Kings Dominion Halloween Haunt 2022

[MikeLovesKD]

I wonder if KD will attempt to include a jungle themed maze or scare zone in the Jungle X area this year. The way they have been going full blown on linking the area themeing wise I think it's possible.

This would be good. I just wish they would retire the maze inside Flight of Fear. Didn't go last year, so I don't know how accurate my information is. Do they still use FoF's queue for a maze? Don't understand why Volcano's old spot isn't used to set up one of the big white tents and have a maze in there. After doing BGW's Howl-O-Scream, I can say that KD has better success in jump scares. Would love to see what they could do with a big white tent. SFA used to have Brutal Planet inside of a big white tent and it was amazing.

As for the theme, I'd go for a dark jungle temple. Something that spills dread into guest who have upset the balance of the secluded temple. There's a lot of creativity to be done there.

 

[horsesboy]

This would be good. I just wish they would retire the maze inside Flight of Fear. Didn't go last year, so I don't know how accurate my information is. Do they still use FoF's queue for a maze? Don't understand why Volcano's old spot isn't used to set up one of the big white tents and have a maze in there. After doing BGW's Howl-O-Scream, I can say that KD has better success in jump scares. Would love to see what they could do with a big white tent. SFA used to have Brutal Planet inside of a big white tent and it was amazing.

As for the theme, I'd go for a dark jungle temple. Something that spills dread into guest who have upset the balance of the secluded temple. There's a lot of creativity to be done there.

They haven't used FoF for a couple of years now.

 

[Nicole]

Technically speaking Lockdown (the most recent maze to use the FoF queue area) has only been gone for one operating year. It was part of the lineup in 2019 and there was no Haunt in 2020.

 

[horsesboy]

Technically speaking Lockdown (the most recent maze to use the FoF queue area) has only been gone for one operating year. It was part of the lineup in 2019 and there was no Haunt in 2020.

My memory must have been off as I thought 18 was it's last year. Thanks for the correction.

 

[MikeLovesKD]

Here are the advantages I see with a bigger white tent. Some of those tents can fit two mazes in there. Sometimes quality is better than quantity. I would go for scraping two less popular mazes, in favor of a bigger and scarier maze. Let's also mention the room for creativity. SFA's: Brutal Planet was scary back in the day. This is before all the regional theme park companies moved towards family friendly focused parks. Once you entered, there was a ramp queue you walked down. Once you entered the actual tent, the scare actors slammed up against the fence. It was straight harassment throughout the maze. Every corner contained someone to scare you.

If we could focus creative efforts to one big maze, it could really create a cool experience for the new Jungle-X area. The Ancient Temple theme is something I thought of yesterday. If the company has no plans to use the land anytime soon, I'd say the tent could operate for the maze for at least 2 or 3 seasons. Especially if it became a fan favorite for the Haunt. Seems a bit easier to do, if the majority of the park's scare actors were situated towards one bigger maze. Not to mention a majority of traffic would flow towards that area of the park during the late evening hours for fan favorite like I305 and Flight of Fear.

 

[Oysterhead00]

With bigger haunts like Halloween Horror Nights already selling tickets and announcing houses, around when does Kings Dominion start announcing stuff?

 

[mtorange]

With bigger haunts like Halloween Horror Nights already selling tickets and announcing houses, around when does Kings Dominion start announcing stuff?

KD usually waits until around mid-August to officially announce the new additions. Though, we’ve seen unofficial rumors as early as late July, and some years they’ve waited until early September at the latest to announce stuff.

 

[mwhinva]

KD put out their first FB post about Haunt yesterday. It is a generic post stating Haunt starts September 24th. No specifics yet.

 

[Coasternerd]

KD put out their first FB post about Haunt yesterday. It is a generic post stating Haunt starts September 24th. No specifics yet.

They have had a poster up inside the park on the bathrooms next to the games in CAG that has the dates listed for about 3 weeks now.
It isn’t exactly big so that doesn’t help lol

 

[Jahrules]

Kings Dominion has filed it's first haunt permit as of today.

"Installation of corn stalks on existing structure to create corn stalkers maze"

 

[Mushroom]

I’m kind of ready for this to be Cornstalkers’ last season, TBH. This is, what, its 11th season now?

I think the challenge is that there’s not much else you can do with that space besides a corn maze. And this Richmond Times-Dispatch profile of KD’s VP of Finance (now one of CF’s corporate finance directors) suggests that the park has a financial reason to keep a Haunt maze at that location on I-Street. Apparently, the one year the park didn’t have a Haunt maze there, merchandise and food sales on I-Street took a serious hit.

 

[mwhinva]

Makes me wonder if the maze count and/or the scare zone count will go up this year. Also, pondering if the Grimm's Wood walking trail will have the original 5 stories as it was designed to have or will just be the 3 stories from last year.

 

[mtorange]

Kings Dominion has filed it's first haunt permit as of today.

"Installation of corn stalks on existing structure to create corn stalkers maze"

Jesus Christ please get rid of this maze…

For real though, I’m impressed with the shelf lives that some of these Haunt mazes have compared to BGW’s houses.

My wishes for this season at the very least are that they put a zone in IronWorx’s old spot and put a maze in Blackout’s old spot. I don’t really anticipate any current mazes or zones being axed this year, as the one maze I originally predicted would be leaving (Cornstalkers) is staying.

 

[Crunchewy]

I kind of like Cornstalkers. It was relatively less scary, which was good for me. Not everyone wants super high scare mazes.

 

[Jonesta6]

Would be nice for a new theme though

 

[Mushroom]

I kind of like Cornstalkers. It was relatively less scary, which was good for me. Not everyone wants super high scare mazes.

My gripe isn’t with Cornstalkers’ quality (although Cornstalkers is consistently Haunt’s most hit-or-miss house in my opinion). On a good day, it’s a great house — spooky, disorienting, immersive, and prime for jump scares.

But consider this: Cornstalkers debuted during Obama’s first term. I’m ready for something new in that space.

 

[Crunchewy]

My gripe isn’t with Cornstalkers’ quality (although Cornstalkers is consistently Haunt’s most hit-or-miss house in my opinion). On a good day, it’s a great house — spooky, disorienting, immersive, and prime for jump scares.

But consider this: Cornstalkers debuted during Obama’s first term. I’m ready for something new in that space.

That's fair. I actually only did Cornstalkers for the first time last year. I'm a bit of a scardey cat, so I do one, maybe 2 mazes and that's it. lol

 

[Jahrules]

I'm just going to leave this right here with no comment...

 

[horsesboy]

So wild card is there any possibility that this is the old Zombie High site and we see a maze added?

 

[Diamond Dave]

My understanding is that the policy is a result of people going out to the parking lot and drinking and doing other activities that they shouldn't and the reentering and causing problems.

But as long as you pay again on a single day ticket it's all fine.

I kind of like cornstalkers. It's still fun, and it's the maze I hit at the end of the night (or second to last maze) so it's quite dark by then.