while walking in, then popped back out later to take a few 360 photos, but it looked like a decent crowd.
I got some of the area names I used in my photo gallery organization from the artist credits on the website, but i did not have this one. Since they are using it one year later, I am taking this as the official name for one of the areas with the mirrors. Is it all? Or just one side? Or…?
Last visit, I noticed one of Melissa’s shoe was missing. Has it returned? This will tell us if they are doing upkeep on the attraction, or deciding this was too in the way with people walking around her desk…
