October is behind us, taking with it potentially the biggest time of the year for events all over the country! Each year I have slowly been doing more trips relating to Halloween events and this year was no different.

Like previously, it's great to start off at Tulleys on the first Saturday of the month. Tulleys is a great, well established Halloween event and really shows where you can end up from starting with selling pumpkins (this seems to be a recurring story, more on that later!). Providing 8 haunts, 4 of which were new, one changed and 3 well knowns remaining untouched. They have such a mix, Colony which uses length, suspense, darkness, exterior and interior, just about everything. Hayride which mixes comedy with fear, Hellements which tries to be unique but is just bad, Haunted House which is a classic. Then there's probably the best conga maze going, The Cellar. Volt was different, the circus good and Chop Shop okay. But they constantly change their line up with fresh, new ideas. No story feels the same, they're all unique each year.

Following week Thorpe's preview night arrived. Roll up roll up to an event that wasn't ready in time, filled with glitches and problems all over. It did get better over the week, Big Top was less of a flop, Containment a good concept just not a lot going for it especially at £10 a go, and the other mazes just felt repetitive with jump scares and screaming. I know people talk about cheap tactics, but Thorpe is one of the worst for this with simple tactics, no stories and rushed scenes. Big Top has so much potential, MBV is always a rush, Cabin is nice but can get old quite quick, BWP is the best improvement on park and Saw Alive was pretty good this year too (or maybe the others had got worse...) Either way, Thorpe needs a huge shake up next year for Fright Nights. It's a hugely successful event, they should boom with it, let it grow, go crazy! Not do the same old stuff. A maze with a really good unique story please next year.

Park is pretty though (or should I say Stealth is).

Was finally time for Scarefest!!!!! I'd been wanting to go here for a good 8 years but had never made it. And what a year I chose to go!

Sub Species is the highlight of the Halloween season for me and I'm sure it is for many others. It pushed the limits, many different tactics of scares, suspense, great length. It was just fab in every way! Park looked great as well, Nemesis in the dark was worth the 3 hour drive alone. Scare zones were cool, Ancestors great and the kids stuff looked pretty neat too.

Perfect

Great event! Especially considering what the park is going through.

Was time to round up the Merlin trio of Halloween events, Chessington and Howloween. Urm. Right, this event used to be great in every way, magical mazes, a brilliant park atmosphere. This year though, they might as well have just let the meerkats loose, that'd been scarier. Trick Or Treat wood is just dire. So surreal, but you don't come out laughing like some bad things, you come out thinking why. Just why. Maybe laughing at the fact people are doing it. Curse of Lost tomb was well, people hated on Krypt. You ain't seen nothing then. This was shockingly bad, story was building momentum and just died. We were told it'd be a 12 minute experience, 5 at most it was. Just oh. Chessington.

Best thing about the event, this projection in the hotel lobby.

It was time to end the Halloween season, ScareCon: Aftershock based at the Broadwitch Halloween event in Broadditch. The first half of the day was talks from other scare events such as Twisted Attractions and the Screamland team. Their events look great and are definitely on the hit list for next season. Also a few independent events that just take place over the half term week in one location with maybe a maze or two. Was quite cool as lots of these were just a small group of friends with a bit of spare money.

Broadwitch started like Tulleys, selling pumpkins! That's it kids, sell some pumpkins and in 7 or so years you'll have award winning mazes. They do an event in the day for kids with two little walkthroughs, a corn maze and a tractor ride. We got to go through them all which was fun and showed an often forgotten about side of the Halloween season. But then it was time for the bigger stuff. 5 mazes, Spooky Castle which is their first like the Haunted House at Tulleys, Thirteen, Massacre, Edge which is new for this year and the SCAR award winning Biometrix. We got to go through them all bar Biometrix without actors to have a nosey at them and the sets, and Spooky Castle and Thirteen were already great in this format. Then the show lighting came on and the actors unleashed.

Spooky Castle: Great maze with many many different rooms from this castle, lots of clever effects and smells.

The Edge: Based on vampires, set in shipping containers, it utilised its tiny footprint brilliantly and there were some good scares. Theming was topnotch.

Massacre: Set in the corn field, you are in the incestous hillbilly town or something. Pretty good, different from everything else.

Thirteen: Based on 13 fears, some are quite funny like walking under ladders, a dentist room, plane crash, dirty toilets. Definitely a different take on fears, and it had some good scares but was more action based than scare based I felt.

Biometrix: This maze is like Sub Species' test subject. Very physical, very different. Just brilliant and how touch mazes should be with larger groups. Not one of us was left out.

So Broadwitch is great, only niggle is the actors are very scripted making it hard to reride without it being repetitive. They struggle to improvise and interact as we found out. Other than that a great event and great way to end the scare season!