HHN XIV: Ghost Town, Castle Vampyr, Horror in Wax

[agalloch]

I remember the smell of hay as I walked past the dead-talking cowboy in the ranch facade of Ghost Town. I remember the seductive woman dancing on the bed in Castle Vampyr, and the smell of incense. I remember the ominous, dripping wax of Horror in Wax with the side-show-ish facade.

EDIT: Even Hellgate Prison, hearing the warden speaking and seeing the search light, walking in and having prisoners verbally abuse you. In Deadtropilis, their best zombie house ever, you smelled vomit.

And as Joe Tourist wrote, "Universal does an excellent job in setting up the atmosphere for the evening." This is why I keep emphasizing how GREAT the event used to be.

[PeoriaBJJ]

Dude, you are my favorite poster now! People are gonna get going on this one too! I can feel it!!!

[agalloch]

I love the show and I have liked what HHN has done the last couple years (well maybe just this year) but its time get back to what HHN knows how to do.

Can we start a grass roots campaign for Uni to bring back the old-school scare zones and shit? PLEASE????!

With you on that man. Wish people would check the 15 or 18 website and feel how awesome it was. Or the secrets in the other older websites.

[PeoriaBJJ]

While I dont agree with most of your opinions on this year I will say I would like to see the old scare zones come back. Im sure they will eventually. HHN is in an experimental phase (insert girls in college joke here ), but I bet they go back to them eventually.

[SadBones]

You had at me at the best zombie house ever smelled like vomit.

[JunoSynth]

2004 was my first experience of HHN and definitely one of my favorite years. Next to "Leave it to Cleaver" Ghost Town is still my favorite house of all time. I can still remember that Glow in the Dark Cowboy at the table in the bar. OMG he looked so Badass! And the girls doing that weird dance on the wall was creepy.

I remember everyone was saying how awesome Castle Vampyr was but I didn't really care for it. Maybe because I don't really care for vampires. House of wax was my first HHN house but I don't remember much. I know it wasn't bad though. I remember Hell Gate Prison being really intense. I even remember some of the inmates using curse words and I was like "oh wow this is awesome!".

I haven't seen all the zombie Houses HHN has to offer but I agree that Deadtropilis is pretty high up there if not the best.

Oh the parade was pretty cool too.

[agalloch]

Juno - thanks for sharing your experience. I remember the glowing cowboy as well haha! I remember the barn, but then the rest is a bit foggy for me. The scarezones were also fantastic.

Did you go to HHN 15? If so, what are your thoughts (even if brief, I'm curious) on that, and how do the events compare to these more recent yeras? Personally, I think the former yeras are far bettter.

And, YES! Any "dark comedy" houses automatically win themselves to me. Leave it to Cleaver is BRILLIANT.

Edited October 16, 2013 by agalloch

[JunoSynth]

Yeah the scarezones were pretty good. Field of Screams had this really creepy atmosphere and I cannot recall any other scarezone having that same vibe. So did Midway of the Bizarre. And Point of Evil. OMG I can't believe I forgot to mention that. The Borg people were one of my favortie parts of the event. I swear I watched them for at least a hour trash talking and yelling out sarcastic remarks to everyone that entered the park. If you took too long to take your pic they would routinely say "Move people, Kodak moment is over!!" They need to bring those guys back!! In fact they should do something like 05 with the storyteller and do some whole Sci-Fi horror theme that all ties together. Like make some alien race that tells stories of the universe or something. Man that would be awesome.

Speaking of 05 I did not go unfortunately. I regret it so much because that year looked so good and original!

I went from 06-09 after that. Looking back I would say 06 was my least favorite year and 08 was my favorite overall year. 06 was supposed to be a return of their best houses but a lot of it felt uninspired and dull. In 08 though they seemed to do most everything right with the orginallity and creativity. 07 was heavy on the IP and it really concerned me. But NOES and TCM wasnt that bad IMO.

I am going again this year though and leave this Friday. Having all these IP's does concern me in the direction HHN is going. Luckily I'm a fan of most of them but they seemed to have used up all my favorite horror IPs now. And becuase of this I just dont see any interest with another heavy IP event.

As far as the event itself going down the toilet haha. I haven't been in 4 years so I can't really make a good judgment if its getting worse. It does sadden me if this is true because I wanted to make it a yearly thing again. I noticed there was a lot of talk about it but I didn't read too much because I don't want to risk any of this years spoilers. I can say this is a very subjective matter though since we are dealing with a form of art. Nobody can tell you how you feel and because of this I don't believe anyone is really right/wrong.

[Cupcakes]

2004 definitely stood out as one of my favorite years, the only really bad aspect of it was the Disorientorium house as well as the fact that there was a lot of dead space at the event. But aside from the previously mentioned, all of the houses were either great (Deadtropolis, Horror in Wax, Ghost Town, Horror Night Nightmares) or just outright spectacular (Hellgate Prison, Castle Vampyr) in their own special way. It was one of the best years for houses, period.

The scarezones too, were nothing short of spectacular. Field of Screams, Fright Yard...both blew my mind away, as they were both something that had never been done before. They went the extra mile to ensure that the trip between both parks would be something worth remembering, and that is something to be greatly admired. Point of Evil and Midway of the Bizarre had plenty going for them as well on top of all that. Excellent scares, excellent atmosphere, excellent everything.

And when you think about it, it really is remarkable that the event turned out as well as it did, since just weeks before it started Orlando got beaten pretty hard by like, three hurricanes or so. But that wasn't going to stop A&D, no siree, they delivered. There was just some true love and dedication put into 04's event, and it showed. It had some flaws, yes, but it was truly the year where the creatives were free to let their minds run wild with insanity and bring in some brand new things to the table with the event that had never been before seen. It was an exciting time. Really exciting.

Whereas with this year, I definitely do get the feeling that A&D had their hands tied down in several aspects. However, I do consider myself to be pretty neutral regarding this whole "Is the event's spirit gone forever?" discussion, as I need to see more before I judge. I want to try and stay as optimistic as I can, as that's just the kind of person I am. Yes, I do believe 2012 was the worst year ever for the event in all the years I've been going, but I have noticed a definite improvement with this year's event, even though it still ranks low among my favorite HHNs. I think the event can pick itself back up completely, and I think it will happen sometime soon. Until then, I'll just try to make the best of things.