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So - my annual trip to Tulleys was last night! Have never done a Sunday before. We always purchase the VIP "RIP" bundle in advance - with fees that worked out at £97 per ticket, and included a £15 merch token and a £10 food voucher according to the website - but in true Tulleys fashion, you actually got a £20 merch token, a £10 food voucher and a £5 drinks token - so that was nice! In case you don't know, the VIP RIP ticket entitles you to unlimited fast-track all night - which, with the new maze entry system where even the paupers with a standard ticket can now go through mazes multiples times (provided they queue obvs), becomes even more worthwhile. Quick and efficient entry to the park as per - they now have bag searches in the queue, and I also got patted down upon entry too - must look dodgy innit! We got into the park at 5.20pm, with haunts due to open at 5.30pm. So lets crack on with my reviews and number of run throughs I had... COVEN OF 13: X3 Normally my favourite maze this one. A few changes this year though - there's a smokey walk to the swamp scene and then after that there's another - pointless - walk without actors that doesn't really do anything in a corridoor. Our first run through was awful, but really because of the group in front taking photos mid-way through the swamp a number of times - despite literally being told not to use phones mere minutes before in the announcements. Also being slow as hell just meant everyone got bunched up and that kills it for that maze. Early in the evening the haze in the swamp was lacking, but this did rectify itself as the night went on. There definitely seems to be less of an outside section from what I could tell and the scares in the outside areas were not forthcoming (had some iconic moments before in the outside sections being stared out blocking the narrow paths). Great actress with a knife in the house section, and I still love the heat room bit! Had a run through effectively by myself at the end of the evening which rectified the wrong-doings of the previous 2 runs with Coven being it's former awesome self. Shout out to the witches in the swamp for now getting up and in your face, crawling on the side walls and such, really cool... and during the heat room section, I was surrounded by no fewer than 5 witches ❤️ Just a shame that this maze suffers badly when you are with a slow group or a big batch. Coven had by far the biggest queues all night - which is a little odd to me when you have newer additions. Maybe people just love that swamp still? And can I re-iterate - having an awful run through is EXACLY why "one shot" paid mazes should not be an £8+ price point... I knew that I could at least give Coven another chance or two throughout the evening vs. "Oh well, some numpty in front completely ruined it for me and that's £10 down the drain" 7.5/10 (on the solo runthrough - if we'd had just the first runthrough, would be 3/10) CREEPY COTTAGE: X3 This was actually our first maze of the night - tradition innit. Some cracking scares on the first run through - always feel the actors have to work harder on this maze. Do have a soft spot for Cottage, however, the end section (with the drapes) should go back to the white fabric from last year in my humblest of opinion - more spooky and fitting, the blue just was a bit odd and that area looked tired. Good fun, but actors seemed sparse late in the evening on this one. Wouldn't like to see Cottage go, but would be nice to have a bit of investment I think. One run was over SUPER quickly in particular. Shout out on this one to the actress with the crucifix on her head who was the perfect mix of creepy and quirky, appearing from nowhere and politely pointing me away when I accidentally ended up in actor run (I know, after ALL THESE YEARS, the shame on me!) Love the "Ring" style actress continually getting up on the ledges in one of the corridor, always looks class when you see that shadow looming at you in the distance! Loved the "there she is!" from one actress when she appeared too 6/10 THE CELLLAR: X4 This was consistent during the night - I know it's basic AF, but I love that snake still, iconic. The strobe/mesh maze at the end was and still is a good addition, with some good scares as always with numerous actresses ganging up on us. On more than one occasion, an actress on one of the bunkbeds got me completely unawares due to how dark it was - one point I was literally looking where she was and couldn't see a thing, only for her to jump out at me into my face! Just a solid maze this really. 7/10 WASTELANDS: X2 This was pretty actor heavy but found the first runthrough suffered due to slow groups in front, meaning you end up as a conga line which just ruins it unfortunately Still an amazing area, and a very big, imposing and consistent maze. Like the "air gun" at the end being fired by an inmate, that makes a real nice change to a chainsaw. Had a go essentially by myself at 11.28pm which rectified the bad run through earlier in the night, got well and truly put upon in the centre of the jail. 7.5/10 (thanks to second solo run - 5/10 based on first run) ELECTRICK CIRCUS: X3 Always liked the Twisted Clowns - not the glasses so much - but it was in need of a refresh, and my god has it got one. Still keeping the fun, silly, scares of before, but now with animatronics, and some true "is that or isn't that a person" moments - particular highlight was the actor with the mask (a la the dolls in Trailers) - spooky as hell. Just really mixes the evening up a bit this maze, something very different, quite intense at times - love the see through actor runs so they can see you coming even whilst waiting in the pre-maze announcement. Great refresh, and an ummmm interesting photo opportunity at the end! That trommel tunnel properly gets me queasy too, bleugh! 8/10 HELLEMENTS: X1 Be wrong not to give this a go, but nothing really has changed. Chainsaw finale that makes no real sense. Kudos to the actor right at the start hearing me saying "We're descending to hell" and then holding down the rope meaning I ended up crawling along. Other than that - can't really say much on it at all. Hooded mazes aren't scary to me and I think the hoods should go and then do the whole fire & ice malarky "in real life" 2/10 CHOP SHOP: X3 I'm saying it - Chop Shop needs change. Whilst of course you are going to dodge a chainsaw (again - must point out an actress here remembering me from a previous run and then cornering me so I couldn't escape "I remember youuuuuu!" great stuff) - it needs more. Maybe make it multi-route (Hey, bad wood/good wood works for Creek!) I'm not sure what other than freeflow/multi route but it can become processional and if there's an actor deficit, the ending can be weak - in fact, whilst I remember - we found most endings quite weak last night to be fair (even Doom Town - review next). Some great interactions with actors though in the first section "Do you like my dress, it's pretty ain't it, like you" - and then asking "you in a rush to get somewhere boy, you're moving real fast" - yes m80, I want another run on Coven innit! 5/10 HAUNTED HAYRIDE: X1 This ride is pure Tulleys. Simple, well executed, consistent, funny, tongue in cheek. It just works. Some new scenes/characters for this year, plus some classics too. Good moment where the hillbilly girl (the brother and sister: "Me and my brother are like cheese and ham... we're In Bread" - asked about my mate's pistol, and I said he's firing blanks - and she said - holding back the laughs - "that's what I was about to say about my brother" 😁 Sorry for ruining the gag, didn't mean to! 8/10 THE ISLAND: X1 Fair play to Joshua on here for calling me out on our run, that caught me by surprise - well done for getting Thorpe Park Mania in amongst your noises and chatterings, ha! The starting scenes here were good with a number of actors (except that expanse of mud with nothing in it, wtf?) - but this is maze is loooong. I still think it has a lot of potential, and other than Joshua - the two female actors in the room with the wooden blocks in that they stand on (for want of a better description) were great, blocking us off and swiping at us, and splitting up a group. The ship section is just dead and don't know why they don't do... something with it? It definitely wanes in the middle a bit. There wasn't the pointless chainsaw ending as far as I recall which is probably a good thing because I don't know how that fits in anyway Maybe next year I'll have a banger of a run on this - I just think it's too long and too much of a time-eater vs. the payoff. 4.5/10 DOOM TOWN: X5 Ok, Ok, Ok - let's just cut straight to the chase here. This is brilliant. Nearly perfect. So much so, it makes everything else look so inferior. Take a bow Tulleys for creating this, because it's absolutely superb. It's got real life road that runs through (from the outside entrance), complete with traffic lights and road signs - and it's genius how you end up criss-crossing this to go in and out of shops and whatnot - through the central area, and you'd be forgiven for thinking it's free flow, but due to well hidden and cleverly disguised seemingly abandoned items, you do go through a particular route - shopping trolleys, bins and such are cleverly laid out to mark the route, but blend in as scenery perfectly. The central area is what really makes this attraction so clever, because actors can interact with you multiple times during a run. I doubt they'll end up seeing this, but there was a tall chap in the outside area who eyeballed me many times on our runs, and then effectively followed me as I went through, which was utterly fantastic. Queue line in the graveyard is brilliant, going through a church with pews, was class - then, as I remember, there's the toilets, into a nightclub, and then there's a newsagents, Blockbuster, a cinema, a pub, a Chinese takeaway, a grocers - with real rotten fruit, you walk through a bus, a hairdressers.... there's SO much content and theming built in to such a comparatively small footprint vs. other attractions, it's top notch. Some particular interactions that I loved, other than the guy in the central area, was a zombie in the centre holding a bin lid over my head because it was raining (love that), the hairdressers making us sit down in the chairs, the cinema attendants pointing to "Small" on the popcorn menu then pointing to me, same attendants using popcorn buckets as hats in the rain, the guy in the newsagents with magazines, one of which was one from the 90s of an adult nature, getting very excited by it, the landlord in the pub reaching through the pile of chairs to grab at you as you go through, the zombies playing the fruit machine cos I told them it was going to payout, zombie in the pub offering me his drink... honestly, so much interaction and again it's something so different to anything else at Tulleys. The whole area is superb, only minor niggle is the strobe/mist finale which falls a little flat, and maybe something else needs to be in the "disco" section - more lights/theming maybe? - otherwise this would be perfect. What I will say is, even on a run through with "numpties" one time, the maze still worked well because of that central section that you criss-cross. There are references to horror films all the way through - we were chatting to one of the creators at the start on our first run through and he was most pleased with what they'd achieved - and quite rightly so. One would assume they won't be adding a new haunt for 2023, but who knows? 9.5/10 TOTAL RUNTHROUGHS: 26 Cost per maze (taking off merch, food and drink benefits): £2.38 👀 (£10 food voucher got us a hog roast roll and a can of Coke - the vendor strictly speaking didn't have to give us the coke but he always does!) - £5 drinks voucher got us 2 pints of Coke (fair play for doing that too, barstaff!) and the £20 merch vouchers were used for 2x mugs and then we had £10 left still of the £40, which they were happy to let us spend, so added a fiver to get a Tulleys scent candle!) Good evening last night all in all - however, I will say that the new queuing system does mean the main queues were notably bigger at times - and this was a Sunday - with even Creepy Cottage having a 30+ minute main queue at one point. VIP/Fasttrack queues were either literally walk on or 2-5 people in front all night, which I think helps maintain the value of said upcharges. At only one point did a maze have a VIP queue that was too big, and that was Electrick Circus. As per above, I was a bit gutted at my poor run throughs on a couple of mazes, but having the VIP means that you do get that chance to re-do a maze very quickly and rectify. Another decent year for Tulleys in my humble opinion, and as above - Doom Town is brilliant, absolute next level - so glad I didn't read any spoilers before hand as it made the first run through even better! Goes without saying - roaming actors were great last night as always (love the spooky twins just appearing in a completely empty covered area where we having food, didn't even spot them and was only aware of the appearance when we heard a very cutesy "Hello" from behind us!... it's all that that makes Tulleys what it is.

Ahhh, I was on park yesterday (15th October). It was a busy day, though by no means full. In fairness to Thorpe, I was impressed by the operations by and large. Long queues, yes, but most felt well managed. But that's not for the Fright Nights thread. Once again, the park are having issues with timed tickets. At 7pm, Survival Games had a queue which reached back to pretty much the gate by the Swarm toilets. Staff were saying it was 1-2 hours. For people with package deals, that meant if you did Survival Games then, you'd likely have no chance to do the other two mazes. The attitude from a few staff on the ground was very indifferent to this too; little care about the fact that people who bought a package would be out of pocket effectively. Also lots of people seem unaware that Trailers is 'meant' to be the first maze people do with the packages (it is a hidden sentence in the details of the package). It's also completely irrelevant and not something which has to be done. Also seems like the packages don't have strict time slots, meaning people can do mazes whenever (and, for whatever reason, choose to do them when it's dark). It's all a bit of a mess. As I had a one shot ticket for Survival Games, I braved the 1-2 hour queue and it took about 90mins. And I'll give the creative and operational sides their dues here. The queue moved well. They weren't over-batching (group sizes no larger than 12). It is tempting to over-batch to clear the queue, at the cost of creating a weaker experience, but I'm glad they didn't give into that temptation. And the maze itself was good. Was it Press Night good? No. Was it better than the runthrough I had last Friday though? Yes. A good number of actors, all very lively, and everything worked well. I think the main criticism I have about the maze would be the ending. Actors can effectively choose when people leave the maze, especially the ones by the exit. But they have no clue how long they've been in the maze. They can spend 5 minutes in the multi route 'arena' section of the experience before making they're way to the exit, or they could be there for 30 second and get there straight away. It creates wildly different experiences, and can leave those latter people short changed. It would be good if actors at the exit actively turned away people when they first discover the exit area, giving people more of a chance to explore the arena. Obviously that's incredibly difficult to do, as it involves the actors recognising faces in low light repeatedly, but if they can find a way to do it, it would be fantastic. In terms of the other two mazes, I know people managed to get Trailers and Creek Freak done in the same time I go Survival Games done. That's a solid 45mins to dedicate per maze, and doesn't match up with the 2 hour limit they suggest when booking. So some more stuff needs sorting out there. I think, realistically, people should (and probably do) expect a queue for mazes on busy days, even when buying tickets. But the lengths of queues at this moment in time is too long on busy days. And really, no Thorpe maze at the moment is worth £10, let alone £10 and a 45min+ queue. That'll end up having a larger knock on effect if things continue.

Anything could happen, obviously, but am I the only one who’s a bit sceptical about this whole Emily Alton theory? Personally, I wonder if Emily Alton would be an overly niche reference for most guests. Remember, she isn’t a major part of the ride and never has been; she is literally just a fleeting gag in the indoor queue line that some guests might catch a glimpse of for a second or two. For that reason, I’m not sure about the prospect of a ride centred around Emily Alton. Most non-enthusiasts (and probably a fair percentage of enthusiasts) probably won’t know who Emily Alton is, and given how small her appearance within the HH/Duel was, it seems like an overly niche thing to focus on to me. It absolutely could happen, but I’m not sure that I see it as the most likely option. Some storyline or narrative applied to the ride would be nice, but I’ll admit that I think an Emily Alton-centred ride would go over most guests’ heads given her fairly limited role in the previous iterations of the ride.

Am I the only person who is more excited about the Duel refurbishment,than any other project Alton Towers has undertaken? I cannot wait to see what elements of Duel remain,once the likely Emily Alton retheme is complete.

Time for my sporadic login. Been keeping an eye on this though haven't been to towers in a decade. Didn't they touch up Duel a couple years back during the Towers Loving Care (TLC) initiative? That didn't seem to prolong the lifespan by much. I'm a bit of a pessimist about this tbh. I do wish they make this great ghost train one of the best in the world once again but thinking about previous Merlin projects. Lets just say I'm very cautious. Also, I wouldn't even contemplate making a trip to Towers if Nemesis isn't available until 2024.

I think pricing is the biggest issue, the lower the price goes > less you care about a run through. Until the wait gets longer and then you start caring again. I genuinely think, if mazes were cheaper, there would be a lot less negativity.

I dunno, I think it was a nice refreshing addition to the thread.

Emily Alton did not write the sign herself as she is not a real person, hope this helps add to the discussion 😱