I thought I would hate the new system of Genie+ and Individual Lightning Lanes and it turned out to be better than the Fastpass+ system most days. Though keep in mind that we are out of state Annual Passholders restricted by the school calendar so the $30 or so per person per day was negligible compared to the cost of APs, airfare, car, DVC, dining, etc.
The biggest advantage of the new system is that it allows for 'last minute' changes in planning. The night before the next day's visit I discussed with my family if they wanted to go on the Individual LL ride and what was their top priority Genie+ ride. I then booked them at 7:00AM and later through the day I booked more LLs as our Genie+ booking times arrived. The second advantage compared to FastPass+ is that we could get at least two and usually three of the best rides instead of just one in EPCOT, HS, and AK. Later this year this is expected to increase by one as two rides per park become Individual LLs. Also as I understand it, you can use Individual LLs and Genie+ across parks...but we never park hopped so I have no personal experience.
It's a little annoying that those of us who like to hit the parks in time for lunch don't get to pick another Genie+ LL until 2 hours after official park open instead of after tapping in...but it never really affected our visits. We still rode lots of rides, most of them through LLs.
As a side note, I also found that there were lots of people who cancel or modify Advance Dining Reservations the night before (and we were among them). So that feeling of ride serendipity carried over to dining as well.
The biggest advantage of the new system is that it allows for 'last minute' changes in planning. The night before the next day's visit I discussed with my family if they wanted to go on the Individual LL ride and what was their top priority Genie+ ride. I then booked them at 7:00AM and later through the day I booked more LLs as our Genie+ booking times arrived. The second advantage compared to FastPass+ is that we could get at least two and usually three of the best rides instead of just one in EPCOT, HS, and AK. Later this year this is expected to increase by one as two rides per park become Individual LLs. Also as I understand it, you can use Individual LLs and Genie+ across parks...but we never park hopped so I have no personal experience.
It's a little annoying that those of us who like to hit the parks in time for lunch don't get to pick another Genie+ LL until 2 hours after official park open instead of after tapping in...but it never really affected our visits. We still rode lots of rides, most of them through LLs.
As a side note, I also found that there were lots of people who cancel or modify Advance Dining Reservations the night before (and we were among them). So that feeling of ride serendipity carried over to dining as well.