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It's absolutely naff to just close it to save on costs, there's no logical reason a rapids ride can't operate in October. If it was having a huge refurb then fair enough, but last year it closed before Fright Nights then opened in exactly the same state the year after.

Nothing convinces me that enthusiasts/fans hate their chosen subject more than being on internet forums (although typing that out, that seems a pretty obvious thing to say). I remember the hate for Gruffalo when that was announced and it turned out to be a vast improvement on what had gone before and a great ride. Sometimes it's utterly miserable being here, especially when reading anything coming in the future. Fright Nights also got an absolute mauling for weeks before the event but oh look, everybody is having a great time.

I went in a group of 12 on Sunday. Here are my thoughts. Queues were all short and rides were walk on except derren brown of course. Overall the acting this year was top notch and really stood out from past years especially in quantity of actors! In each maze we hung back to make a gap between our group and others so we got the best run through. Living Nightmare - wow this was very good for me. The actors were amazing, some even had contacts where their eye was completely whited out. Very intense and loads of scares. Much better than last year. Glad to see negan back but I couldn’t hear him properly. For me my favourite, 9/10 Do or die - I enjoyed this, the chainsaw and the tunnel were great as I got plenty of jump scares. I even got separated from my group for a while at the butcher scene! Actors did a great job. 8/10 Dead Wood Creek - I quite enjoyed this, some in our group put this as their favourite maze. Plenty of jump scares and a good chainsaw section. theming was slightly lacking but a good attraction. 6.5/10 Platform 15- better than last year with many more actors including loads in the tunnel and even in the fridge! It was a favourite for many in my group and I did enjoy it. I think more theming could be added in parts but I actually liked the tunnel this year due to the great scares. 7.5/10 Blair witch- 2nd weakest maze that we did, it was very short, glad we didn’t queue long. Not much happened, the witch was a bit anticlimactic. You can see the queue from parts of the maze. 4/10 Saw- was a good run through with plenty of actors but I’m quite bored of this one now. Conga line meant the group was too large so we couldn’t space ourselves out. Even those new to it didn’t put it up the top of their list. The last part was the best. 5/10 Roaming actors were great, had a chat with the prom queen and some clowns. Didn’t see big top showtime and didn’t put myself through the joys of Vulcan peak. Order for me (tho my group may put platform higher) 1. Living nightmare 2. Do or die 3. Platform 15 4. Dead Wood Creek 5. Saw 6. Blair witch The Fanta thing had a very slow queue and was pretty rubbish, we queued for an hour for what looked like a short queue, definitely not worth it. It’s essentislly a haunted vending machine. So avoid!!

So I had my first ever visit to Fright Nights and I really enjoyed it. I've heard a lot of people complaining about this year but I found it great. I went on Saturday 6th October and it was terrible weather. Downside was that the bigger rides outside were very frequently closed, but this did mean that people were put off and went home. As a result the queues were way smaller than I'd been anticipating. The longest we queued was 50-60 mins when Stealth eventually reopened from the rain on the slowest operations I've ever seen (my only legitimate complaint about the whole day). Due to poor sleep I arrived at 2pm having had a lie in order to drive to the park. It was absolutely horrible weather and the dome was rammed and the guest services had an enormous queue. This worried me a lot but upon leaving the dome my worries lifted as the rides that were open had light queues. Walking Dead The Ride First ride of the day was Walking Dead. The coasters were all closed due to the weather (Derren Brown was out of action virtually the whole day as well...which was a shame) my friends had my done this before so it was a no brainer. All 3 of us enjoyed it. It's not amazing but I found it good fun and it's pretty well themed. When I rode this in May there were some live actors and I was a bit disappointed that Fright Nights didn't have them but oh well. We did this twice, first time was a 20 min queue and second time in the night was a 5 minute queue. Living Nightmare First maze of of the day was Living Nightmare. We queued around 20 minutes all huddled an umbrella. I'd never done a scare maze before and was nervous, however I greatly enjoyed this. It wasn't really scary but I found myself enjoying it and chuckling the whole way through. The theming was great too (if lost on me a bit as I don't watch the show on TV). Dead Creek Woods Complete walk-on during the day time. We did this during the daytime for the sake of getting another attraction done since we arrived so late. It was a bit naff, And not in a way which seemed like it'd be redeemed by being in the dark. Saw: Alive Longest queued for a maze was this at 40 minutes. This was probably the scariest maze, but even then it just made me jump and laugh a lot rather than actually being 'scared'. It was very fun though. Stealth When this finally opened after the weather eased off to just light drizzle, the queue still looked short. However the 1 train operations were agonisingly slow. It took nearly an hour to clear what would normally be 30 minutes. 1 train wouldn't bother me but it was extra slow operations too even with this in mind. Still, this is my favourite ride so I was happy to get it done in a day in which rides struggled to stay open due to rain. Do or Die We did this after dinner at Pizza Pasta Buffet, and it was the first maze in the night time. We entered the queue around 6pm and after the 30 minute queue it was pretty dark. I enjoyed this one a lot and had a few jumpy moments. I didn't quite get the story or appreciate the black fabric walls everywhere but enjoyed it overall. A second quick ride on Walking Dead happened after Do or Die before moving on to... Platform 15 Great fun in this maze. We queued 30 minutes for this with the depressing remains of Loggers Leap in view (I am still seething that Thorpe both closed it and can't admit it's not coming back). The scenery in this was pretty cool, and I really enjoyed the house in the middle. The experience was improved by having a particularly scared group and I had a laugh at their expense. I ended up at the front for the tunnel and it actually really intimidated me! The maze was fun but had a naff ending. Nemesis Inferno Final ride of the day was Nemesis Inferno in the dark. There was a 5 minute queue, but we waited longer to do the front row. Wow. Best ride on this I have ever done. Really felt intense in the dark and super disorientating. Great way to end the day. We left at 9pm. Queues by this point were 5-20 mins on the rides which were open and probably could have done more if I didn't have a long drive home to worry about. We skipped Blair Witch as it had a 50 minute queue as we left and skipped Vulcan Peak because I didn't see the point in a hooded maze. So all in all I really enjoyed the event. Getting lunch, 4 rides, 5 mazes and dinner done in around 7 hours seemed pretty fantastic given how busy I've heard FN can be and given the weather was abysmal. I know this year has received a poor reception from regular visitors but as a newbie to it I had a great day out.

I haven’t been to FN - and I won’t be visiting - but the quality of attractions does seem to be lacking. Go back to 2013; you’ve got 4 very solid indoor mazes in Cabin, Saw, The Asylum and MBV - not forgetting Blair Witch. This year, 3 of the 4 indoor maze locations are in use: Saw is still Saw - which is surely getting stale. The Asylum is now Vulcan Peak - which is quite possibly the largest downgrade in the history of mazes. Cabin is now Living nightmare - which also must be seen as a downgrade; going from a critically acclaimed conceptually innovative maze to one which feels ‘almost’ there. Elswhere, the park has replaced 1 outdoor maze with... 4? Whyyy? What do each of these mazes do that others don’t? Blair has never worked as well as intended. Platform is still a bit iffy. Sanctum seems as hastily put together as it was last year. So what do Thorpe decide to do? Open another outdoor maze of course, instead of putting all that enthusiasm, energy and money into their existing offering. It seems like the overriding problem with FN at the moment is the lack of variety of actors. Both walking dead mazes use zombies, Platform has dead train people who act like zombies, Dead Creek throws infected people at you, who behave like zombies and Blair’s confused actors end up giving a zombie like performance. If you look at the Villains of Europa Park’s traumatica - you’ll see there’s vampires, werewolfs, ghosts and a whole host of other characters. That what Thorpe needs, for each maze to be distinctly different - with actors acting distinctly different. There’s too many blokes with black paint around their eyes growling at you....

I've done the mazes a couple of times now, so here's some thoughts from me... Saw Alive Surprisingly, my early favourite for the event. Saw has been consistently good, and this year is no different. The ending still lacks oompf, but it's generally good this year. Platform 15 I'm not a fan of the new story this year (a train full of wedding guests is crashed into a non-existing oil pit by the jealous conductor who appears at the end) - I preferred last year's incarnation. Nonetheless, Platform remains good this year, with the tunnel having a good number of actors. It still suffers from the same problems as last year - a slow beginning and a weak ending, and it hasn't reached the heights of last year, but it's still good. Living Nightmare I've decided - Living Nightmare is not a good maze. The route is poor. There's only 3 recognisable scenes - hospital bed, Don't Open Dead Inside doors and the prison scene. Anything else, despite being well themed, isn't that recognisable to anyone who knows nothing about the show. The maze isn't set up for scares very well. The pre show isn't as good without getting people to kneel on the floor. The script features a lot more swearing now (which makes sense given how sweary Negan is), but it feels cheap. Actors in the strobe section were good at teaming up on people though. Do or Die How do you describe this. It's good, yet still misses the mark. There's some nice touches with the theming, there's some good story moments, but equally there's black walls which are there for the sake of it, and bits that make no sense - why are we being told to find food or become food when you've assured us this place is safe? There's a chainsaw section about 2/3 of the way through, which just feels like it's there for the sake of it more than anything else. So there's potential there. There actors have a good scope for dark humour which I love. But it just needs more oompf. Dead Creek Woods Dead Creek is okay. It's a confusing, easily lost, story. It has moments which are okay, but equally it just feels very standard Thorpe fodder. Again, a chainsaw 2/3 of the way through, but it doesn't capitalise on it - you just sort of stroll through the rest of the maze. I guess it can't be at the end due to the uneven / sloped floor, but it just makes the rest of the maze feel so...dead. Blair Witch A decent incarnation of the maze. Lots of thick trees and woodland which really works with the concept of the maze. The fact that there's a shed at the start of the maze, which you avoid, before you eventually come back to it at the end was clever (fitting in with the whole 'you go round in circles' idea of the story), though that was actually lost on me at first! Despite the significantly shorter route, it does snake round well. The trouble with Blair is, ultimately, there's not much scope for it - actors act creepy, do creepy things, but you're very much a bystander, until the strobe shed. 2015 still remains, by far, my favourite version of this maze. The route started off open, then gradually got narrower. Actors would appear and disappear. They worked with loud noises, impact scares and general creepiness to build something which did work. But this isn't a bad version. Vulcan Peak Awful. Awful. Awful. From the set up which makes no sense, to the pre show which you can't hear, to the bags you can see through, to the not-atmospheric 'don't look at the locals' announcement that rings through the whole maze, to the bad soundtrack in the maze, to the lack of actors, to the lack of scares, to the ending where you arguably take your bag off far too soon. Basically everything. I'm guessing a large part of I'm a Celebrity cannot be used as a traditional maze, because if people bump into the rock work or walls, it will hurt a lot. And with jump scares and the like, it makes sense that a traditional maze wouldn't work. A hooded maze is a good way around this, but it doesn't work. Bad audio. No exposure to touch or smell. It fails miserably, and arguably is the worst maze Thorpe have churned out. Screamplexx 4D You go into the cinema, and watch one of 5 films which is randomly chosen. These films vary between 2-10 minutes in length and have clearly been cheaply produced. They aren't in 3D. They don't use any special effects. It's a waste. Terror at Amity High It's okay. Literally just actors dancing around. Adds a bit of atmosphere, but not really what they've advertised. Big Top Showtime Ignoring the travesty that Big Top isn't returning, this is okay. Mostly because there's loads of people who hate clowns, so people react very well to the actors, which creates a great atmosphere. But again, not a scare zone. Containment - Apparently the same as the past couple of years, so doesn't warrant me bothering to do it. So yeah, this year's Fright Nights is okay. Some good attractions, a few bad ones. They've clearly gone for quantity over quality and it really shows. Everyone would much rather have 5 quality mazes with good throughputs than 11 attractions of varying quality and questionable throughputs. The event lacks a headline attraction, which in the past has been taken by Asylum, Studio 13 and The Big Top (even if those mazes weren't the best, they were always a clear focal point for the event). To just add - Saw has never been my favourite Fright Nights in any year since it opened. I don't think this year it's been particularly better than other years, so that means - on the whole - quality has reduced across the park. The event needs a massive shake up next year in my opinion. Arguably an event like this should have no more than 1 outdoor maze, and needs 5 quality indoor attractions. An event with Saw, Living Nightmare, Platform, 3 more indoor mazes plus Containment would be perfect for the park at the moment. I don't see that happening, but that's what should happen now. To shorten it up, here's my favourite mazes this year in order: 1) Saw Alive 2=) Platform 15 / Do or Die 4) Dead Creek Woods 5) Blair Witch 6) Living Nightmare 7) Leaving the park, going to Chessington via the M25, going through Trick or Treat Wood, coming back to Thorpe via the M25 8) Vulcan Peak

Here are my brief thoughts from my experience of Fright Nights on opening night: Vulcan Peak: Awful. The bad reviews for it aren't an exaggeration. Opened 40 mins late, and queue moves at a crawl. Couldn't hear the opening video, and only encounterd one actor in the whole maze. Also constantly walking into walls and banging your head which gets pretty painful pretty quickly. Wouldn't even bother even if no queue. Living Nightmare: Same as always. Solid and well themed. Bit with the car at the end is a nice improvement and adds the kick at the end the maze needs Platform 15: Same old, same old. Tunnel still way too long, but decent enough. Dead Creek Woods: Nothing noteworthy at all. Would rather have an extended Blair Witch than this. Also way too short. There also needs to be more of a division between this and P15. You can hear them from each one. Blair Witch: Vastly shorter, but what is there is far improved. Do or Die: Much better than Sanctum, but nothing near a replacement for Big Top Also, the actors in Amity High scare thing are brilliant. Shouldn't be called an attraction, but they are really, really good Didn't do Saw, and Twisted Carnival wasn't open. Big Top Showtime was good, and the roaming clowns were excellent. There was also a fire show next to Stealth at 8:30, which was really good. All in all, not the best Fright Nights ever, but not as bad as some were dreading

My thoughts from last night's mEDiA pRESs NigHT at the Island Like No Other as follows... Top 5 Celebs I spotted. 1. TheJackSilkstone - was behind him in the free buffet queue so I now know how to create the SICKEST of SICK combos of buffet food. ? 2. The Scottish Man What Won Strictly Last Year 3. Err.... Right onto the important stuff - at approx 9pm the bar bill on just one of the tills in Fins was over £2k already. Oh no wait, I jest, now onto the important stuff... Mazes Ranked from Best to Really Really Really Awful: 1. BLAIR WITCH If you told me I was going to find this the best maze of the night before visiting, I would have said pickle me sideways and call be Shawn Sanbrooke but alas here we are! We had 3 run throughs on this, two of which where we were in just a pair and I have to say, the first in particularly, was ruddy brilliant. The scene is set very well at the start, love ending up "back where you started", some excellent jump scares, was proper dark and you really did feel you were going through the woods - Thorpe have played a blinder with the scenery in the dark, not so sure how it would work at 3pm! One run we had in a group of 8 (C'mon guys it's press night m8) wasn't as good so maybe come proper FN's with large groups this won't rank highly among da fans - but yes, for us it was our standout. One thing I will say - the Heras temporary fencing (Thorpe love the stuff) at the very start should have black plastic or a thicker tarpaulin on it because yellow (?!) doesn't exactly set the scene, nor does it manage to hide the platform of P15 to the left, so you can see the tour guide waiting for guests. I can also forsee the queue of Blair Witch going far far beyond the area they have set aside, it's tiny. 2. CONTAINMENT Cracking run on this in it's tweaked format. We were useless. The actors were most definitely not - the blonde girl doing the doctor intro at the start was fantastic, delivered so many lines as if she knew them like the back of her hand and performed it like she meant it. No actors in first room obvs, but the second room with the clocks - man, the actor in there was losing his sh**, amazing stuff, trashing the filing cabinet, getting up in our faces, muttering about time, freaking out - awesome. Similarly, the dentist room next was equally as hectic and delivered with passion, I was made to sit on the chair and the actor performed the creepy dentist role perfectly - also love how the assistant in the back ground does nothing and just looks creepy - until you get into room 4 where it all kicks off! Again we were thoroughly impressed with this attraction and the actors involved last night should be commended if they end up reading this, they knocked it out of the park. 3. THE WALKING DEAD: LIVING NIGHTMARE We got a Neagen, and Neagen had a proper mic! Impressed with this, as anticipated - top notch theming inside, and I love the intro (even if the families don't like the swears). New little twist halfway through at the car scene which worked well. As I say, love the theming on this, the bus is absolute quality and the rooms prior to that were packed with actors - good scares, breathing on your neck etc. Top tip: don't point out to the girl freaking out on her bed that her bottle of Smart Water is on her bedside table as she'll gesture to you to move away 4. MATT CREEK'S HAUNTED WOODED AREA This isn't actually a scare zone but a legit maze... we had low expectations but again there were some decent scares and everyone loves a chainsaw right? Again, a good intro and set piece (via some temporary fencing and you end up doubling back on yourself) which sets the scene well, a decent amount of actors scattered about. I liked it - some actors followed us out too (as they must have been going on their break!) but continued to scare us outside of the maze which was cool. Good interaction, and good to see the actors progressively more "contaminated" as it goes on. A solid effort if you ask me and we enjoyed. 5. SAW ALIVE Not much really to say about this - nothing has changed, it was OK... seemed to be over very quickly and there weren't too many actors vs. other mazes but it's SAW and it's well themed. 6. SANCTUM DO OR DIE THE WALKING DEAD If you look very carefully at this you can tell they've used the shipping containers from Sanctum in it's construction... We were underwhelmed by this, considerably. Expected good things - again, a good start with the bus and set piece with two actors arguing but after that it deteriorated pretty quickly. The area is too well lit (considering it was 8pm!) so you can see exactly where the actors are... just didn't do it for us at all and it all feels very temporary in it's construction (I appreciate it is temporary but you know) - this wouldn't be so noticeable if the lighting wasn't so bright. Perhaps we got unlucky with our run but for us it ranked about the same as Sanctum last year. 7. PLATFORM 15 Right, whoever's vanity project Platform 15 is at Thorpe Park - please, please, please admit defeat and get rid of it. I cannot comprehend any Youchoober or vlogstar or fan site raving about this. The walk at the start goes on for too long and does nothing in particular, walking alongside a rotting Loggers Leap, still lit up like a Christmas tree. You see the train with some dummies on it, you might get a bit of fire, you find a bride wandering about, then there's a house that smells of human faeces (which to be fair, had like 4 actors in which was random), then there's the never ending tunnel where not much happens and you get told to go back, and then you have to do a seance (and to put some positive spin on it - the actress here was good and felt like she was holding onto my hand for dear life) and then the conductor appears and then you're out, and you wonder - what the hell was all that about? And the answer is, no one actually knows. Maybe if they filled some areas with some smoke machines (although that's an expense) there'd be more atmosphere, but the walk is just too big and any pace or anticipation just goes and then you think "oh look, there's some actors coming up" and there they are. Kudos to the actors involved like I say because they were good, but the maze just doesn't work and we found it more of a chore to complete than a thrill. Sorry guys but I think Platform 15 needs a new timetable in 2019 where it gets taken over by Southern and then just never turns up. 8. VULCAN PEAK Well. Wow. This has to be quite possibly one of the most hastily and cheaply thrown together embarrassments of an attraction at Thorpe Park I've ever seen. Heck, it wasn't even supposed to open last night because it was still being finished, showing as "opening 5th October". The only plus point I can draw from this "attraction" is that they created an introduction video to watch, but make no mistake other than this, this maze is total utter garbage. I find hooded mazes pointless anyway, the original Hellements at Tulleys was poor, but they at least improved it last year by adding a live action section at the end. We must have literally had 1 actor in Vulcan Peak last night, and it was basically 5 minutes of walking round in the dark with a bag on your head. You then have to take off the bag, before walking through the inflatable walled section, and then you're out. Because that makes a lot of sense. Also - and this is possibly a small thing but it's all about the details - why on earth are there blue LED string lights in the bit where you take off your hood? Do they mean anything? Who decided to put them there? Who at Merlin signed that off? It looked like something from Maplins (RIP) and served no purpose - why not have a flickering light or something SpOoKy. Why not green so it's vaguely "jungle" themed? Anything, but that. That detail just typified the maze for me: cheap, tacky and pointless and I defy anyone to find it anything otherwise. This just screamed to me, Merlin wanted quantity over quality this year. I take pity on anyone should this get big queues and people decide to pay for a Fastrack one shot not knowing the horror that awaits. I can't comment on Fanta Horror Thing as it was still being finished (though did look quite impressive), nor Screamplexx. Spotted the Big Top show happening in the dome but didn't bother watching. Terror at Amity High - I assume this just means the roaming actors? I think? Anyway, they were out in force on the entrance bridge and were good! Massive shout out to the awesome clowns and associated freaks too, they are fantastic walking around and then starting their menacing clap before terrorising someone - genuinely top stuff there, was impressed and added to the night. More of this please! Had two rides on Stealth on the dark including one front row (swoon), a nice night ride on the smooth Swarm, a not so smooth ride on Sore The Ride, and my first ever ride on X Version 2.0. Which, to be fair to Thorpe really isn't that bad at all considering what they had to work with in terms of converting a family coaster. However, as expected, whoever signed off the article stating "15 out of 10 on the scare scale" really really needs to consider their life choices ? Total utter hyperbole as I expected but like I say - in terms of slapping on an IP on to X, they've done a pretty good job - I like the nod to X on the trains (at first I thought they'd just left the old logos on, ha!) No actor in the after ride bit though which was a shame. One thing I touched on earlier - being able to see P15 from Blair Witch etc. - those 3 mazes in Old Town are seriously seriously close together, and I wouldn't like to be queuing round there once FN's get in full swing and there's fast tracks and RAPs and what not going on because there is going to be SO many people in such a small place, it isn't going to be pretty. The Blair Witch queue as I say is tiny, assume they can extend out but yes, the quantity of mazes angle they are going for, when you have a finite amount of space like Thorpe has, could make peak times pretty horrific. Congratulations if you read all that. Bit of a mixed bag as you can see. Be intrigued as to how I find it when the general public (shudder) are allowed in when in visit on the 11th and 13th! ? Oh one thing I forgot to say - Thorpe definitely got a great bulk deal on human waste smell pods this year, bleugh! Could smell 'em in 4 different locations.