Universal Studios, Osaka, Japan🎡

You can't go to Osaka and not make plans to go to Universal Studios! We spent the whole day there and it was a huge highlight of our trip...as well as the most expensive.

Tickets for the park are around $95 AUD for just a day pass, however, you can upgrade to 1.5 or a 2 days if you want. There are also 6 Fast Pass packages to choose from, each of them giving you fast access to different rides and areas of the park, but they are all very expensive! You can find all of these tickets and passes on their website here.

Do you need to get a fast pass or not?

We got the fast pass, however, after spending the day there, we probably didn't need to splash out on one and this is why:

• Having a fast pass is to avoid queuing hours for rides. If you don't mind long queues then you don't need one, however, if you don’t want to be spending half your day waiting in queues, this is a must!
• Secondly, we were going during Golden Week (which is a five day Bank Holiday in Japan, meaning everything was 10 x busier) so we thought it would be chaotic and didn't want to have to wait ages.
• Thirdly, the fast pass gave us access to only four attractions, which were at specific times, meaning we had to line everything up to make sure we made each attraction on time. The more expensive passes give you more access, so even if you get a basic one, the rides you get might not even be the best rides you want fast access to!
• Lastly, queues for rides are split into three lines (fast pass, normal pass and singles), singles queue is when they fill in the empty seats on the rides if there is an odd number in groups. If you don't mind going on the ride as a single then you really don't need a fast pass. We realised this halfway into the day and spent the rest of the day going as singles, which were sometimes even faster than the fast passes.

Best time to go

The best time to go is during the week, as locals tend to go on the weekends. Go as early as you want to avoid crowds as well as make the most of your day! We thought the park opened at 8am, but apparently it often opens 30-60 minutes earlier than normal. We aimed to get there for 9am, but everyone else had the same idea and the queues were already really long. However, once we were in, it was fine!

Super Nintendo World

Download the official USJ app and book a timed entry for Nintendo World. If you don’t do this and don’t have a fast pass, I would go to the area of the park as soon as you get in and book a slot. During the day they give out allocated time slots that you need to book in. We didn't realise this and were only able to book the 5pm slot and by then we were pretty tired so we sadly didn’t spend that long there. If you don’t get a timed slot, you might not be able to go to this area of the park as it sells out pretty quickly.

Nintendo World is huge, with two different main areas, Super Mario Land and Donkey Kong Country. You will need at least a couple of hours here to enjoy the area properly. Walk around the different levels of Mario Cart, then head to Donkey Kong Country and go on the Mine Craft Madness ride, a bit of a rough ride but was fun nonetheless.

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter was by far my favourite part of the park. As big fans of the Harry Potter movies we spent the most time here! Once inside the area, you properly feel like you are part of the Wizarding World. You get the chance to walk around a smaller version of the iconic Hogwarts Castle, where you explore the classrooms, corridors of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardy, as well as peak inside Dumbledore’s office and Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom.

You can then walk around Hogsmeade, the famous village where wizards live. Here you can pop into all the main shops that you see in the movies, from Hogs Head, to Owl Post and Honey Dukes. You can pay for additional attractions to try, like going to Olivanders and experience the magical moment when the wandmaker says ‘the wand chooses the wizard’ or try casting your own spells around the village. There are also different stalls where you can buy souvenirs and iconic props from the movies.

Around the grounds of Hogsmeade, you can see the iconic steam engine of Hogwards Express, barrels of Butterbeer that you can try and the sweets shops where you can buy the chocolate frogs and secret love potions.

There are also two rides in Harry Potter World, Flight of the Hippogriff and Harry Potter and the Forbiden Journey. The Forbidden Journey was an interactive ride and was pretty good, however, I get really bad motion sickness so came off it feeling pretty sick. The Flight of the Hippogriff, is an alright ride too, but it was over in probably 20 seconds, so not worth the long queue in my opinion. Ned sadly was not allowed on the ride for being too tall, so he got to watch me go on it by myself. This was one of the rides that was included in our Fast Pass, meaning this was another reason as to why we didn’t necessarily need the fast pass. However, we couldn’t have known that Ned wouldn’t have been allowed on the ride!

Food at Universal Studios

There are so many different food options in Universal Studios. Make the most of the day and try the small bites from the different stalls dotted around the park, however, it will add up and be a very expensive day! You’re not really allowed to bring your own food from outside, but if you have small snacks, depending on the day security might let you take them in. If not, you are spoilt for choice once inside.

We had breakfast before we went to, which stopped us from going crazy inside. For lunch we both got pizza and then a couple of snacks throughout the day to keep us going. Of course we had to get the chocolate frog from Harry Potter World and some sweets, it would have been rude not to!

Rating the Rides

Overall, it was a really fun day for us and we definitely made the most of it. We went on most of the rides in the park, so here are our ratings for all of them:

1. Space Fantasy - 9/10
   Was surprisingly really fun! We weren’t expecting it to be so thrilling, only waited twenty minutes for this ride.
2. Minion Mayhem - 3/10
   We didn’t realise it was a stationary 3D ride for kids, so we queued or over an hour and it was very underwhelming. It was also in Japanese obviously, so we couldn’t understand it.
3. The Flying Dinosaur - 1000/10
   This was the best ride in the whole park! We would have spent the whole day just going on this ride if we could and if the queues weren’t so long. Had a fast pass for this so were able to go on this twice.
4. Hollywood Dream - 8.5/10
   Over too quick otherwise it would have been a 10, but still really fun to go on. Make sure to try it going backwards as well for an extra thrill.
5. Donkey Kong - 6.5/10
   Waited for over an hour for this ride and it was good, but we came off feeling battered and bruised! Less thrills, more whiplash!
6. Jurassic Park - 8/10
   Surprisingly really cool, but prepare to get very wet
7. Jaws - 5/10
   Pretty fun for kids, but pretty boring for adults. Was also in Japanese again so not as exciting.
8. Harry Potter Forbidden Journey - 8.5/10
   Loved it! Was really good for an interactive ride. Maybe give it a skip if you get motion sickness as I struggled quite badly when I got off!