Fright Nights 2018 - Spoiler Thread

[ProudToServe]

 

11 hours ago, StevenVig said:

Just to clear things up about WWTP

 

The reason such upbeat tracks were chosen, is because Big Bob describes the terror and massacres that are occurring in such a positive tone of voice, bit creepy right? Imagine someone telling you that you are all going to die with a massive smile on their face, and then Sunshine, Lollipops & Rainbows is played. 

 

It's not immediately obvious, but if you listen it is there. 

 

12 hours ago, StevenVig said:

I think people are hearing the cheery 60s tracks and are automatically assuming that it is the usual loop. It's not unless you stop and listen to the brand new Big Bob vocals, that you will realise why these tracks have been chosen. Everyone is just expecting Monster Mash ?

Come on... if you put cheery 60s tracks in the mix that are used on the standard amity track, then people are going to assume its the same BGM or just pure laziness, just like I did as I walked through Amity in 4mins, hearing no FN related stuff at all. This actually ruined the atmosphere for me completely, as BGM plays a massive part in the mood. No one wants Big Bob, its Fright Nights for god sake.

 

You can't be on here defending the track saying "had you listened longer and closer" you would have heard the FN theme. Are you standing outside Thorpe Park telling all the other guests this? I'm not going to hang around for 10mins to hear some Halloween related audio. This just means the sound design is very poor. Just sounds like it's been created as it's something a bunch of fans wanted to do. You should be able to pick out the mood instantly when walking into an area, and the amity track isn't doing this at all, this is like the first thing that should be thought about. Not that you want to recreate more Big Bob indents or include theme park enthusiasts in in the mix. Hey, now it's all available online, for what, ego feeding? what utter rubbish. Why is this even a thing in the UK, I don't see Universal posting their tracks online. 

 

The park was built for 'islands' but everything is such a mash and islands are so close and mixed, with broken speakers and poorly levelled across the park, until this is fixed, adding zoned audio for FN's isn't effective and should have just been one or two park wide tracks, designed allowing the roamers to act along with, and actually make you feel like at 3pm, it's Fright Nights, and not normal TP. Regarding ride audio, you do it all, or non at all. Saying theres more to come, err the event opened last week, it should have been done.

 

6 hours ago, Nick Hutson said:

There’s a good 25 minutes where evil takes over; spooky rock and roll songs play and big Bob Jones is possessed. 

 

It’s all about the story though; it all depends what time you get there. But - there are horrors in there.  

 

Why would you theme only 25mins of the track. Why would you put a story into the track, in an area which no one is going to be around to listen, because the mazes are on the other side of the park. It shouldn't depend on what time you get there, it should be there ALL the time.

 

----------------------------------ION------------------------

 

This has to be the worst Fright Nights ever, everything has been thrown into it to make it the biggest, but it's all shoddy, low class, black walls, poorly designed atmosphere and mazes and then go to the lengths of using enthusiast to produce content across the park, including the vloggers, where I'm 100% sure have been paid to say it's the best Fright Nights ever, when it's the worst. I mean, 2017's top maze couldn't even come back, despite owning everything for it, apart from a tent to put it in. As for Scare zones... what scare zones? Fright Nights 2018 has nose dived. I feel extremely sorry for the Actors who are trying the hardest, as I saw in some mazes, but frankly they are not given the environment to make scares happen. Everything's so open. Instead I found them more of an annoyance, just standing there and then stamping in front of me.

[Marc]

There’s a lot of focus on WWTP which is a shame as a lot of the park wide audio is quite good - as has been mentioned the Colossus track is probably my favourite - especially in the station (video below) although I did notice sometimes the normal track plays - I don’t agree with there should be one / two tracks park wide - even with speakers not working during normal season we have themed audio for the areas and it works so I think it’s good this year we’ve seen the areas go back to having their own Individual Fright Nights tracks.

 

Goung back to WWTP I do see what it’s trying to do though it is subtle - back in 2006/7 maybe we had a fright night themed WWTP which had Halloween songs between the standard Big Bob voice overs which worked but was pretty cheesey.

 

Agree with comments on the lighting - would be nice to see the LED lights set to just one colour in the areas which they are used.

 

For all the bad points regarding the mazes this year one good thing to come out of this year IMO are the roaming actors, the guys over at Amity do a great job of generally being pretty freaky, always interacting too which is nice to see. The Big Top clowns also I feel would have a lot more praise if they weren’t a “replacement” for one of the best mazes the park has had, on their own the show does a pretty good job of scaring anyone in the dome and causing general havoc in there whilst when there roaming park wide they do a good job - it’s just a shame it’s at the expense of The Big Top. There was also a Zombie Flash mob there on Saturday - saw some videos which looked good hoping it returns next weekend!

 

Overall for me id say the biggest problem with Fright Nights this year is the lack of a stand out attraction - we’ve always had one (The Asylum, Cabin, Big Top) where even if you had bad run throughs on the other mazes - these are almost certain to deliver, this year im not certain what the headline attraction would be.

[Benin]

Quite sad to see the person involved in something creative responding to criticism in a very "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THE SUBTLETY OF MY DESIGN" approach...

 

Like, I've no idea how it actually sounds, but most people aren't going to be sat around Amity Cove listening to the music in order to 'get' it... You might get lucky and hear another part of it as you pass through, but if you need extensive listening to understand it then you've already failed at the job at the creative aspect of passing on the story for guests... 

 

Consuming other media to get the full story only works for those who are dedicated, this goes for games, movies and anything else...

[Mark9]

You guys are absolutely brutal this year. 

[A Lost Zookeeper]

Normally adding layers of story to the area music wouldn't be that bad, but at Thorpe (and more importantly Amity) where less than a half of all speakers actually still work, having guests have to wait around 15+ minutes to understand why the same music that plays all year round is playing is laughable. Especially in queues like Stealth where only two of the speakers in the plaza actually work.

 

If having a few 'theme park celebrities' (a very loose term - haven't heard of half of them, not sure many of Thorpe Parks target audience have either) is a cheap way of them getting some more guests in, that is laughable. Why not use the Imascore loop created for FN last year, and spend some of the money that was used to create the new loops on the mazes that lack quality or depth. I'm no expert, but Imascore can't be cheap, and it sounds a lot better than a couple of theme park fans creating a dream WWTP playlist. Why not use something for more than a month. 

[Marc]

12 minutes ago, A Lost Zookeeper said:

Normally adding layers of story to the area music wouldn't be that bad, but at Thorpe (and more importantly Amity) where less than a half of all speakers actually still work, having guests have to wait around 15+ minutes to understand why the same music that plays all year round is playing is laughable. Especially in queues like Stealth where only two of the speakers in the plaza actually work.

 

Thats not quite true - Tidal Wave finally has music back in its queue line and station, Stelath has had it’s plaza speakers which were removed put back into place and the rest repaired.

[MattyMoo]

9 hours ago, ProudToServe said:

 

including the vloggers, where I'm 100% sure have been paid to say it's the best Fright Nights ever, when it's the worst.

This is why our Lord Sanbrooke was not invited to FN Press Night - he tells it like is bruv, he called Vulcan out as the worst halloween attraction ever #notimmersive.

 

Just to throw some positivity into the mix - as much as Big Top Showtime is an insult to the iconic Big Top, the kids who were in the Dome when the clowns did their thing did seem to be having a cracking time on Saturday, and I did like the atmosphere. Just don't pee on our mini doughnuts by referring to it as Big Top plz.

 

As I said after press night and has been said now so many times, general consensus is that it totally is quantity over quantity. The cheapness of dividing fences between P15 and Zombie Hunt woods, the black fabric "walls" in (what should be a prestigious IP maze) on Do Or Die - not good enough. Interesting thing is too, as soon as the mazes open at 3pm and 6pm, the biggest queues I've seen at those times are Saw Alive & Blair Witch respectively. And then later on, the biggest queue is at Guest Services after everyone has been on Vulcan Peak

[SteveJ]

Unprofessionalism from many people at the park this year.  Certain people predictably still obsessed with using theme parks to further their careers and trying to earn status amongst fans then.

Would theme park 'personalities' please stop trying to be the Fright Nights mascot. In reality, a huge amount of collaboration and differnt teams go into putting on these events, most the work never gets seen – because what matters is the end result. But when people start going online to claim "hey I've done this, it's mine, enjoy my work everyone" then you know what people's real agendas were.

Fright Nights this year is clearly very poor, perhaps budget from the lords above was a big factor in that. Either way it's a bit sad to see we've got to a state where the people involved in an event and their mates come on to a forum to tell people how clever and smart their work actually is.

A bit like when we had Bradley Wynne tell people on Facebook how actually clever Derren Brown's Ghost Train was and how its "supposed" to be disjointed. That's not the point when the end result just doesnt entertain.

I'd wish Thorpe Park all the best for next year and hope it goes better. The park needed a really strong Halloween event this year and just didn't manage it.

[Ringo]

16 minutes ago, Wumbamillio said:

Unprofessionalism from many people at the park this year.  Certain people predictably still obsessed with using theme parks to further their careers and trying to earn status amongst fans then.

Would theme park 'personalities' please stop trying to be the Fright Nights mascot. In reality, a huge amount of collaboration and differnt teams go into putting on these events, most the work never gets seen – because what matters is the end result. But when people start going online to claim "hey I've done this, it's mine, enjoy my work everyone" then you know what people's real agendas were.

Fright Nights this year is clearly very poor, perhaps budget from the lords above was a big factor in that. Either way it's a bit sad to see we've got to a state where the people involved in an event and their mates come on to a forum to tell people how clever and smart their work actually is.

A bit like when we had Bradley Wynne tell people on Facebook how actually clever Derren Brown's Ghost Train was and how its "supposed" to be disjointed. That's not the point when the end result just doesnt entertain.

I'd wish Thorpe Park all the best for next year and hope it goes better. The park needed a really strong Halloween event this year and just didn't manage it.

 

Sums up the park completely.

 

Needs a management refresh who takes back control of the park instead of the social team...

[Mattgwise]

6 hours ago, Marc said:

 

Thats not quite true - Tidal Wave finally has music back in its queue line and station, Stelath has had it’s plaza speakers which were removed put back into place and the rest repaired.

Worth a mention actually, it sounded a lot better around Tidal Wave and Stealth plaza. Only thing left to sort out now is the third or so queueline speakers for stealth that are not working (and cranking the volume up slightly in the queue) 

[ProudToServe]

12 hours ago, Marc said:

I don’t agree with there should be one / two tracks park wide - even with speakers not working during normal season we have themed audio for the areas and it works so I think it’s good this year we’ve seen the areas go back to having their own Individual Fright Nights tracks.

The park has no clearly defined zones due to broken speakers or areas not had speakers added as the islands expand/contract/move/appear. Like the bridge into the park, entrance plaza, Colossus, angry birds splitting amity/stealth plaza up, dock yard, dock yard, is that still a thing? The Jungle island has little to no speakers yet has it's own track? There's nothing in these areas which have dedicated scare zones or actors themed to the tracks/island they are in. So you have Clowns walking through a jungle area to a jungle themed track, yeah that makes sence? Do you see what I'm getting up? You have zoned up areas, yet no one actually knows the areas as they are not defined enough to make it immediately obvious. Until this is fixed, having so many different tracks just comes across as messy. Picking out amity, dome area and maybe old town as areas having their own tracks but the rest should be a generic BGM FN track.

 

8 hours ago, MattyMoo said:

This is why our Lord Sanbrooke was not invited to FN Press Night - he tells it like is bruv, he called Vulcan out as the worst halloween attraction ever #notimmersive.

Ah yes, by paid, I mean indirectly paid via press night invites, exclusives, and other incentives that'll keep those vlogs rolling out with positives vibes for Thorpe. I have a lot of respect for Scaretour 

5 hours ago, Ringo said:

 

Sums up the park completely.

 

Needs a management refresh who takes back control of the park instead of the social team...

Oh and how that is happening, maybe not the right way still though.

 

Sorry if I'm being very blunt or direct, but seeing how it's turned out this year, compare to last year, makes you wonder what went so wrong on the Island Like No Other.

[yeah]

19 hours ago, ProudToServe said:

then go to the lengths of using enthusiast to produce content across the park, including the vloggers, where I'm 100% sure have been paid to say it's the best Fright Nights ever, when it's the worst

cough  Jack Silkstone cough. Whether he gets paid or just a suck-up, it was so blatant when he repeated the exact same stuff after every single maze on the preview night. It was "soo sick".

 

Also, watched two POVs of Vulcan Peak just now, and oh my word. I didn't make it through all of I'm a Celeb because it got too much for me and I don't think I would be even slightly scared in that thing. Love how before the ending you literally just walk through the behind the scenes area that I exited through, without any attempt to theme it.

 

 

[Mark9]

7 hours ago, Ringo said:

 

Sums up the park completely.

 

Needs a management refresh who takes back control of the park instead of the social team...

 

This is certainly true. Merlin need to take a long look at Thorpe because right now, its really not in a good place.

[MattyMoo]

12 minutes ago, ChessingtonSam said:

cough  Jack Silkstone cough. Whether he gets paid or just a suck-up, it was so blatant when he repeated the exact same stuff after every single maze on the preview night. It was "soo sick".

He went to Tulley's press night but the vlog for that had nowhere near the amount of detail Vs Fright Nights Press Night.

 

To be fair to him though he didn't say Vulcan Peak was good or sick... However one of his mates said "at least it's another attraction" which isn't a viewpoint I'd share personally.

[Marhelorpe]

42 minutes ago, MattyMoo said:

To be fair to him though he didn't say Vulcan Peak was good or sick... However one of his mates said "at least it's another attraction" which isn't a viewpoint I'd share personally.

And that sentence right there is what's entirely wrong with Fright Nights now - quantity is more valued than quality.

I have nothing against the vloggers online at these press events, (except Silkstone who has essentially nicked sections of my own YouTube videos without asking me beforehand a few times very recently...) as it's evident these people clearly fall into Merlin's good graces, so won't dare discuss the issues with the event this year. But by doing so, it undermines their positions in my view where they are not being honest with their viewers and as a result, I pay almost no attention to what they have to say.

 

Just wish those with a position of influence like the vloggers can be brutally honest to the viewers and not toe the line.

[yeah]

22 minutes ago, MattyMoo said:

He went to Tulley's press night but the vlog for that had nowhere near the amount of detail Vs Fright Nights Press Night.

 

To be fair to him though he didn't say Vulcan Peak was good or sick... However one of his mates said "at least it's another attraction" which isn't a viewpoint I'd share personally.

I'll have a look at that then, I try to avoid YouTubers who use the word "sick" and use those hand motions he does as much as I possibly can but I guess I'll make an exception. Then again, I've never seen a negative comment during a press night anywhere so it probably won't be the same.

 

That last bit says it all really.

[onair]

It's really is quite sad to see how the quality of Fright Nights has dropped this year. In fact its not just Fright Nights its the whole running of the park.

They seriously need a complete refresh at present its seems the social media wannabees are running the place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[HermanTheGerman]

1 hour ago, Mark9 said:

 

This is certainly true. Merlin need to take a long look at Thorpe because right now, its really not in a good place.

So far all they've done is sack the Divisional Director. Arguably not the best resolution, and definitely not getting to the root of the issue. Hopefully there's a more intensive attempt at shake up ahead, as the entire structure and direction of the park needs rectification. The constant U-turns and unprofessional management need to go asap.

[A Lost Zookeeper]

It currently seems that a bunch of disjointed theme park fans are running the park. With the bizarre and irrelevant IPs popping up constantly; rushed, poorly managed, low-budget attractions; and pointless, disappointing events it is difficult to see where the park is planning on going. 

 

Hopefully they will learn from this mistake, and sort out the actual root of the problem. The people who believe that creating 8 Mazes and a 'Show' (very, very loose term) in one to two months with minimal staff who seem to be not experienced enough to make it work. It seems that the Marketing team saw what Universal are doing, and decided that they would take it all and do it in the UK, without thinking about the amount of money that goes into those attractions, and the large group of designers, technicians and builders who manage to create these attractions.

[Benin]

11 hours ago, Marhelorpe said:

Just wish those with a position of influence like the vloggers can be brutally honest to the viewers and not toe the line.

 

This will never happen because then the parks won't invite people just in case they're mean honest...

 

Like I doubt Bakken or Walygator would ever give me freebies...

[Ringo]

Over at TowersStreet it’s been confirmed that Ian Crabbe (Towers divisional director) is currently acting as interim at Thorpe and the marketing director is also believed to be gone, which isn’t surprising at all.

[HermanTheGerman]

59 minutes ago, Ringo said:

Over at TowersStreet it’s been confirmed that Ian Crabbe (Towers divisional director) is currently acting as interim at Thorpe and the marketing director is also believed to be gone, which isn’t surprising at all.

Ahh I didn’t know they’d chucked the marketing direc. too? Well hopefully the shakeup continues, and they get a whole new direction for the park. It’s desperately needed. 

[Ringo]

5 hours ago, HermanTheGerman said:

Ahh I didn’t know they’d chucked the marketing direc. too? Well hopefully the shakeup continues, and they get a whole new direction for the park. It’s desperately needed. 

Yeah it’s much needed, as I said elsewhere they need to go back to basics and make sure they deliver on the simple things first.

 

Also employ staff who are better suited to the job, the behaviour of some staff at Thorpe wouldn’t be tolerated at any other park. 

 

I doubt we’ll see a proper change in direction until 2020.

[Ringo]

9 minutes ago, Coaster said:

Wasn't the new Divisional Director only appointed last year?

 

https://www.thorpeparkmania.co.uk/news/09-01-2017/Resort+Appoint+New+Divisional+Director

 

It doesn't say much about the park if they're going through directors that quickly, but it does explain the constant misdirection and change in target market.

Yes he was about November 2016 so almost 2 years. To be fair the last Director (Mike Vallis) managed nearly 8 years in the job.

[Matt 236]

It’s a great shame Dom Jones has left as the park’s divisional director, however I am not surprised either.

 

Sure he wasn’t perfect but definitely had some ambitious plans, many of which were likely noticeably downsized or cancelled altogether such as the reopening of Loggers. I’ve met him many times and seemed a down to earth guy who tried to improve the park’s cosmetic appearances such as tweaking the entrance, bridge and Dome areas.

 

Sadly I’m not surprised he’s gone as I thought it was a matter of time before he went. Despite being the now former front man, he was likely restricted into what he could realistically do amongst insufficient resources too maybe.