Large family group and although of course a cruise vacation is always fun and we all made a great time Carnival was very disappointing in many areas that could have made our vacation so much better and at $1200 pp plus drink package we expected better but cuts have definitely been made since we cruised last in 2010 on carnival dream, we have also cruised on royal caribbean and disney and we would prefer NOT to sail Carnival again.Although many of the reviews on here were good, this ship lacked so much that we've had in past cruises and we've been cruising as a family for last 20 years but haven't on carnival in 7 years and boy has carnival changed for the worse in our opinion. Ship was just way too crowded and food was just such poor quality and little options & entertainment was poor or non existent except for group/line dancing to same songs!!

Embarkation was very good and quick although we did have an issue with check in due to agents fault who was not very nice either. However all of us were on the boat by noon but big mistake, the lido buffet was just unbelievable I've never seen the lines that wrapped around whole inside, no tables to be found, and so hot i thought i was going to melt, check in after 1 next time!. No place to go, hoping the cruise wouldn't be like this but we were wrong, Constant lines all the time wherever you went. This ship public areas like pools and the eating areas way too small for amount of passengers. Never have been on a ship where the lines were wrapped around for buffet in morning & for hamburgers & for burritos and the pizza line was ridiculous when at 11:30 pm it was the only place to get something to eat! Midnight buffet was non existent and no food served after 11 and when we ordered room service they were out of 1/2 the menu only the pay menu was available and that took over 45 minutes!!

Food quality was very poor, completely had gone down hill. For lunch the buffet had mostly salads and about 3 hot dishes that were very heavy, flavorless, & salty and carved meats the deli served horrible luncheon meat, weird pulled turkey and strange tasting smokey ham not good and to just get a hot dog you had to wait on this long deli line for one man to make sandwiches, why not put hot dogs out on buffet line and premade subs?? Breakfast buffet was cold watery powdered scrambled eggs, omelet line was always long, same danish no donuts etc and everything was cold and bland. Dinner in dining room was terrible, food cold, and just flavorless, and terrible choices. 2nd elegant night was filtet mignon and short rib and both were gross mystery meat, the chicken breast was so dry, and the fish had no taste, no sauces etc. the desserts were almost always the same and no taste. Service was bad the poor servers so overworked forgot 1/2 what we asked for and drinks took forever to get i actually had to get up and get the water pitcher myself several times and don't ask for anything afterwards or you just won't get it. Food is a big part of cruising and the Carnival Magic lacked good quality food and choices. Only good was when you had to pay for the specialty restaurants and even at $35 the steakhouse was way overpriced should be $25 at the most! Buffet closed at 3 pm and there were not much other options if you wanted a meal or snack, how about put out sandwiches, nachos snacks in afternoon or late night??However the drinks were good and pretty strong and lots of servers so that was great we drank more then ate cause food was not good!! Read more