Halloween Haunt 2015
- Thread starter buckler89
- Start date
Glaze corrected me in an above post. There is a $40 ticket labeled 'bring a friend' online for purchase. It is $25 off regular price. Which is the same price you can get all year long as a pass holder. Sorry if I confused you. It is not the highly discounted rate available on 'bring a friend days' that occur throughout the year.
Thanks and sorry I didn't notice Glaze's post. I wish I could use the Friday/Sunday ticket price but I'm doing my student teaching right now and Saturdays and the only days I can go and have the next day to rest up.
I'm going tomorrow. It will be my second and last trip to Haunt for the season. Looking forward to riding Berserker and walking through No Vacancy.
I'm planning on going tomorrow with a few friends. We'll probably not have Fast Lane. Anyone have a good attack plan for the mazes? I was told to hit Club Blood and Zombie High first and make our way toward the front of the park.
They're putting 2 actors in tollway tonight
That's probably all they need to put it over the top.glaze700 said:
Thanks to the Wilson bridge closure making the beltway in MD gridlocked, I wasn't able to go tonight. Bitter. Hoping to go next weeked.
I'm in the park. Waiting for my family to get off Dominator. Anyone know if Berserker is running today? There was a mention of it at the front of the park but it's 10:46am and it's deserted.
Wasn't able to make it today. Are they at Busch level crowds right now or is the park faring better?
Considering a trip up there next weekend.
Considering a trip up there next weekend.
Went to BGW earlier in the day, and now I'm at KD. No, KD is not at BGW level. I have a skeleton key so I wouldn't know what lines are like but all the mazes I've seen are overflowing their queue.
I went to KD yesterday night. We completed all the houses with time to spare. It felt like KD has better crowd control for their mazes. All of the maze lines were out of their "area", however, we only waited 30 mins at the most. The scares were great as well! It was a great experience since my home park is Busch. Freezing cold though. ;P
I noticed from the path that KD seems to have made some *slight* improvements to Tollway Terror. Gone is the modern country music soundtrack (which was apparently a leftover part of Blue Ridge Bloodbath), replaced with a soundtrack of what is best described as "spooky forest noises". I heard whooshing wind, howling wolves, Verbolten-esque engine noises, and thunder. It did set a better mood than the country music.
One thing that did seem kind of cool, was that periodically the sound of a train horn would blast loudly through the area. Loudly. It could easily be heard as far away as Panda Express. That seemed cool.
I also noticed some more Miner's Revenge props have been set up along the track, such as some of the cave structures. Also, some of the "animatronic" figures are now bathed in a red light to make them a little spookier and easier to see.
That said, there is no way in hell these changes make up for the complete shittiness of Tollway Terror, and I would bet my life savings that it still remains total garbage.
One thing that did seem kind of cool, was that periodically the sound of a train horn would blast loudly through the area. Loudly. It could easily be heard as far away as Panda Express. That seemed cool.
I also noticed some more Miner's Revenge props have been set up along the track, such as some of the cave structures. Also, some of the "animatronic" figures are now bathed in a red light to make them a little spookier and easier to see.
That said, there is no way in hell these changes make up for the complete shittiness of Tollway Terror, and I would bet my life savings that it still remains total garbage.
So I was able to visit Haunt for the first time in my life this past Saturday, even though I have attended Howl-O-Scream almost before I can remember, and just thought that I'd give my thoughts.
After getting my Fright Lane, and almost looping the park to find a restaurant that didn't have an absurdly long line, or wasn't closed(Spoiler: all of them had 30+ minute lines or were closed), I started the night by eating at the new Sideshow Buffet. It was kinda hard to spot, especially since no one was eating there. The usher directed us to the cash register beside the buffet line, and we then waited for the cashier to show up for about five minutes. After finally paying and being handed our plates(which was another annoying flaw, every time you wanted seconds you had to ask the cashier for a new plate so they could go retrieve it for you), we finally proceeded to eat. The menu was simple, not much variety. Tortilla chips, bread sticks, ceaser salad, tortellini with your choice of sliced chicken and red or alfredo sauce on top, lasagna,vanilla cake, vanilla cupcakes, and a layered pie.
The ceaser salad was I guess enjoyable for salad, all the appetizers were fine. The tortellini was overcooked, I don't mind overcooked pasta too much, but it's come to my attention that some people on here do, so I just thought that I'd mention it. The alfredo sauce and chicken was good, I didn't dare try the red sauce though. The lasagna wasn't the best, but I guess that's what happens when it's served buffet style. Would I recommend? Well, if it sounds appealing to you and you're willing to cough up the money, give it a shot.
After dinner, I began to go through the houses. Below I will list the houses I did in order from my most liked to least liked. Disclaimer: my rankings are probably not the norm, but you'll see why as you read down the list, but to say the least, I must have encountered a lot of issues that are not typical of Haunt.
No Vacancy: This house was simply fantastic. I loved it. The theme was great, and the detail inside the maze was amazing. Loved the hall of TVs, it had a great animatronic scare. All of the actors did a great job. I would've done it again if I wasn't so tired by the end of the night, hope to see this house stick around.
Lockdown: Yeah, I'm surprised to have this one as high up as it is too. The sets were meh, not really hitting the detail of most of the park's other mazes. I recall a blank hall with an LED light at the end of it doing some sort of weird thing. I think it was meant to be some sort of strobe, but ended up failing miserably and just making the hall as bright as could be. The general atmosphere gave me flashbacks to Maze of Madness, except this time it's a prison instead of a mental hospital. I encountered some stacking issues, even though they were separating groups, and I went in alone, but I met the group in front of me without getting out of the first room. The only reason this is ranked so high is because it had a fantastic cast. Probably got me the most scares of all the mazes, even No Vacancy. I fear without the great cast, and if the other mazes were performing as they should/could be, this maze could easily be one of the worst at the park.
Doll Factory: Honestly, I'm cutting this maze some slack. There was a person with a No Boo on right behind me(Why KD? Why?!), so I probably missed out on the total greatness of the cast. But it didn't have too many stacking issues, and there were a couple of nice scares here and there. Seemed a little short-staffed, nothing too noticeable though. The detail was great, and I really liked the final room with the mirrors and hanging manikins, it gave a really cool effect with them swaying in the strobe. Wished there was an actor in that room, however. One suggestion is maybe covering the top, I feel like it would make the whole maze dimmer, which I felt it kind of needed.
Maze of Madness: Yes, I'm shocked this is up here too. I think I waited 15 minutes outside of the maze(remember, I had Fright Lane) for a stupid photo op that I didn't even have to do because I was a single, and then beyond that I waited another 10 minutes for a downright awful skeleton key room. Well, after that the maze detail was probably the worst in the park. There were no stacking issues, but at some points, it was somewhat unclear where to go next. The mirror maze was hardly disorienting. However, this maze's cast was still pretty good. I think most of the scare actors actually made an attempt to scare me.
Zombie High: This started with a fantastic facade, I really liked the zombie at the top. I got let into the house, and even though they were letting people in by groups, there was still immediate stacking in the first room, and it stayed like that the entire maze. It probably took me 3x the amount of time to get through this maze than it should have. I guess the actors don't respond well to horrid stacking because I got little to no scares out of this maze, I walked by a countless amount of actors who I just got to look at. So basically, the only thing going for this maze was the detail, which it did pretty well. I would be willing to give this maze another chance, but because the park wasn't dealing with crowd control the correct way, it almost entirely ruined my experience.
Cornstalkers: Simply put, this maze was probably the least memorable of the night(mazes can be memorable by being really bad
) . Like Zombie High, it had massive stacking issues. I wasn't moving at all at multiple points throughout the maze, it was ridiculous. And like Zombie High, the actors apparently did respond to the stacking. I think someone actually attempted to scare me or actually move 2-4 times at the max, which is strange considering I had a group of teenage girls directly behind me. The atmosphere was decent, but it was honestly a standard corn maze, lots of corn stalks, not that much to make it unique. Perhaps that's what made it so unimpressionable. I am willing to give Cornstalkers another chance in the future though.
Club Blood: Like Cornstalkers and Zombie High, it suffered from major stacking issues, but this was probably the worst of the three. Totally stopped at tons of points throughout the maze and there were times where I was only taking 2 steps every 20-30 seconds. The maze was a cool concept, different and unique, with some nice sets. However it seemed short staffed, I remember there being five people in one room but only one or none in others. Hardly any scares to be had, again, probably because of the stacking issues.
Slaughterhouse: By far the worst maze of the night. I waited 20 minutes for an awfully gross skeleton key room. The sets were gross, not scary. There were probably 6 or 7 actors in the entire house. None of which actually tried to scare me. I remember hearing/seeing an actor with an obviously fake chainsaw who was actually trying a little, and by the time I got to his position he was gone. I guess he went on break in the 20 seconds it took for me to get to him.
I did all the scare zones except Iron Worx. All the ones I did seemed understaffed, Cleaver Brothers probably had the most, and Primevil I only saw two actors, one was in a nearby planter making odd movements and noises. I didn't look at the online descriptions before I went to the event other than the new maze this year, Lockdown, so all the scarezones besides Cleaver Bros and Feary Tales, the theme was pretty much undetectable. I liked the props for the most part though.
The new DJ and bar, the Annex, was pretty bad. I could hear the music all the way over at the entrance to Slaughterhouse. When I walked by once, they were playing, uh.... Taylor Swift, and not even something relatable like Bad Blood, they were playing You Belong With Me. WTF?
One thing I was looking forward to mainly at Haunt was the great actors, or more comparatively, better actors than Howl-O-Scream. I only encountered a couple that did more than a standard jump scare. I know people may have different experiences, but I didn't encounter this aspect of the event.
I may have had an abnormally bad experience with Haunt, but I still enjoyed myself. It's definitely always fun to try out a new event. I think that KD has a couple issues to work out, mainly crowd control, I know their intent is to make lines shorter, but it was to a point that it was almost completely ruining my experience inside the mazes. So finally, I hope that I will have the opportunity to give Halloween Haunt another chance in the future, but that won't be until next year at the earliest, unfortunately.
After getting my Fright Lane, and almost looping the park to find a restaurant that didn't have an absurdly long line, or wasn't closed(Spoiler: all of them had 30+ minute lines or were closed), I started the night by eating at the new Sideshow Buffet. It was kinda hard to spot, especially since no one was eating there. The usher directed us to the cash register beside the buffet line, and we then waited for the cashier to show up for about five minutes. After finally paying and being handed our plates(which was another annoying flaw, every time you wanted seconds you had to ask the cashier for a new plate so they could go retrieve it for you), we finally proceeded to eat. The menu was simple, not much variety. Tortilla chips, bread sticks, ceaser salad, tortellini with your choice of sliced chicken and red or alfredo sauce on top, lasagna,vanilla cake, vanilla cupcakes, and a layered pie.
The ceaser salad was I guess enjoyable for salad, all the appetizers were fine. The tortellini was overcooked, I don't mind overcooked pasta too much, but it's come to my attention that some people on here do, so I just thought that I'd mention it. The alfredo sauce and chicken was good, I didn't dare try the red sauce though. The lasagna wasn't the best, but I guess that's what happens when it's served buffet style. Would I recommend? Well, if it sounds appealing to you and you're willing to cough up the money, give it a shot.
After dinner, I began to go through the houses. Below I will list the houses I did in order from my most liked to least liked. Disclaimer: my rankings are probably not the norm, but you'll see why as you read down the list, but to say the least, I must have encountered a lot of issues that are not typical of Haunt.
No Vacancy: This house was simply fantastic. I loved it. The theme was great, and the detail inside the maze was amazing. Loved the hall of TVs, it had a great animatronic scare. All of the actors did a great job. I would've done it again if I wasn't so tired by the end of the night, hope to see this house stick around.
Lockdown: Yeah, I'm surprised to have this one as high up as it is too. The sets were meh, not really hitting the detail of most of the park's other mazes. I recall a blank hall with an LED light at the end of it doing some sort of weird thing. I think it was meant to be some sort of strobe, but ended up failing miserably and just making the hall as bright as could be. The general atmosphere gave me flashbacks to Maze of Madness, except this time it's a prison instead of a mental hospital. I encountered some stacking issues, even though they were separating groups, and I went in alone, but I met the group in front of me without getting out of the first room. The only reason this is ranked so high is because it had a fantastic cast. Probably got me the most scares of all the mazes, even No Vacancy. I fear without the great cast, and if the other mazes were performing as they should/could be, this maze could easily be one of the worst at the park.
Doll Factory: Honestly, I'm cutting this maze some slack. There was a person with a No Boo on right behind me(Why KD? Why?!), so I probably missed out on the total greatness of the cast. But it didn't have too many stacking issues, and there were a couple of nice scares here and there. Seemed a little short-staffed, nothing too noticeable though. The detail was great, and I really liked the final room with the mirrors and hanging manikins, it gave a really cool effect with them swaying in the strobe. Wished there was an actor in that room, however. One suggestion is maybe covering the top, I feel like it would make the whole maze dimmer, which I felt it kind of needed.
Maze of Madness: Yes, I'm shocked this is up here too. I think I waited 15 minutes outside of the maze(remember, I had Fright Lane) for a stupid photo op that I didn't even have to do because I was a single, and then beyond that I waited another 10 minutes for a downright awful skeleton key room. Well, after that the maze detail was probably the worst in the park. There were no stacking issues, but at some points, it was somewhat unclear where to go next. The mirror maze was hardly disorienting. However, this maze's cast was still pretty good. I think most of the scare actors actually made an attempt to scare me.
Zombie High: This started with a fantastic facade, I really liked the zombie at the top. I got let into the house, and even though they were letting people in by groups, there was still immediate stacking in the first room, and it stayed like that the entire maze. It probably took me 3x the amount of time to get through this maze than it should have. I guess the actors don't respond well to horrid stacking because I got little to no scares out of this maze, I walked by a countless amount of actors who I just got to look at. So basically, the only thing going for this maze was the detail, which it did pretty well. I would be willing to give this maze another chance, but because the park wasn't dealing with crowd control the correct way, it almost entirely ruined my experience.
Cornstalkers: Simply put, this maze was probably the least memorable of the night(mazes can be memorable by being really bad
) . Like Zombie High, it had massive stacking issues. I wasn't moving at all at multiple points throughout the maze, it was ridiculous. And like Zombie High, the actors apparently did respond to the stacking. I think someone actually attempted to scare me or actually move 2-4 times at the max, which is strange considering I had a group of teenage girls directly behind me. The atmosphere was decent, but it was honestly a standard corn maze, lots of corn stalks, not that much to make it unique. Perhaps that's what made it so unimpressionable. I am willing to give Cornstalkers another chance in the future though. Club Blood: Like Cornstalkers and Zombie High, it suffered from major stacking issues, but this was probably the worst of the three. Totally stopped at tons of points throughout the maze and there were times where I was only taking 2 steps every 20-30 seconds. The maze was a cool concept, different and unique, with some nice sets. However it seemed short staffed, I remember there being five people in one room but only one or none in others. Hardly any scares to be had, again, probably because of the stacking issues.
Slaughterhouse: By far the worst maze of the night. I waited 20 minutes for an awfully gross skeleton key room. The sets were gross, not scary. There were probably 6 or 7 actors in the entire house. None of which actually tried to scare me. I remember hearing/seeing an actor with an obviously fake chainsaw who was actually trying a little, and by the time I got to his position he was gone. I guess he went on break in the 20 seconds it took for me to get to him.
I did all the scare zones except Iron Worx. All the ones I did seemed understaffed, Cleaver Brothers probably had the most, and Primevil I only saw two actors, one was in a nearby planter making odd movements and noises. I didn't look at the online descriptions before I went to the event other than the new maze this year, Lockdown, so all the scarezones besides Cleaver Bros and Feary Tales, the theme was pretty much undetectable. I liked the props for the most part though.
The new DJ and bar, the Annex, was pretty bad. I could hear the music all the way over at the entrance to Slaughterhouse. When I walked by once, they were playing, uh.... Taylor Swift, and not even something relatable like Bad Blood, they were playing You Belong With Me. WTF?
One thing I was looking forward to mainly at Haunt was the great actors, or more comparatively, better actors than Howl-O-Scream. I only encountered a couple that did more than a standard jump scare. I know people may have different experiences, but I didn't encounter this aspect of the event.
I may have had an abnormally bad experience with Haunt, but I still enjoyed myself. It's definitely always fun to try out a new event. I think that KD has a couple issues to work out, mainly crowd control, I know their intent is to make lines shorter, but it was to a point that it was almost completely ruining my experience inside the mazes. So finally, I hope that I will have the opportunity to give Halloween Haunt another chance in the future, but that won't be until next year at the earliest, unfortunately.
Matthew said:
One thing I would recommend is to go on a Friday. Crowds are way better, allowing for better experiences in the houses as the actors aren't just constantly trying to reset. Last time we went, our longest wait was like fifteen minutes, which was awesome. I've avoided Saturdays like the plague lol.
I went last week for the first time and I have to say I now understand better why people complain so much about Hallowscream. I will that for the love of God get rid of those no boo things. I was surprised by the number of teens and adults wearing them last week.