There have been some whispers lately that apparently Hex has received actors inside the show rooms this summer and I can now confirm this is indeed the case after trying the ride today. But rather than enhance the experience, in my view, this change has bastardised the ride instead.
Now, I realise in the past this ride has had actors in the show buildings so this is not a new concept, but the way the actor interacted with the guests was honestly shameful to what the intention and design of this attraction was intended for. Here’s how it went:
The cinema room remains the same and everything up until that point was as it typically is, but as soon as the doors opened into the Octagon room, there was an actor with a torch in his hands shining at us telling us to “move along and follow me” obnoxiously loudly. We did so and once we gathered in the room near the TV screens, he started babbling lines about welcoming us to this historic site and that we should be observing all the artefacts around us before the screens started. He even injected some humour into the mix trying not to confuse his co-worker Boris for the PM... (*golf clap*)
But anyway, once the video finished and the equipment was malfunctioning, he proceeded to begin shouting “Stay calm ladies and gents! Remain where you are! It’s only a temporary glitch...”. From this point where the strobe lights occurred, he just aimlessly started flashing his torch in our faces, pointing the light randomly with an OTT reaction coupled with screams in sync to the effects used, almost as if this scene is meant to be funny, like a Dungeon scene.
Once it all ended, he shouted again at us to proceed up the stairs flashing his light all across the room. At this point I thought ‘okay, now that’s over, we won’t see him again. Right?’
Errrrm no...
As we walked up to the vault doors, he then followed us and started talking loudly again saying “You enjoying the tour so far?” with more humorous lines added in such as “We don’t have vault manuals” when there was a delay boarding.
Finally, we took our seats and this was the cream of the crop for me. He once again started shouting loudly at everyone telling them to take our seats (talking over the pre-recorded message inside the vault) and once the bars lowered, he stood near the entrance doors shining the torch in his face, and then gave us all a menacing look saying “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the vault, enjoy!” and then walked out with an evil laugh just before the ride began, with the whole room laughing too... and then the rest follows through until the end of the experience. I was just sitting there thinking “the heck?!” the whole time.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I am perfectly fine with actors having a bit of fun with guests and injecting humour into the mix, as in a lot of cases, it works pretty well - The Dungeons being a good example. But Hex is not meant to be humorous, loud or obnoxious one bit and this change has completely devalued the ride experience in my view.
Gone is the quiet, eerie atmosphere inside; gone is the feeling of isolation as you explore the ruins; gone is the feeling of tension; gone (for now) is the ride I love. Instead, we now have a spare actor left behind from Sub Terra/Ghost Train who has learnt how to combine his shouting skills with the accent of an Alton Towers Dungeon performer, who then proceeds to overlay that in three different scenes, eliminating any atmosphere the ride used to have.
Nothing against the actor personally, I just feel this is a very bad move by the park and hope the change is gone as soon as possible.