Nickelodeon Studios
Photo credit: Photo via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
The working Nickelodeon studio tucked inside Universal Studios Florida — the one with the giant Slime Geyser erupting green out front. Kids toured the soundstages, watched real game shows get taped, and dreamed of being the one pulled from the crowd to get slimed. For a 90s Nick fan, it was a pilgrimage.
Nickelodeon Studios opened on June 7, 1990, as both a real production studio and a theme-park attraction inside Universal Studios Florida in Orlando. Out front stood its signature landmark: the Slime Geyser (also called the Gak Geyser), unveiled on October 27, 1990, a 17-foot fountain that 'erupted' with green water every ten minutes and became the backdrop for a million family photos.
Inside, a 45-minute tour walked guests upstairs through the control room, past viewing areas overlooking Soundstages 18 and 19, then down through the wardrobe department and the Gak Kitchen, ending with a mock game show called Game Lab where one lucky guest got slimed. And the tapings were real: shows shot at the facility included Double Dare, Nickelodeon GUTS, Nick Arcade, Legends of the Hidden Temple, Figure It Out, Slime Time Live, Clarissa Explains It All, and Welcome Freshmen — the exact programs kids watched at home. On April 30, 1992, Nickelodeon buried a Time Capsule out front, filled with items voted important by 1992 viewers.
The studio closed permanently on April 30, 2005, as Nickelodeon shifted production elsewhere. Soundstage 18 was later redesigned into a 1,000-seat theater for the Blue Man Group, which opened its residency there on June 1, 2007. The geyser and the slime were gone, but for a generation of Orlando visitors, touring the real Nickelodeon Studios was the closest a kid could get to living inside the TV.
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Double Dare
Nickelodeon's messiest game show: take the money or take the physical challenge — and the physical challenge always meant getting slimed. Marc Summers, the giant obstacle course, and the human nose you dug through.
Nickelodeon GUTS
An extreme-sports game show where three kid athletes competed in over-the-top events, many of them strapped into bungee harnesses. Hosted by Mike O'Malley and refereed by Moira Quirk, it crowned winners with a gold GUTS medal and a glowing piece of the legendary Aggro Crag. That final mountain climb — Aggro Crag, Mega Crag, or Super Aggro Crag — was the holy grail of 90s kids' TV.
Nick Arcade
You remember it running for years — it was actually two quick seasons, all in 1992, kept alive by reruns until 1997. Phil Moore sent kids "to the Video Zone!", the green-screen finale where you physically jumped around inside a video game and almost always lost. The dream of every kid with a Genesis and a dream.
Legends of the Hidden Temple
Six teams of kids competed in arcade-style obstacle courses to retrieve a relic from inside a booby-trapped temple. Hosted by Kirk Fogg and the giant talking stone head Olmec, this Nickelodeon action game show was as chaotic as it was captivating.