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Chessington Howl'o'ween


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But to experience that we have to pay extra? Seems like the in house teams have it easy this year, with just the trick or treat wood business to create, I expect that to be pretty groundbreaking..

Seems a shame to loose two great Halloween attractions and replace them with nothing, just because they're hard work to install.

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But to experience that we have to pay extra? Seems like the in house teams have it easy this year, with just the trick or treat wood business to create, I expect that to be pretty groundbreaking..

Seems a shame to loose two great Halloween attractions and replace them with nothing, just because they're hard work to install.

Curse of the Tomb is apparently free now (source Southparks) which should be the case to begin, however it's still strongly disappointing that both the park's former Halloween attractions however have disappeared as they looked top notch additions snd I never got to experience either of them. I'd really like to no why the decision to chop them were made and whether it was the park or Merlin that gave the 'this maze can't run anymore' order.

Part of me is really hoping for a u-turn or change, but this is Chessington. If the 8pm closings are slashed again, I will likely call off my visit (I'm already considering doing a Scarefest instead).

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The next thing to be announced will be 7pm/ (possibly) 6pm closings Just wait and See! doubt 2nd of November will remain a Halloween date either Gutted that I was finally plucking up the courage to go in hollows That they are getting rid of it. Last two halloweens were the best visit's to Chessington of the whole season's and I visit Chessington at least 12 times a year without fail 2013's halloween Was so good I visited 4 times!  And rounded off the theme park opening season extremely well. Curse of the lost tomb is going to have to be extremely good to make up for the loss of Mystery of hocus pocus hall and Haunting in the hollows.

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Chessington has been a joke throughout the whole of this year and rounding it off with this shockingly crap Halloween event? That's certainly going to keep the customers coming back next year isn't it.

Seeing as Thorpe Park haven't even started to advertise their Halloween line up yet, I just know that it will be on the same scale as last years. Due to the nightmare that fright nights was last year I'm not surprised they aren't willing to expand as they know there will likely be a massive drop in gate figures over the Halloween period compared to last year. Chessington are likely in a similar situation as they've had a really bad year and know it's not worth investing money into an event which will be much emptier than previous years.

I'm surprised that Alton Towers are going all out with the event this year however I imagine that's because they are trying to regain their guests and draw them back in after the accident. Alton is unfortunately the only Merlin park which will have an exciting and interesting Halloween line up but even then they are still charging a further £20 on top of entry to experience those scare mazes.

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I don't get your vendetta against Fright Nights James.

Thorpe experienced some of their highest attendances in the past few years during last season's event. They will be keeping it at least as large as last season's event. With 5 scare attractions, roaming actors and out of hours extras, it is one of the biggest Halloween events in the country.

A few days where they got higher attendances than expected isn't going to drive many people away, nor will it stop the park expanding the event.

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I don't get your vendetta against Fright Nights James.

Thorpe experienced some of their highest attendances in the past few years during last season's event. They will be keeping it at least as large as last season's event. With 5 scare attractions, roaming actors and out of hours extras, it is one of the biggest Halloween events in the country.

A few days where they got higher attendances than expected isn't going to drive many people away, nor will it stop the park expanding the event.

It was nothing to do with getting higher attendance than expected that the queues rocketed out of proportion and I'm almost certain that even though attendance this year will be lower than last year, queues will still be an absolute nightmare due to oversold fastrack, low throughputs and Reserve n Ride. The event last year was a complete nightmare, after preview night the mazes were all pretty rushed, sub-standard and certainly not worth the horrendous queues they were gaining. The lack of atmosphere at fright nights is utterly a poor show as well, I encountered the roaming actors once on preview night and there was no park theming whatsoever. How you can consider that an immersive Halloween event completely confuses me.

Howloween last year along with scarefest had a brilliant atmosphere over the park with great park lighting, theming and atmosphere. Whilst on the other hand, thorpe park was a mess of over crowded and ridiculously slow moving queue lines with no atmosphere whatsoever. It's a shame that Howloween has taken along the path thorpe follows with a truly half-arsed effort to approaching their Halloween event.

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whilst fastrack overselling was a problem last fright nights it's not Thorpe's fault they're extremely popular! :)

I disagree here, whilst they may receive relatively high figures for a UK park, this does not make them "extremely popular" overall. The only reason for the long queues at thorpe park are simply because they are unable to cope with the figures they achieve and the park should be changed to accommodate this(no RNR,no fastrack overselling, more shows, higher throughput attractions etc) before they try and get more people through the front door.

Yes, even if they made these changes queues would still exist inside the park, however they would be nowhere near as long or slow moving as they currently are.

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Thorpe experienced some of their highest attendances in the past few years during last season's event. They will be keeping it at least as large as last season's event. With 5 scare attractions, roaming actors and out of hours extras, it is one of the biggest Halloween events in the country.

A few days where they got higher attendances than expected isn't going to drive many people away, nor will it stop the park expanding the event.

The park being busy isn't the issue here, it's the fact that several rides were down on the busiest days (I recall one day at least with five rides closed, including Colossus), as well as mass Fastrack overselling on the mazes and rides, and RNR causing havoc with the main queues of the mazes.  For such a busy time, all rides should be open, but I recall Samurai and Fish being closed for maintenance (obviously didn't do Samurai any good :lol: ) as well as many other closures throughout the day.

 

It's the poor operations which might put people off returning, not the park being busy. 

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The lack of atmosphere at fright nights is utterly a poor show as well, I encountered the roaming actors once on preview night and there was no park theming whatsoever. How you can consider that an immersive Halloween event completely confuses me.

Howloween last year along with scarefest had a brilliant atmosphere over the park with great park lighting, theming and atmosphere. Whilst on the other hand, thorpe park was a mess of over crowded and ridiculously slow moving queue lines with no atmosphere whatsoever. It's a shame that Howloween has taken along the path thorpe follows with a truly half-arsed effort to approaching their Halloween event.

 

I've never said Fright Nights was an immersive Halloween event?  I've just said it was popular and one of the biggest in the UK.  Personally I never got the fuss about Scarefest with its atmosphere in 2012 - other than the mazes, there was the hearse, a few pumpkins and some coloured lights.  Not exactly a brilliant atmosphere.  Maybe it was a bad year, but it's not exactly much different to what Thorpe did last year.

 

I don't see how you can call Fright Nights half-arsed given how much they offer.  Whilst there's not much outside the mazes, the mazes themselves are still of some decent standard theming-wise at the very least.  Then again, I don't see how you can call this season's Howl'o'ween half-arsed given we haven't seen what they'll do outside of the Halloween attractions...

 

I disagree here, whilst they may receive relatively high figures for a UK park, this does not make them "extremely popular" overall. The only reason for the long queues at thorpe park are simply because they are unable to cope with the figures they achieve and the park should be changed to accommodate this(no RNR,no fastrack overselling, more shows, higher throughput attractions etc) before they try and get more people through the front door.

Yes, even if they made these changes queues would still exist inside the park, however they would be nowhere near as long or slow moving as they currently are.

 

Thorpe hit capacity on a few days during Fright Nights.  For a park to hit capacity, that means it must be very popular in its own right surely?  And in those cases, any park would be very busy.  The long queues at Fright Nights at least won't be helped by the mazes' low throughputs, which are always going to be the case by the very nature of the attractions.  

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Thorpe hit capacity on a few days during Fright Nights.  For a park to hit capacity, that means it must be very popular in its own right surely?  And in those cases, any park would be very busy.  The long queues at Fright Nights at least won't be helped by the mazes' low throughputs, which are always going to be the case by the very nature of the attractions.  

 

Will feel busier too, queue wise with a normal queue, fastrack and Reserve n ride!

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I've just spotted this from the advert:

"You can take a flight of fright on Vampire to soar through the trees of Transylvania, enjoy Dragon’s Fury’s spectacular spin underneath the stars, or incur the wrath of Rameses’ Revenge with Chessington’s favourite rides available to enjoy under the dark cloak of night."

This sounds to me that not every ride will be available in the evenings at this year's event. I do hope I'm wrong! 

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I've just spotted this from the advert:

"You can take a flight of fright on Vampire to soar through the trees of Transylvania, enjoy Dragon’s Fury’s spectacular spin underneath the stars, or incur the wrath of Rameses’ Revenge with Chessington’s favourite rides available to enjoy under the dark cloak of night."

This sounds to me that not every ride will be available in the evenings at this year's event. I do hope I'm wrong! 

Just like in the day time then.

 

Seriously though, it does sound like that, hopefully it's just the way it's worded.

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