Defunctland: The Failure of Disney's Arcade Chain, DisneyQuest 

Hey everyone! Hope you liked the video. One correction to sources, "Matt Sonswa" is misspelled. Here is the link to his DisneyQuest urban exploring video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-zGNc-WxOc48.html. Highly recommend checking it out.

I love how 90% of DefunctLand essentially boils down to “One day, Michael Eisner had billions of dollars and a really bad idea”

So now the grand plan is revealed. What we thought was a series of mini-documentaries about former theme-park attractions is actually one giant documentary about the collapse of a man.

“Where’s the exit on this thing?” This was Disney’s plan all along. Trap Michael Eisner in virtual reality so that his reign of terror over Disney could come to an end.

DisneyQuest in 2017 still featured the exact same VR magic carpet ride which opened with Quest in 1998. To put that into perspective, we're talking about a 3D VR video game from before the PlayStation 2 was released, available to play in Disney three years after the PlayStation 4 released. Ocarina of Time released in 1998, Breath of the Wild released in 2017. The gulf in technology is massive, it's really absurd that the attraction stayed open for as long as it did.

I love how defunctland is secretly just all about the rise and fall of Michael Eisner

Note to anyone wanting to start a theme park: don't publish your estimated numbers for opening day.

Special note about that NBA place that replaced Disney Quest, it officially closed for good in August 2021, after being temporarily closed for nearly 1.5 years, meaning the attraction was only open a total of 7 months before it bit the dust.

my family was actually lucky enough to have a really special experience at disney quest! it was somewhere in the early 2000s and my family was on our annual trip to Orlando. during one of our days there it was down-pouring all day so my parents having 2 young kids, off to Disney quest we went! We get there and get into the very long line while it downpours on us. As we’re all standing there shivering and wet a cast member is walking down the line asking people how many are in their party “3!” “Ok have a good day” “we have 5!” “Ok thank you have a good day!” Then he came up to my family “you don’t happen to be a group of 4 do you?” and we were. And then this man looked at us and said “how would you like to skip the line, get right inside and test out a new attraction that’s not open yet?”. I think my brother and just about burst with excitement lol. We obviously agreed and next thing we know we were being escorted inside through the whole building and to the area where we’d be trying out a new “4-D simulator pirate game”. We get to the area where the game is and they explain everything we need to know and then we get on this pirate ship looking platform with screens almost completely around us. There are 4 cannons and we each get behind one and start playing! We got to play it probably 3 or 4 times. It was such a cool experience I only wish I was a bit older so I could have appreciated it more! after that they brought us back out to one of the main areas and gave us some stickers, a couple pins, a pass to the front of the jungle cruise ride, and a certificate making us official game testers lol. If you were a kid that loved technology and video games and virtual experiences and got to go to Disney quest you got to experience a really special kind of magic. Thanks Defunctland for making this video and reminding me of the Disney i grew up with- going to downtown Disney walking around and shopping, getting a massive box of candy at goofy’s candy co, having dinner at rainforest cafe, and then while walking over to go see cirque du soleil passing by all kinds of live music, people dancing, vendors selling cool glow sticks and snowcones and toys. it was a really cool time

Defunctland: "WHOOOSE THAT COMPANY!?" Me: "Disney?" Defunctland: "IT"S DREAMWORKS" Me: "Damn it"

It blows my mind that we've had VR technology since the 70s but only recently has it blown up in the consumer market

I think another issue was they leaned too hard into being "Cutting edge" with all the VR stuff. It's the Tomorrow land issue all over again. In that every time they installed some brand new game, it was obsolete and dated a year or two later.

I didn't realize it before but Michael Eisner is what happens when someone with unbridled influence, spite, and too much money has a series of midlife crises.

Michel Eisner is starting to sound more like a Kingdom Hearts villain

It’s a shame how much of these games/videos are just lost now. I’d totally pay for a collection of all these VR games exactly as they were (just with higher framerates and resolution) on steam for our modern VR headsets.

It finally happened. The NBA Experience closed down for good. I knew it was going to happen. People will say it's mainly the pandemic's fault. But in reality, it was such a niche and specific thing. Disney Quest had more mass appeal. They should have updated it instead of closing it down.

michael eisner almost single handedly destroyed the world's largest media empire. that's pretty impressive in its own right.

i am fascinated by the Michael Eisner lore

There’s a almost indescribable sadness watching a place of entertainment slowly die in front of you and Disney quest is a perfect example of that

Now I can’t wait for the NBA Experience Defunctland episode. All 6 minutes of its history.

inject them themeparks directly into my brain defuncty

Oh my god, the amount of attention to detail put into that opening sequence! Seriously this feels like a big budget TV show documentary series sometimes and is just more proof that indies are going to take over the mainstream someday. This is quickly becoming one of my all time favorite RU-vid channels.

Defunctland has taught me that Michael Eisner is the kind of guy to go to a Coca-Cola machine and buy water

Aw man, reminds me about how even those successful SEGA arcades are in decline in Japan too. Not too many High Tech Lands left now I hear.

Has anyone else noticed that all the Season 2 Disney epsiodes (from Journey Into Imagination to now) form a complete arc?? It's genius!!!

The last time I went to DisneyQuest, my family took my sister there for her birthday in 2013. It was really fun seeing it again after a few years... until I couldn't help but notice how outdated a lot of the games were. Don't get me wrong, they were still plenty of fun, I especially loved Cyberspace Mountain. But one of the shops still sold VHS tapes. VHS tapes. In 2013

Honestly all of these attractions seem really fun, I think I wouldve enjoyed a lot of this as a kid

I miss Disney Quest, I took my nephew there and we really had so many excellent memories there. It was the only place in Florida where a video game kid could enjoy his passion.

I want to believe that this project failed entirely because of that extremely ugly Q.

"You control when you return to reality" Seconds later "Where's the exit on this thing?" Michael Eisner: Stuck in VR

The sad thing about Michael Eisner is that he truly embodies who Walt Disney was: a childlike visionary, well meaning yet very unrealistic thinker who's concept art and ideas are so good yet can't feasibly be created for some unfortunate reason or another that could've been prevented by thinking logically for five minutes.

Now that I think about it, a lot of the interactive and cooperative elements in these attractions have made it into others in the parks (e.g., Toy Story Mania, W.E.B. Slingers, Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run), so it's cool to see that in some way, Disney Quest's vision lives on.

Previously on Defuntctland "A powerful rat, named Charles Entertainment Cheese" 0:44 "They would find a powerful company that starts with a D, DreamWorks" Love the continuity

I love that you included the same stock photo of the "numbers guy" in every video where Disney vastly overestimated opening day attendance, your sense of humor and thorough research is so refeshing

Most of the games in this place were not that great, but the ambiance was something magical. It felt like you were walking through Traverse Town from Kingdom Hearts. It was dark with soft lights everywhere, and it was not as loud as you would expect. If they rebooted this with similar decor, modern VR, and even more retro freeplay arcade games, I think it could work. I also remember the pirate ship game being fun, so a remake would probably do well.

An interesting thing to note is that Merlin Entertainments has had massive success with indoor LEGOLAND Discovery Centers, which are basically a better and more LEGO themed DisneyQuest with rides and building areas instead of video games. Basically, they made what DisneyQuest should’ve been.

"It's virtual reality! Will real life ever be the same?" Yep.

eisner's favorite business tactic: jealousy

At 14:05, I legit had to pause the video when Janet and Jim showed up and call my dad to fact check. I'm from Chicago and did NOT expect it being pulled into the story like this 😂

i had my birthday at downtown disney as a kid just so i could go to disneyquest with my friends. it was the best. i was so upset when it shut down. thanks michael eisner

During this whole video I was like “WHY does this place look so familiar, I know I never went” and then I remembered, one of my old design teachers worked in the design team for Disney quest & showed me all of his original design drawings! So cool

The fact that he gets a different editor for each intro is so cool.

Me, seeing the trailer for FNAF: Security Breach: "The heck? The U.S. doesn't have malls themed around arcades." (Watches opening of video) "....Oh."

VR cost was $50K (I guess not adjusted for inflation) and ticket was $5 to enjoy it once. Now you can have endless VR experience in a comfort of your home for an affordable price of $400. What a great time to be alive.

The Head of Attendance Calculating at the Walt Disney Company is my favorite Defunctland character

I will say: this concept could totally work today given Disney’s significant strides in advanced immersive technology

We were Annual Pass holders to Disneyquest in 2007 & 2008. My kids and I logged hundreds of hours in that place those years (always getting high score on Donkey Kong). It did get old and dated after 2008, so we allowed the passes to expire. It was alot of fun at first.

I'm from Orlando and I actually remember really liking Disney Quest when I was a kid, everyone was sad that it was neglected

I'm lowkey disapointed DisenyQuest failed. It looks like it could have been really fun.

Hearing the 8-bit Fantasmic theme at the beginning gave me chills

"Here's how to draw Mickey Mouse! ...Don't do it anywhere else, though, or we'll sue you."

Disney Quest was fun when I went there in 2008. Battle for Buccaneer Gold was easily the most fun.

DCU = Defunctland Cinematic Universe

MICHEAL EISNER. GOAT. (I totally love how Disney Quest was created almost entirely out of spite. This is hilarious.)

A few months ago I found a Disney Quest backpack at trift store near me for 4$. Needless to say, I snatched it asap! I use it to store my Oculus Quest 2 (ironic I know, especially since VR and shit), but I would have never known about Disney Quest without this video, so I have so say a big thank you for not just giving amazing content but also making me find cool shit. Also the new Fastpass documentary was insane, big ups on that. Back to the RU-vid abyss I go

Man, I wish places like this still existed. Just... places for youngins and teens to hang out safely. Feels like more die every day

The place really didn't have to die. If they just updated it when it needed to be updated, they could have grown with technology but they just built it and left it to slowly die. It was a perfect place that they could have had a mini Wreck it Ralph indoor theme park with different areas rethemed to the different games of Ralph's world. Get a little Dave and Buster feel in there with must do dining location and acarde games galore and it could have been a winner buuuut nope. Just.... let it die a slow death. This is a dark era of Disney.

Between reading Disney War and watching Defunctland, Michael Eisner has become more than a human to me. Now, he is a pure greek tragedy. I have seen the rise, and now, we shall see the fall.

I went to DisneyQuest in 2016. Had a blast. Saw an arcade machine bluescreen and reboot. I went back in 2019 to see that it was gone. I miss that place.

I'll always have a special place in my heart for Disney Quest Chicago, the scene of many birthdays and group outings. Somewhere I'm pretty sure I still have the stickers we printed from the photo booths with a dozen different frame filters - initially free, eventually an additional cost on top of entrance. They also had essentially an internet cafe, which was a blessing to awkward pre-teen me; I def remember sneaking off to get away from the crowd and read fanfic for the allowed 15-minute intervals.

Has a massive themed arcade that was still bringing in steady visitors despite the main attractions being horribly outdated. Rather than upgrade the software and equipment to try and revitalize the place, they decide to demolish and then build an oversized Sports Store... I don't get Disney sometimes.

I loved Disney Quest as a kid. I can't remember how old I was when I first went, I must have been 10-11. I was terrified of the Aladdin ride for some reason; I screamed and cried so loud the workers had to stop it halfway through. I also didn't realize the make your own coaster was a... make your own coaster. I built the craziest one with loops and twists (I had never been on a fast or upside-down ride in my life at this point as I was too scared), got really confused when they loaded us into the simulator, and proceeded to have one of the scariest experiences of my young life. Despite all that, I loved it.

As a business model I have seen and learned from watching your videos, NEVER OPEN, THINK OF OPENING, OR INVEST in a arcade, theme park, or theme restaurants! 😂

So, I actually have a story from (of all people) my optometrist. His hobby is to build and repare arcade machines. Disney, around the time of Wreck It Ralphs release, asked for a bunch of people to donate donkey Kong arcade cabinets. He, and a whole lot of others, thought they wanted purely donkey Kong cabinets. So, they cleaned them up, made them look nice and pretty, put in new boards and sent it to Disney. What Disney wanted to do with it though, was gut them, get rid of the decals and turn them into Wreck It Ralph cabinets. So they did. He told me that so many people got angry at Disney, they almost sued them.

Is it just me or does Eisner sound like the cartoon sterotype of like... some shady middle-aged guy talking about something like it's actually good, when so clearly he's barely got any realy grasp on what's going on? "Yeaaah, it'sa virutal reality whatzit!"

My wife was part of the opening team at DisneyQuest. Two things of interest: 1. the slide was closed because people kept hurting their ankles on the hard landing. I am not sure that there were any broken ankles, but the pains it caused alone were bad enough. 2. The original Ride The Comix concept was supposed to feature Disney Villains. The only reason that I know this is because one of the training manuals that she was given has a concept painting of the Villains in place of the final poster which had newly created bad guys for the ride. It's a fun "What if?" kind of thing. I miss DQ.

I somehow managed to go to DisneyQuest AND Gameworks as a kid and I loved the afternoon I spent in DisneyQuest as an early teen, but I never realized it was meant to go across the country. And Gameworks closed a year before my high school graduation, where our party was meant to happen…

Man, DisneyQuest was awesome... I think I only went there once or maybe twice but I distinctly remember it being one of the biggest highlights of that trip to Disney World. Of course, I might've been really easily entertained cause I was pretty young...

You've gotta do River Country! It's got everything. Brain-eating bacteria, lawsuits, unsafe water slides... and the lights and music are still running, years after the whole place was abandoned! It's all still there...

I remember going to Disney Quest in Orlando as a kid, it was the most amazing thing I had ever seen. Up until I lost my parents and ended up running around the entire building tears streaming from my eyes trying to find them for about 30 minutes.

I was so happy to see that you mentioned Randy Pausch. His Last Lecture book and speech changed my life, and his innovations in computer science were ground-breaking. It's great to see that people still talk about his work and legacy. :)

I'm so glad I got to see Disney Quest near the end of its life. The make-your-own coaster attraction was arguably better than the actual parks since you got to make it as wild and crazy as you wanted. The rest of the space was pretty decent, even in 2016. You could tell some attractions had been there forever, but it still felt unique and magical.

I gotta admit this sounds really cool. I'd be down with seeing them revising a lot of this concept; with modern technologies you could produce some way cheaper VR arcades.

did you ever hear the tragedy of Michael Eisner the unwise?

Oh man, I remember aiming here years ago. One of the best memories was me and my dad playing the Pirates of the Caribbean game together. Good times man…

I miss classic Downtown Disney. Now its just a mall called "Disney Springs" I regret not going to Disney Quest back 10 years ago. But it was a bit too pricey for what you can do over there. I barely remember the last time I went back in late 1990s.

Wait... Disney quest had NO updates on the VR systems / graphics and ran until 2017?? That's absolutely unbelievable!!

Defunctland Season 2: The Story of Michael Eisner’s fall from grace.

The moment I saw the Create Zone I couldn’t shake the feeling I’d been there before. And then you mentioned the Create-a-Toy, which I KNOW I went to in 2000!

I went to Disney World (Orlando) once in my life at the age of around 7. Im 23 now so a lot of it feels like a dream. This was the one part of the whole two week visit that I never did know if it was real or if I imagined it..

I've literally never heard of DisneyQuest, and so I assumed it closed during the early 2000s or something. To find that it was open until LAST YEAR is genuinely shocking to me, and it definitely makes sense that the place never got any business because I've been to Florida for amusement park vacations numerous times and not ONCE have I seen an advertisement or hide or hair of DisneyQuest. But damn, this was a fascinating video, thanks for making it

I wish history channel hired you make a show like this.

disney then: $16 for games everyone: TOO EXPENSIVE! disney now: $6999999994354534645635423423545234123 for a star wars hotel everyone: ❤😍💝😘

That absolutely breaks my heart that DisneyQuest is Defunct. I loved going there every time me and my family went to Disney World for our summer vacation, with it dominating most of my memories of being there. We need time machines to be invented NOW.

Defunctland is such a dope series. Thank you for making such interesting videos.

12:58 My grandfather and his business partner created the attraction Treasure of the Incas. As Kevin said, it was less immersive than the other attractions in Explore zone. The premise of the game was you were a Indiana-Jones like explorer searching through an ancient Incan temple to acquire the 13 artifacts placed around the maze. Some of these artifacts included: the Serpent's Crown, Sun Disk, Crystal Skull, Llama's Throne, Monkey's Torch, and the Jaguar's Eye. You had a time limit of 5 minutes (excluding treasure room cutscenes) to collect all of the treasure. When a jeep pulled into a treasure room, a short cutscene would play depicting you activating and dispelling the treasure's curse and then acquiring it. The CGI graphics were mainly used for the Treasure Room cutscenes that played when you pulled into them. While less physically immersive, a sense of immersion came from the amazingly detailed set pieces used in the maze. Everything was created to be to scale with your small RC Jeep so when viewed on the screen, it appeared life-sized. These included wrecked jeeps with skeletons next to them, ivy growing on the walls and ceiling of the maze, Incan paintings and sculptures, and flickering torches outside of each Treasure Room. There were 20 jeeps in the maze with working headlights and taillights. The jeeps controlled like a tank, able to stop and change direction as needed to navigate the many turns in the maze. Kevin mentioned that you could have a spotter watch your car in the maze and call directions to the driver. This was thanks to the plexiglass ceiling of the maze and clear numbering on the tops and sides of the jeeps. For those playing without a spotter, inside the maze were road signs at most intersections that pointed toward the directions of different treasures. If there is any more information that you would like about Treasure of the Incas, or Disney Quest in general, just let me know.

Man this looks like it was very impressive for 90’s VR! Sucks that it got outdated so quickly. I really want to know how the Sega/Dreamworks version did!

The Disney Quest closure was honestly one of the saddest things from my childhood to see end. I loved that place so much. I really hope they open something similar one day. And it was nice because you could have a fun Disney experience with nice air conditioning, unlike the hot and humid Disney parks, that make you want to go home early because you got dehydrated because you can't afford $4 water.

Idk when I saw that one of the dining spots was called "Food Quest" I just lost it because although it fits in with the theming it's such a generic name and for some reason set me off on a giggle quest.

I really loved Disney Quest as a kid and without making updates to the games, it made sense to shut it down. However, it would have made even MORE sense to update the games and add new virtual reality stuff with all of the new tech that has come out.

I live in Philly and had no idea about the Disney hole, it is indeed still a parking lot. I walk past that every day on my way to work

I've been to DisneyQuest! It was fun as a kid, however not sure if I'd have fun now as an adult lol (if it was even still open 😂😭) when we went my brother got so sick after.

I was at DisneyQuest on it's last day of operation. It was an amazing and heartfelt day.

So you have a place where you can be lightly introduced to animation while also having a VR Roller Coaster Tycoon where you can actually *ride* the roller coaster you built? How in the world did Disney screw that up? I'd love to go that place even as a teenager. It may be defunct now but man this sounds like such a cool and fun concept. Capitalism sometimes just doesn't make any sense.

I want to say the last time I went to Disney quest Orlando was 2016/2017, and it was definitely nearing the end by that point. I remember going in the late 2000s and it being my favorite lesser-known Disney attraction, but that last time we went it felt sad. The rides were definitely dated but the novelty of it was awesome. But the last time there was no one there, which was cool because there were basically no waits and no lines, but I remember parts of the building were closed off already and it felt eerie. It was quiet and we left after maybe abt an hour, and the next time I went it was already shut down.

One of the best memories of my childhood. Sad that it ended up going down.

I was going through a bunch of old boxes and I found a CD that my sister had made at DisneyQuest, a song about partying and cheesecake. I understand the cheesecake part of it now.

When they closed down DisneyQuest in Orlando last year I filmed my last night there with some friends as one of the saddest nights in our recent lives. So many good memories had there. Such a unique and fun place to spend a childhood. It still kills me to walk at Disney Springs, visit the tomb of an old friend and see an NBA experience sitting on the corpse of a far superior landmark. Whoever it was that finally signed off on the death of DisneyQuest: I have a major bone to pick with you.

Damn it, just finding out today that Disney Quest is closed for good. Was one of my favorite parts of going to Disney World as a kid. My parents were usually very strict about spending time on video games, but at Disney Quest my entire family would spend the entire day together just gaming and trying out all the VR experiences. For my 8-10 year old self that was like heaven on earth, always proved to be the highlight of our Orlando trips. It's proof that even the most strict asian parent could bond closely with their child over having fun with video games.

I'm 2 years late to this video jist like I was years late to Disney Quest. My first time experiencing and ever even hearing of Quest was its literal last day in operation. They gave out photos to commemorate the moment, it was pretty cool but obvious the place hadn't been updated for years.