LukeP_8

Awesome. Cheers for the advice. I reckon well head to creepy cottage first then and probably start working our way back. Hopefully well get round to hayride and cellar and I'll keep an eye on the queues for those are we go. Well probably skip hellements and island then unless we somehow get everything else done before then.

So it looks like I'm finally heading down tomorrow night (30th) and I can't wait. Only issue is I can see it being mad busy. As someone who's never been, from what I've read here and seen elsewhere it seems like the ones to make sure I get done are Cellar, chop shop, wastelands, doom town and creepy cottage? Assuming I don't have time for all of the mazes is there any I should give a miss to make sure I get the better ones in? Hellements seems like one of those.

Just wanted to ask a quick question on here and hopefully people who have some advice could help me out a little. I'm planning on hopefully going to shocktober fest with a mate next week (largely because I've simply given up on Thorpe and their lame ass fright nights which they now upcharge a fortune for 🙄🙄) and we need to get back to maidenhead afterwards. Does anyone have any tips or tricks as to how we can get back to that area without having to leave super early to catch the last train from Crawley? And whenever we do leave are the ubers back to Crawley late at night really hard/expensive to get hold of? I'm thinking of going next Tuesday/Wednesday. Ofc a taxi all the way back to maidenhead is off the cards expensive 😂 Also if anyone's been this year, is it any good? I heard it was fantastic last year.

So I went to fright nights yesterday, and given the constant rain the park seemed to empty out rather quickly and was generally rather quiet... and so were the mazes 😬 I apologise for the negativity in advance. --- So first was creek freak massacre in which we didnt hear nor see a single chain saw, which is meant to be the signature theme of the maze. For large portions the corridors were empty, and even though there were absolutely no queues and was just me and a friend in there it lacked the intensity I felt it had in 2019 when I last went to the event. However on a positive note some of the individual acting was solid. But ye, disappointed to say the least. --- Next we did trailers which I didnt do last year as I didnt attend the event. But this was for me just as poor as creek freak. The pre show story about everyone having being "sucked into the screens" was a bit odd and some of the scenes didn't actually have actors in them. I will say though that some of the theming was impressive. But ive certainly never walked out of the exit to that building so relaxed before 🙄 --- Last was survival games which was easily the best maze of the night. The start where someone comes up behind you and pulls you away was something I didnt see coming and was really effective. However the rest of the maze still suffered from a lack of actors but just to a lesser degree with some of the maze feeling empty. However being completely alone and lost looping back on myself was good fun and quite daunting. However the maze just didnt scare me one bit aside from the beginning. --- So overall as of 30/09/22, very poor event. I havent been back to the event since they began upcharging mazes and I really hope with a change of heart they'll stop doing it. They are in no way worth the money and non of the mazes had any sort of queue to them or any element of apprehension given I was already set up for disappointment given I just spent a tenner to walk through an empty queue. Again I apologise for the negativity but just going by **my personal** experience I won't be paying for mazes again. An upcharge maze should surely mean more revenue to invest into actually having actors and more than 3 mazes. They really need to go back to 4 or 5 free mazes that were actually good and bouncing with activity. But the event still somehow finds ways to become worse 😂 Hopefully this was all just down to thorpe anticipating the park would be quiet and the mazes will be better during peak weeks.

Well I first went to FN in 2012 and the Asylum was by far the scariest maze on the night. And you could say that 2012/13 is in the more "modern era" of the event. So I completely disagree with the idea Asylum would not be well recieved because it was levels above (imo) any other maze back then, and the rest of those 2012 mazes are better than the mazes (bar a couple) that we've had since then. Imo 90% chain link mesh is what the end of creek freak is, Asylum added a hell of alot of messed up detail to that strobe maze and it all added up to a terrifying experience. Also the chain link stuff was probably only a half of the actual maze in later years... There were many different scenes added to that maze each with their own unique detail and chaotic environment. The only thing that stayed constant throughout the whole thing was the soundtrack and strobes (which was a good thing). As for overall past years being tinted by nostalgia I completely understand that arguement actually, but in this particular case also disagree with this aswell. I'm a big advocate for the past not necessarily being so much better than the present due to nostalgia bias but in this case the mazes in recent years have done absolutely nothing. I mean come on... Are we really suggesting the 2018 maze line up with those walking dead mazes is better than the 2013 lineup, or better yet, the 2011 lineup? Well I'd say most will agree that's not the case.

Ye indeed there used to only be 2 or 3 mazes in its earliest years. Which is why I didnt write off this years fright nights already haha. The only thing is back then, all those mazes were top class (Freezer and hellgate for example) whereas there isnt one top class maze imo currently.

So were only going to get one more maze? That seems way too little to me. I was really hoping Thorpe would finally nail it with mazes this year but I suppose covid was still a factor in their decisions. Lets hppe their last maze makes up for this as Platform is a terrible maze.

Ye theres loads of posters for instance of other mazes. I just thought as though that sign was one of the biggest ones and seemed to get some attention in their latest teaser too, But ye as I said, probs doesn't mean an awful lot sadly. But one can hope.

Anyone else notice the old Surgery/Matron's office/recovery room sign from the Asylum's first corridor in the top right? 👀 That probably means nothing but it's certainly interesting to me non the less...

I'm beyond disappointed with Platform 15's return however I'm not even slightly suprised by it. It's always been a boring eventless maze however by recent standards at fright nights I assumed Thorpe wouldn't go through the expenses of actually replacing it for a maze they'd put some care into. A way of Thorpe minimising their spendings is all I can make of it. Creek freak is good but they really need some great new mazes if they're seriously bringing back platform 15...

Jack Silkstone in disguise? 👀😂

The events for this year just got announced, only 3 this time around though. A new one called park vibes whatever the hell that is from 21st-25th of July was announced a few days ago I believe. Then obviously Oktoberfest was announced and Fright Nights also got confirmed as expected for the 8-10th and 15-31st. Quite suprised theres only 4 days worth of events during the summer, I'd love to see summer nights return one day. They were a hell of alot of fun.

Well they need to actually make fright nights, scary, again to do that. But hold on, bit of an issue with that... They've not had a scary fright nights attraction since Asylum in 2013. As much as I like your idea, the reason there were so many families is because Fright Nights now has a reputation for not being particularly scary. I mean at the end of the day, it is all about reputation. Back in the day, Thorpe would never have had to operate an ID system for under 13s etc as people knew what they were getting themselves into. You cant force a perspective by making it seem scary cus ur IDing people who may be too young for the image that you personally have about who can handle it, you have to create that image again by bringing in scary attractions. Plus, it isnt fair to make it strictly 15 or over. Not only is that too old, I was that terrified 12 year old back in FN2012 and loved it. While I understand ur point, it isnt the right way to fix the problem. However the idea of closing the part for day guests I actually think is a good idea. Do what Universal do, but dont shut out age groups. Its their problem after all. As you said, I'd love to hear stories of parents complaining about fright nights being too "fright"ening 😂. Which would eventually stop happening if Thorpe can build Fright Nights reputation again.

Yup! Thats exactly what I could hear, that video shows perfectly how powerful those new speakers really are. Fastastic upgrade. And ye, I really really don't like the new imascore music at all. So repetitive and all based on that same bloody island theme. Doesn't do anything at all. I dont mind the imascore music around the park, but really wish theyd leave the coaster music as it was. The 2 rides had perfectly unique and great soundtracks.

I did kinda wonder why I could hear the pulsating bass on Inferno's soundtrack all the way from Jungle Escape... Seemed abnormally loud. Guess these new speakers were the reason, sounded great.