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Another excellent post @Marhelorpe. It's a bit of a "hot potato" to discuss but it's clear the system is broken and/or being abused/flouted beyond what it was intended for - that group of TWENTY people on one pass being a perfect case in point. I understand people have needs and reasons, but I can't help but think the popularity of the internet and therefore awareness of RAP's on groups such as the MAP group means they are being abused for the very slightest reasons purely to maximise the number of rides and minimise the queuing time vs. non RAP users. It wouldn't surprise me if Merlin are scared to refuse a RAP to a guest for fear of reprisals on social media, the press etc. which is a sorry state of affairs but that sums up the grabbing, want-want-want and superiority complex that an increasing number of the population seem to have. Did someone say VIP MAP lanyard? *cough*

After visiting the park last Saturday on the 29th September leading up to Fright Nights, I feel now is a good time to voice some big concerns I have with the way several rides are being operated not just across Thorpe, but other Merlin parks such as Alton and Chessington. This problem has been getting worse and worse as 2018 has progressed and up until the start of 2017, this was never an issue before until now. But last Saturday demonstrated this system has now gone too far, and this is regarding the use of priority or disabled passes by guests. Now, I understand this may be a discussion which can be quite sensitive to some readers and I am not criticising or demeaning those who use these passes that have a genuine disability, but I am going to pick at the way the parks manage this system because it has reached boiling point after my experience last weekend and here's why with some examples I've experienced this year and indeed last weekend. Used spoiler tags for each example to keep this post shorter: (Saturday 29th September - Colossus) (August Bank Holiday - Th13teen) (Every visit in 2018 - Derren Brown's Ghost Train) (September 2018 - Vampire) (Opening day 2018 - Wicker Man) Before 2017, this system never really posed any problems or frustrations in the past at any of the Merlin parks, but every time I visit any of the parks now, the number of people I am seeing using these ride access passes has increased dramatically, so much so that in most cases, they are in fact longer than the Fastrack queues and this poses a huge problem. All the main queues for every ride across every park are moving so slowly now that it makes Spinball Whizzer's queue look like nothing these days. What should be short & quick queues on quiet days are now doubling in length for the most part across the majority of rides at Thorpe, and I have noticed this on every visit I have made this year. Staff on most attractions are allocating far more seats to those with a priority/disabled pass to the point where as highlighted with Colossus above, they are now filling entire trains of these people in order to keep the length of them down. With Fright Nights soon approaching where queues will hit their maximum lengths, I am deeply worried many attractions are going to have some horrendous queueing experiences for guests not only in the main queue, but also the disabled and Fastrack ones where they will need to also wait longer because of the quantity of people that are now using these passes. I'm unsure what solution I can suggest to prevent this getting further out of control, but this needs to be brought to attention because the situation is getting worse and worse every visit I make and nobody else is talking about this ever-growing problem shockingly. I need to be careful with how I word this, but something needs to change with the allocation of these passes because right now, I am seeing the disabled entrance as nothing more than just another Fastrack queue given many people through my eyes don't look like they have a disability. And for those with a genuine disability such as being in a wheelchair, I find this incredibly unfair for them, just like the father at the example with Th13teen I mentioned above. I can only ever dream of a queue system similar to the likes of Phantasialand and Europa Park, but understand this will never happen sadly. As it stands, not one of the three queues at Merlin parks is a win for guests, so something needs to change to keep this from degrading and getting worse.

In a frankly unheard of twist of events, I'm going to Thorpe on 4th, 11th and the 13th so will be interesting to see the difference in mazes, queue management etc. over those days... the initial reports are a little concerning but will reserve judgement until I experience it myself. (Tulleys on 6th.... shhhh)

I’m still concerned with the lack of fright night fast track packages ?

THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS, I blagged my press event ticket under the premise that general riff raff would NOT be allowed in. Unbelievable. Now I know what the MAP holders group feel like - FUMIN'! ??

That's good to know. Just watched The Jack Silkstone's vlog from the sick AP preview night of sorts - have to say the roaming clowns looked good from that. Have also read complaints from the beloved MAP'ers group that they were too scary and were frightening their children... perhaps some research before visiting would be a good idea to a theme park that is allegedly the Year Of The Living Dead (and Love Island) when bringing your kiddy winks ?

Propose that every further mention of a ride that's closed forever being shut for someone's visit should result in automatic £5 donation to the Benin fund (or an actual charity)...

The maze was the usual hands-on-shoulders when I went through on Saturday? I feel it would definitely work just as well as a free-flow attraction, if not better. I've never been a fan of HOS mazes..

Indeed. Rooms from £125... nice little money spinner for Thorpe there ?

@MattyMoo Whats the betting all those VIP passholder are frantically booking shark stay just to go to press night ? Then they’ll have a meltdown when they are told sorry you aren’t VIP enough to queue jump

Naturally everyone will have their favourite and least favourite attractions. Some love Stealth, others love Saw. There are even people out there who love Storm Surge. I’m not one of those.

Haha show off, I’m doing 7th and 13th at Thorpe (and 14th for tulleys). Excited

‘Negan’ was there when I went through on Saturday.

Setup a Tulley's Park Mania. Let's stay true to our roots.

Contrary to the over-exaggerated praise I am seeing from many blogs/YouTubers about last night's preview everywhere online at present, if everything from yesterday remains in place and things are not improved upon considerably by the time the event arrives in just a week's time, 2018 is shaping up to be potentially the worst Fright Nights in the park's history through my eyes and here's why. Almost every year I have attended Fright Nights since 2007, I have always enjoyed visiting this event to try some of the exclusive attractions the park offered and most times, these mazes were thoroughly enjoyable as they felt very polished and delivered on what makes a good scare attraction, especially for the likes of Asylum, Big Top and Experiment 10. Back then, the park used to pride itself with the event. However, the mazes last night had none of these qualities at all. Blair Witch being a perfect example. It was horrendously and laughably bad and I kept on thinking "why is this back?" the whole time going through it. As for the audio, my question is "what audio"? If you take away Inferno and Canada Creek, along with the bizarre speech coming from Vulcan Peak's empty queue line, not a single other ride or area had music or ambience which matched the event. Everything was playing it's regular version, so you would scarcely think this was a Fright Nights evening if you were on-site. I understand there are more audio changes on the way but come on now, adding at least something to every area whether it's IMAscore's 30-minute Fright Nights loop, or a bit of Midnight Syndicate would've been an improvement. Not impressed with the audio and frankly haven't been with this event since 2011 in all honesty. Park-wide theming was non-existent other than across the entrance bridge, so clearly this is still not a priority for the park when it comes to Halloween. I still miss the days of 2007 - 2009 when this used to matter to them... As for operations, this was the most concerning area. Even on a preview night they were terrible in terms of queue management regarding Fastrack/disabled guests and I dread to think how much worse they will be when the event is in full swing next week when even more people are attending. I'll post these problems experienced in the "Park Operations" topic with examples. The overall vibe I was getting from last night was the park only cares about having the largest number of scare attractions possible now, not about the quality of the mazes and the event itself anymore. Not a single maze impressed me, the audio was a right mess and very inconsistent, the queue management was awful and there was simply no trace of anything resembling Halloween at this park at all, thus having no atmosphere anywhere. There is no "go-to" maze anymore and I doubt Vulcan Peak or Do or Die will change that when they finally open. It truly saddens me that the park is now going down the route where "more equals better" because last night has proven this not to be the case at all. People everywhere are falling over themselves because of the quantity and as a result, the mazes we are likely going to see this year are going to be both short and poor in quality for many guests, especially in comparison to previous years with excellent attractions such as Big Top, Asylum, Experiment 10 etc. For example, Blair Witch didn't need to come back and I would happily have sacrificed this entire attraction and picked a longer version of Dead Creek Woods over this if it meant delivering a better maze. Vulcan Peak feels extremely lazy as it's just gonna use I'm a Celeb's building and route for the most part, just with some changes inside with the props and theming. Do or Die looks to be extremely short and is just Sanctum under a different name, and as for the misleading advertising for the park to class Terror at Amity High an attraction when it's just actors...... no comment needed. Maybe this is an outdated opinion, but I would much rather see fewer attractions of higher quality than more attractions of less quality as we are now seeing. My worry is when the event arrives next week, people are not going to care about the fact the event might have some very poor mazes and will instead focus on the fact there are (supposedly) 12 attractions altogether, which is more than other competitors like Tulleys Farm for example. I guarantee those with a position of influence like bloggers and YouTubers are gonna keep mentioning this in all their reviews and forget everything else at the event (such as the mazes, atmosphere, audio etc), which is going to be sub-standard. As others have said, it was just a preview night, so things might improve and I really hope they do so everyone can enjoy it. But I'm concerned with the way things currently look, this year's quality control will be at an all-time low for them.

I really liked Living Nightmare last year and the beginning with Negan was a great start to the maze - I never did Living Nightmare Extreme back in May so no idea if he was in there but I did have a run through of LN in the summer which they opened for a bit until Saw Alive was ready and again, no Negan or photo. Though yesterday was a preview so fingers crossed he returns with his baseball bat ?

Same for me! I usually only ever go to the park 2 times a year, one of those being for FN. 4 times in total for me this year is a first and pretty much a miracle! ?

TPM meets are lots of fun and this one should be no exception. You get to meet people of different ages and opinions, but everyone has one main thing in common, they enjoy theme park type attractions. Its not just sbout getting on tonnes of rides but the social side too. From laugh out loud memories to plenty of banter and shenanigans. Still thinking if I should dress up for this meet up. If yes, what as? Being myself is perhaps scary enough for some people!

Wanted to make a comment about Towers really as its the first time I've really seen the place busy since 2015. Operationally they were spot on. Full capacity on everything (aside from Galatica which we didn't go near, stupid VR) and near perfect operations. Nemesis dispatching before the second train hits the break run, Oblivion using both stations, Wicker Man dispatching quickly with minimal stacking. Blackpool was much the same on Saturday. UK operations blow American operations out the water. I was really impressed with Towers and its fantastic to see them back on form. Wicker Man has really done so much more for Towers then people realise. ?

I find it incredulous that there isn't a 2019 Season thread yet to discuss the future of Loggers Leap and speculation that Ramases Revenge finally moves to Thorpe.

Was at the park on Thursday too and decided to get on DBGT first thing when it opened just after 12pm (because I'm insane). Ride broke down twice on us before even the first set of people for the day went through I was in, so technically, it didn't open until 12:40pm. Not surprising though, but when inside, it was obvious why this was. Oh boy, this was a ride I won't be forgetting on it anytime soon... here's a quick rundown of my walkthrough: Good Points: • Pre-show worked nicely with the presentation, audio volume, working bulbs above and most of all, the staff members finally turn the fan off during the speech so you can hear Derren properly again. • Being the first group on, there was no batching thankfully at any point before loading the carriage. • Staff in the queue dealt with some queue-jumpers very well near the batching area. Well done to the team for being vigilant about this, greatly appreciate it. Bad Points: • As others have mentioned, when loading the carriage, the screens inside were all on a blank white screen with no audio or video playing "Welcome on-board" etc. • When seeing the VR in the first half, the carriage lights remained on throughout the entire duration and light was leaking through my headset as a result. • When offloading the carriage, the lights were still fully turned on, killing the whole evacuation atmosphere entirely. • In the mid-section, this was diabolical. When doing through the doors into the little walkthrough section, there was NO AUDIO at all. Not one bit. No rumbling ambience, no sound effects, nothing. So we walked through a zig-zag with a random flashing strobe light and some smoke near the crashed train. It felt extremely weird being in there without that rumbling background noise constantly there like it usually is. • The section where you wait and see a projection on the wall of the demon creature was turned off entirely and was about 2 minutes delayed before a voice appeared, so we stood there waiting for something to happen far longer than usual... with no background audio. • When boarding again for the 2nd half, the carriage lights were all still on. No lights flickering or a voice saying the doors are closing. • 2nd half was once again entirely with lights on during the VR sequence. • No appearance from Derren on the screens once your ride has finished. Still blank. • When waiting in the fake shop, we all stood there for about 3 minutes waiting for something to happen. Far, far longer than usual, no idea why but it killed the suspension. • One of the screens in the fake TV shop kept on flickering on/off randomly, indicating it was broken. Plus, Derren's "keep it a secret" appearance didn't appear on it too. • About 5 of the bulbs in the real shop above the enclosed hovering train carriages for sale are broken and need replacing. I mean, is it really that difficult now to replace a simple light bulb in this attraction?! So yeah, this was one heck of a shoddy experience I had on Thursday and once more just to remind everyone, this is a ride branded as the 'future for theme parks that re-writes the rules of what they can do'. Now, I understand stuff breaks, things go wrong and nothing is ever perfect on any ride, but come on now. For something technically just 2 years old now which is in a condition this bad? Inexcusable for a ride worth £30M and owned my a multi-billion quid company. Probably the worst run I've had on it since Fright Nights 2016. Sort it out please Thorpe, it's a shambles currently.

I’ve had some discussions with Amanda about the park wide audio as frankly it’s a bit of a disgrace. Sadly it’s not a priority, despite it being a pet peeve of hers.