Visitors check out the newest version of Dragon Ball Z Kakarot on the 2019 Gamescom gaming trade fair in Cologne, Germany.
Lukas Schulze | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Saudi Arabia is ready to grow to be home to the first-ever Dragon Ball Z theme park — a 5.3 million square foot entertainment venue announced as a part of the dominion’s huge Qiddiya project.
The newest tourist attraction announced by the dominion will feature seven different areas recreating locations from the unique Japanese anime television series, greater than 30 themed rides, and a lot of hotels and restaurants, in response to the press release.
Five of the rides on the Dragon Ball Z theme park will likely be “world firsts,” in response to the discharge, one in all which will likely be a 230-foot-high roller coaster called Shenron, named after the series’ magical dragon.
Video games and the favored Japanese genre of anime have grow to be targets for significant investment from the dominion — Japan-based manga producer Toei Animation (producers of
Dragon Ball Z) and MiSK, a foundation of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, are also collaborating to create anime movies. Saudi’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) can also be the third-largest shareholder of Japanese video game giant Nintendo.
Qiddiya itself — a planned multibillion-dollar “city” in Riyadh — is a large plot of desert about 28 miles, or a 40-minute drive, outside the capital Riyadh.
Its planners say it should be greater than 360 square kilometers (or around 140 square miles) in size and may have greater than 400 specific attractions including golf courses, theme parks and hotels. It is also set to have a Six Flags and a waterpark.
A project of the Saudi’s PIF, which oversees $925 billion in assets, Qiddiya City goals to grow to be home to 600,000 residents, in addition to host tens of millions of holiday makers yearly. The fund has poured billions of dollars over the previous few years into sports, music events, e-gaming and cultural attractions in a bid to show the dominion right into a tourist hub and diversify its economy away from reliance on oil.
Vision 2030, the name of this project, a brainchild of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has also set a goal of 150 million tourists visiting the dominion annually by 2030. Tourism reached a record for the country in 2023 at 106 million, in response to its tourism ministry — a rise of 56% from 2019.
