HHN 2017 Speculation

[Kurseddragon]

10 hours ago, WESKER69 said:

Scareactors with epic timing.... which I've gotten to see the past 3 years (for the most part) since I moved out here, especially last year...

 

HHN should be trying to be more innovative & experimenting. Its stuck in its gimmicky old ways (most of that is due to Murdy). Orlando suffers the same thing, but it has at least tried new scare tactics & effects. Other haunts take it to the next level. I've been attending the event for 12 years, so I have no issue with pointing out its weaknesses, while also praising it where it deserves. If I'm hard on the event, its because I know it can do better.

 

I agree. HHN was the first haunt event I went to as a kid and maybe that's where I have the bias, but it is also pretty good; however, after visiting other events in following years and seeing them use different tactics, I'd always hope HHN would add them. But Murdy has claustrophobia and other excuses and so while he's there, it probably won't change. Universal also has a lot more to lose by risking things since it's such a large company, people always looking for shit to complain about, so keeping it to a minimum, that's obviously working, isn't exactly stupid on their part either. 

 

Completely off topic. I'm up in NorCal. Looking for haunt events. They all seem to suck. Was gonna go to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, but that shit got like 1.5 stars in like 600 reviews. Lol. Other events are like 3 hours and I can't find much information about it. I'm not opposed to trying them, but I'd like to go with friends and idk how that's gonna be since they all start in the middle of the school year. No event seems to start in September, which would be before school starts. So that's sad. ): 

There is one event that seems to be the most fitting, since it actually runs throughout all of October. I might even volunteer there, but I don't think it pays. :\ Dead Time Dreams is what it's called. Looks ok, I guess. I'll probably at least visit it even if I don't volunteer. Can't get into my haunt spirit up here. ): But I'll probably drive back down to HHN the last weekend it runs.

[JonaMar]

5 minutes ago, Kurseddragon said:

 

I agree. HHN was the first haunt event I went to as a kid and maybe that's where I have the bias, but it is also pretty good; however, after visiting other events in following years and seeing them use different tactics, I'd always hope HHN would add them. But Murdy has claustrophobia and other excuses and so while he's there, it probably won't change. Universal also has a lot more to lose by risking things since it's such a large company, people always looking for shit to complain about, so keeping it to a minimum, that's obviously working, isn't exactly stupid on their part either. 

My first experience with a haunted house was at Universal IIRC, it was the HHN with a Van Helsing maze. It scared the shit out of me to the point where my dad had to let me piggy back the rest of the way out of the maze. I didn't go to another Halloween themed scare attraction until 2015 when I went to HHN and Fright fest. I think that fright fest does a way better job. They have a maze that they used the last two years that has some really terrifying things. I went to both HHN and FF, like I said, and I only got spooked at FF. They have a ton of Uncanny Valley stuff there and I think that that stuff really gets under peoples' skin more so that the Universal Stuff.  I gotta give Fright Fest props for their amazing sets. I felt like I was actually at a mansion or a hedge maze when I was there. However, when i was at HHN for the first time, it felt like poorly made sets inside giants warehouses/tents.

 

I think that after working the event last year, and going through every maze several times, I've become desensitized to the social standards of what "scary" is.  Hopefully AHS will be able to give me a fright this year. 

[Jcs1707]

14 hours ago, WESKER69 said:

Scareactors with epic timing.... which I've gotten to see the past 3 years (for the most part) since I moved out here, especially last year...

 

HHN should be trying to be more innovative & experimenting. Its stuck in its gimmicky old ways (most of that is due to Murdy). Orlando suffers the same thing, but it has at least tried new scare tactics & effects. Other haunts take it to the next level. I've been attending the event for 12 years, so I have no issue with pointing out its weaknesses, while also praising it where it deserves. If I'm hard on the event, its because I know it can do better.

It's looking like this year we might actually get a few unique scares, particularly in the saw maze where murdy hinted on twitter we might have to crawl a few times, or at least duck.

 

[WESKER69]

15 minutes ago, Jcs1707 said:

It's looking like this year we might actually get a few unique scares, particularly in the saw maze where murdy hinted on twitter we might have to crawl a few times, or at least duck

 

Orlando has already pulled this gimmick twice (not sure if they've attempted it the past 3 years though). Once with 2012's "House of Horrors" & 2013's "TWD". Its not as OMGZ AMAZING as it might sound. It was more annoying than anything. Thankfully I didn't have to deal with it for TWD that year due to ONLY doing that house ONCE & that was during Employee Preview  

 

This is not what I call unique, creative, or wow-worthy (not even when Orlando did it). Besides, we already do enough "ducking" in the mazes due to all the hangy shit.

 

Out of all the gimmicks to "borrow" from Orlando, Murdy wants to hint at this... SIGH... give me some of the old mirror gags, distraction triggers, etc

[dereksdominance]

I've always felt like each haunt has their own style, so I wouldn't say that Universal has to steal all the other tricks from other haunts because they already have their own unique way of scaring. I've been to every haunt in socal and HHN wins for best set design and makeup hands down. Knotts, Fright Fest, Queen Mary, and all San Diego haunts feel like a room with a few decorations and I never feel truly transported like I do at HHN. While the strobe light jump scares feel a bit repetitive after all these years, so do the stand around scareactors in other haunts. I'm all for HHN trying new things like the hologram walls but in the end I wouldn't want them to do an overhaul of the way they scare people. 

[bendelthegreat]

2 hours ago, dereksdominance said:

I've always felt like each haunt has their own style, so I wouldn't say that Universal has to steal all the other tricks from other haunts because they already have their own unique way of scaring. I've been to every haunt in socal and HHN wins for best set design and makeup hands down. Knotts, Fright Fest, Queen Mary, and all San Diego haunts feel like a room with a few decorations and I never feel truly transported like I do at HHN. While the strobe light jump scares feel a bit repetitive after all these years, so do the stand around scareactors in other haunts. I'm all for HHN trying new things like the hologram walls but in the end I wouldn't want them to do an overhaul of the way they scare people. 

Exactly! I've been to other haunts and there's a reason I go back to Horror Nights more. I feel like a close second would be Queen Mary because they have some stellar set design and scare factor, but the stories feel a bit vague. HHN tells stories in a more linear sense than other haunts that make it feel cinematic. I'm going to give Knotts a second try this year, but I was super disappointed in them the last time I was there.

 

Fright Fest feels more catered to middle school children, and the San Diego haunts (though the last time I was there I was in middle school) have never really scared me. They felt like someone trying to do a haunt after going to a good one. HHN does have some major issues; the biggest one being crowds. The mazes feel cramped with people, and the crowd control inside the mazes draw me out of it and almost distract more than they should. Crowds also make it hard to explore scarezones, and also make the Terror Tram annoying. But I guess crowds ruin most things (Disneyland used to be tolerable before you had to shove your way through the different lands).

[dereksdominance]

On ‎8‎/‎21‎/‎2017 at 7:54 PM, bendelthegreat said:

Exactly! I've been to other haunts and there's a reason I go back to Horror Nights more. I feel like a close second would be Queen Mary because they have some stellar set design and scare factor, but the stories feel a bit vague. HHN tells stories in a more linear sense than other haunts that make it feel cinematic. I'm going to give Knotts a second try this year, but I was super disappointed in them the last time I was there.

 

Fright Fest feels more catered to middle school children, and the San Diego haunts (though the last time I was there I was in middle school) have never really scared me. They felt like someone trying to do a haunt after going to a good one. HHN does have some major issues; the biggest one being crowds. The mazes feel cramped with people, and the crowd control inside the mazes draw me out of it and almost distract more than they should. Crowds also make it hard to explore scarezones, and also make the Terror Tram annoying. But I guess crowds ruin most things (Disneyland used to be tolerable before you had to shove your way through the different lands).

I completely agree. I really wish there were a way to manage the crowds to allow a group of like 8 or less into each maze. This is the really great aspect of many smaller haunts and even the Queen Mary. It feels much more intimate and you feel more vulnerable. HHN makes the most understandable storylines in their mazes because they keep it simple. When I'm freaking out I don't easily connect the dots of an intricate storyline. My main point is that I disagree with people saying that HHN needs to stop scaring people in their signature style because without it what makes the event any different than other haunts? I definitely suggest branching out to other haunts for different types of scares but HHN will always be my top choice. 

[WESKER69]

On 8/21/2017 at 5:16 PM, dereksdominance said:

I've been to every haunt in socal and HHN wins for best set design and makeup hands down. Knotts, Fright Fest, Queen Mary, and all San Diego haunts feel like a room with a few decorations and I never feel truly transported like I do at HHN.

 

9 hours ago, dereksdominance said:

HHN makes the most understandable storylines in their mazes because they keep it simple. My main point is that I disagree with people saying that HHN needs to stop scaring people in their signature style because without it what makes the event any different than other haunts?

These are such brainwashed leg-humping fanboy responses. "HHN IZ TEH BEST EVENT EVA!!!"

 

Because they keep it simple?... so they keep it dumbed down so the guests don't actually have to use their brains. Got it. No wonder movies are so bad nowadays. Everything has to be kept simple so the audience isn't challenged in any way.

 

Scaring people in their signature style? HHN doesn't have a signature style. Its "Murdy's style", which means "same crap, different IP" (or same IP multiple times). The event will become stale if it relies on the same thing over & over. Even Orlando has fallen victim of it several times.

 

Knotts... 45th year, we wouldn't have HHN if it wasn't for Knotts... This will only be Hollywood's 18th year. Bash Knotts all you want, but clearly they know what they're doing.

Fright Fest has also been doing their event longer than Hollywood & have also learned over the years. It used to be the butt of haunt jokes, but they're stepping up their game.

 

HHN is a great event, but lets not kid ourselves. It is NOT "the best" event ever. It is just the event that most of us grew up with and/or attended the most. There are smaller haunts, standalone haunts, & home haunts that have done better stuff than HHN.

[LetsMakeBiskuts]

On 8/21/2017 at 7:54 PM, bendelthegreat said:

HHN does have some major issues; the biggest one being crowds. The mazes feel cramped with people, and the crowd control inside the mazes draw me out of it and almost distract more than they should. Crowds also make it hard to explore scarezones, and also make the Terror Tram annoying. But I guess crowds ruin most things (Disneyland used to be tolerable before you had to shove your way through the different lands).

I've noticed they tend to send groups of 20 people or so at a time and space out inbetween the groups, however the main issue I see is the people in the front of the group move really slow because they're scared to move forward and that ends up holding the whole group back and eventually clogging up the maze and creating the Congo line. I guess the only way to remedy this would be to send smaller groups and space them out more, but wait times would get way longer. They could always sell less tickets but it's a money making business so they're going to cram as many people into the pro as they can.

[dykealiscious]

On 8/20/2017 at 9:48 PM, JonaMar said:

What would you want in a maze that you think would actually scare the shit out of you? 

Aliens. I know it's been done in the past (florida?) but I've only been to HHN once, and this year will be my second. 

[JonaMar]

2 hours ago, LetsMakeBiskuts said:

I've noticed they tend to send groups of 20 people or so at a time and space out inbetween the groups, however the main issue I see is the people in the front of the group move really slow because they're scared to move forward and that ends up holding the whole group back and eventually clogging up the maze and creating the Congo line. I guess the only way to remedy this would be to send smaller groups and space them out more, but wait times would get way longer. They could always sell less tickets but it's a money making business so they're going to cram as many people into the pro as they can.

If a maze doesn't get the estimated put through, then the ops team gets seriously bashed. Before the event starts, whoever the area manager is (person in charge of the entire backlot for example) will set the put through at say 2,000 people for a popular maze like AHS. If they're under that number by the end of each hour, then the entire team gets told something. Of course shit happens all the time and the goal is never really reached by a few dozen or so numbers. This entire situation forces the operations team to send in 20+ people at a time. If they didn't, and they did smaller, more intimate groups, then lines would be really backed up. 

 

The only way to beat this problem so that everyone wins is to have more mazes. This would allow guests to be more spread out and hopefully reduce the ridiculous lines. Of course for this to work, the park would need to increase the amount of mazes and keep ticket sales to around 20k/night.  AND EVEN THEN the operation teams would have pressure on them to have high put throughs and short wait times. It's an internal problem that most likely will never get solved because there are too many things demanded of the employees. 

 

My solution to this problem would honestly be to have 10 mazes and only sell 20k tickets. Things would fall on central command to not be so demanding on the rest of the park employees. Maybe only ask for about 1000 people to go through the maze per hour. Keep all lines at a 45 minute wait. The way I see it, you need bigger mazes in order to space people out and avoid the conga line effect. This would obviously enhance the guest experience as they won't see the scares coming. 

 

If every maze takes between 3-5 minutes to walk through it, then what the teams could do is send a group in every 20 seconds. Groups should be no more than 10 people big and no smaller than 4. I'm terrible at math so someone else should do that for me and let me know what a min/max hourly through put would be if that system were in place. 

[dykealiscious]

On 8/21/2017 at 11:28 AM, JonaMar said:

My first experience with a haunted house was at Universal IIRC, it was the HHN with a Van Helsing maze. It scared the shit out of me to the point where my dad had to let me piggy back the rest of the way out of the maze. I didn't go to another Halloween themed scare attraction until 2015 when I went to HHN and Fright fest. I think that fright fest does a way better job. They have a maze that they used the last two years that has some really terrifying things. I went to both HHN and FF, like I said, and I only got spooked at FF. They have a ton of Uncanny Valley stuff there and I think that that stuff really gets under peoples' skin more so that the Universal Stuff.  I gotta give Fright Fest props for their amazing sets. I felt like I was actually at a mansion or a hedge maze when I was there. However, when i was at HHN for the first time, it felt like poorly made sets inside giants warehouses/tents.

 

I think that after working the event last year, and going through every maze several times, I've become desensitized to the social standards of what "scary" is.  Hopefully AHS will be able to give me a fright this year. 

I went to both HHN and FF last year (Six Flags, is there others?) and I really felt like SFMM did a great job freaking me out.

[JonaMar]

1 minute ago, dykealiscious said:

Aliens. I know it's been done in the past (florida?) but I've only been to HHN once, and this year will be my second. 

Unfortunately, USH would only ever do Aliens from the Aliens franchise and that's pretty stale. So unless someone releases the greatest alien film ever and US can get the rights, then I highly doubt we're going to get a new alien themed maze. Which is sad because aliens allow for a wide variety of original content. 

 

To answer my own question: I want demons. Shit that's so ridiculous that it could only be spawned from hell. The closer something gets to uncanny the scarier it becomes to me. Imagine a maze forcing you to walk through trees filled with fake blood, there are several different ways through. The woods are plagued with gruesome looking hell spawn and you're constantly being chased by a human with the head of a horse stitched to it's neck. But it's turned inside out with all the blood vessles facing you, teeth all jacked up and it doesn't run like a normal person, it limps and jumps as it stalks you.

 

I'd certainly be spooked by that right there.  

5 minutes ago, dykealiscious said:

I went to both HHN and FF last year (Six Flags, is there others?) and I really felt like SFMM did a great job freaking me out.

I personally thought that the costumes at FF were better than at HHN. There were less houses and they weren't as scary but they felt more real to me. I honestly felt like I was where the maze was portraying. Also, original IP's are far scarier in my opinion, as you have no idea what you'll be faced with when you walk through the entrance. 

[WESKER69]

5 minutes ago, dykealiscious said:

Aliens. I know it's been done in the past (florida?) but I've only been to HHN once, and this year will be my second. 

Define "aliens"... like Ridley Scott/James Cameron "ALIENS" or like "abduct you & perform experiments 72 times with a turkey bastor & egg beater" aliens?

 

8 minutes ago, JonaMar said:

The only way to beat this problem so that everyone wins is to have more mazes.

The way I see it, you need bigger mazes in order to space people out and avoid the conga line effect.

More mazes doesn't actually solve anything if the budget itself is not increased significantly. More mazes means less quality as far as scenic details go, unless you start doing the trend of other haunts & that is bring back the same maze for 2-4 years (or more) at a time. Sure, those returning mazes can be made fresh/new if the effort is made. Hell, even some of the reasons why other haunt events can do new things is by keeping the same scarezones for several years to save on budget.

 

Bigger mazes is not possible or even better, let alone logical.  Mazes are designed to basically have the same number of scenes (8-10, depending on the location & theme/design). It is rare for a maze to have more scenes than that. You also run into the same problem as you do with having more mazes.... budget.

 

The real problem with Hollywood's crowds is the park NOT having all rides/attractions open for guests. Some guests have never been to the park before, so HHN will be their first (sometimes only) time to do these rides/attractions. I know its hard to believe, but its true. With more rides/attractions open, it helps put bodies elsewhere. Then of course the obvious lack of shows... They have the Animal Actors stage, the have Waterworld (which is a little difficult with a maze next to it & the space around it being used for maze queue).

[JonaMar]

5 minutes ago, WESKER69 said:

The real problem with Hollywood's crowds is the park NOT having all rides/attractions open for guests. Some guests have never been to the park before, so HHN will be their first (sometimes only) time to do these rides/attractions. I know its hard to believe, but its true. With more rides/attractions open, it helps put bodies elsewhere. Then of course the obvious lack of shows... They have the Animal Actors stage, the have Waterworld (which is a little difficult with a maze next to it & the space around it being used for maze queue).

I guess you could open up the WWoHP but that opens up a whole other can of worms, one that I don't think any fire marshal would approve of. Ultimately, I don't know if there is a solution to this problem.  As for budgeting, I'm sure that NBC Universal makes more than enough to shell out for HHN. Whether they want to or not is a different thing. 

[Kurseddragon]

I don't think more mazes would help, tbh... A bigger nightmare behind the scenes for multiple reasons.

 

On another note, I've applied to some other haunt I didn't know existed, so I might be scareacting again this year.  There's also another place, but it's volunteer work, and I need money, so that's backup for now. ):

[WESKER69]

21 minutes ago, JonaMar said:

I guess you could open up the WWoHP

They did for the final night of the event last year. And the only thing that needs to be open is 3 Broomsticks, FJ, & Hippo...

 

Thats one of the biggest issues with USH when it comes to HHN... The park has very few rides/attractions as it is, but then only have 4 of them open for their big event... it doesn't help that 3 out of those 4 rides are on the Lower Lot. Of course another issue is, anytime they get these big grand ideas to change the park in one way or another, they don't exactly take into account of how it affects their annual events like HHN & Grinchmas.

[JonaMar]

1 hour ago, WESKER69 said:

They did for the final night of the event last year. And the only thing that needs to be open is 3 Broomsticks, FJ, & Hippo...

 

Thats one of the biggest issues with USH when it comes to HHN... The park has very few rides/attractions as it is, but then only have 4 of them open for their big event... it doesn't help that 3 out of those 4 rides are on the Lower Lot. Of course another issue is, anytime they get these big grand ideas to change the park in one way or another, they don't exactly take into account of how it affects their annual events like HHN & Grinchmas.

I don't see how opening WW affected HHN. The area is just too big to manage, it can hols some ridiculously big number of people. Plus HHN is supposed to be about the mazes, not the attractions that are open year round. People who go to HHN go for the halloween stuff, and not the rides. They opened WW on the final night as a test run to see how it would affect the Horror Nights aspect.  

 

As for there only being 4 rides open, it makes a hell of a lot of sense. DM is mainly targeted for small children who usually aren't at the event, and that part of the park can be used for moving props to scare zones in and around the Parisian courtyard. Makes sense to shut down DM for HHN. Shrek has the lowest guest count on the daily basis, which is why they closed it and are building the Kung Fu Panda attraction there. Even if it wasn't closed for remodeling, the amount of people going to Shrek would be too low to justify having it open during night OP's. Simpsons being open makes a lot of sense as it has one of the highest through puts, it's queue and two domes can fit a lot of people, and it's out of the way of any major scare zones. 

 

The lower lot has The Mummy, Jurassic Park, and Transformers open because they're very popular rides. Although the JP ride is old as hell, it's opening day counted one of if not the biggest in park guest count. People like for nostalgia reasons, AND it's the only water ride in the park. The mummy has one of the highest through puts due to it being the only roller coaster, and the ride time being extremely short. Transformers, one of the newer rides at the park, does not get a whole lot of visitors during HHN. Last year the highest wait time I saw it have was 15 minutes. However, it being right outside the entrance of Route 666 and The shinning, gives guests something to do if they think that line is too long. It too is on the popular spectrum when it comes to rides at USH. 

 

There are currently only Seven rides in the park (Simpsons, JP, Mummy, Transformers, DM, and Forbidden Journey and hippogrif). They keep 4 of the most popular rides open, close the two least popular rides, and close the WWoHP as a whole. It makes perfect sense to me why they would do that.  WW is not cheap to keep open, and people for the most part don't want to work there until 2:30 am. My first year working at USH i was a ride op at one of the rides that stays open during HHN. We had empty cars throughout the majority of the event hours. It sucked, we were extremely overstaffed which lead to a shortage of employees during day ops to balance out hour budgeting. 

[zombieman]

I've wondered for a while - when HHN sells out, what is the attendance cap?  How does that "sell out" cap compare to a summer day when all the rides are open?

 

Where this Q comes from is that we talk about "what if they opened X during HHN", assuming that the additional ride/show would lower wait times at houses because customers would have more to do.  

 

But if HHN capacity is < potential park capacity, then is it not reasonable to assume that if they brought back SlaughterWorld and opened WWoHP, they would sell a correspondingly higher number of HHN tickets and our house lines would be just as long?

[JonaMar]

2 hours ago, zombieman said:

I've wondered for a while - when HHN sells out, what is the attendance cap?  How does that "sell out" cap compare to a summer day when all the rides are open?

 

Where this Q comes from is that we talk about "what if they opened X during HHN", assuming that the additional ride/show would lower wait times at houses because customers would have more to do.   

 

But if HHN capacity is < potential park capacity, then is it not reasonable to assume that if they brought back SlaughterWorld and opened WWoHP, they would sell a correspondingly higher number of HHN tickets and our house lines would be just as long?

Lat year, the most tickets we ever sold for one night was 23k. During HHN we have an attendance limit of 20k~ (I don't remember the exact number). During regular day ops, the record was set on the opening day of JP when we had well over 40k people in the park. These numbers don't mean that all 23k and 40k people were in the park at the same time, just that the overall attendance throughout the day/event were 23k for HHN and 40k+ for JP opening. 

 

The answer to your second question is no. The park only sold like 19k tickets on the last day when WWoHP was opened and the lines for all the mazes were the same as usual. Granted WW was only open from 11-2 or something like that. But even if they had WWoHP open throughout the entire event, they wouldn't be allowed to sell more tickets. This is why: The amount of people allowed in is determined by a fire marshal, he goes in and inspects all the mazes and he decides what the max capacity is. The way he does this is based solely off of the mazes, this is because he's only assuming that people will be in those maze queues and nowhere else.

 

Let's say he thinks that a maximum of 20k people would fit inside every maze queue if every guest was only in the maze queues. So he lets the park sell around 23k tickets because obviously, there would never be all 20k people in the park at the same time, and even if they were,t hey wouldn't all be ONLY in the maze queues. They'd be in some of the rides or inside the mazes themselves. So the park is allowed to sell 23k tickets  but they always oversell because math and semantics. WWoHP can hold like 12k people inside of it (I don't remember the actual number but I remember it being pretty high) so even if they opened it up and they could in theory (and I guess practice) hold an extra 12k people in there, the fire marshal doesn't care, he only cares how many people fit inside maze queues. 

[WESKER69]

5 hours ago, JonaMar said:

Plus HHN is supposed to be about the mazes, not the attractions that are open year round. People who go to HHN go for the halloween stuff, and not the rides.

 

Too long, didn't read. Actually I did read it... even though it was overly wordy (and thats coming from me) & boring, not too mention completely missed the point entirely.

 

Let me put it this way, I've been attending HHN for 12 years... I'm well aware what the event is supposed to be about & what you're supposed to go for. But again, I am not talking about the typical fanboy who goes to the event multiple times or even goes to the park multiple times throughout the year. I am referring to the average generic park guest who does NOT go to the park all the time or ever. Trust me when I say, there are people that attend HHN who have NEVER been to Universal before. I know what I'm talking about. There are also people who have been to HHN before or even go every year, but not the actual park during the daytime.

 

If you actually pay attention to guests at HHN, you will see that there are quite a few that don't do the mazes, they want to do the rides. Or you have the guests that do the mazes, but then want to do the rides since the maze waittimes are too long or they just want to do everything once before leaving. It doesn't matter about capacity for Shrek  or if you think DM is for small children, they are still rides/attractions that can put bodies elsewhere. And again, there are people who have never been to the park that probably would enjoy experiencing them. Of course, when it comes to either of those attractions, if they had a halloween overlay, it'd add to the daytime & hhn experience. Oh... and just FYI, "Kang & Kodos" in Orlando is the same Dumbo spinner type ride as Silly Swirly & they have had it open during HHN and people DO ride it.

 

I've gone with friends who have been to the park before & even though we still had TCM, Terror Tram & TWD left... they wanted to ride JP, Mummy, & Transformers. I have no problem with doing the rides at HHN, BUT ONLY AFTER you do all the mazes. Of course it also depends on waittimes. But don't fool yourself into think that EVERY guest that goes to HHN is ONLY there for the mazes/SZs. Some go to the event & are too afraid to do the mazes, so they just do the rides.

 

And @zombieman has an unfortunate point. Even if they were to have more things open or add a show in Waterworld & Animal Actors, sadly they'd just sell even more tickets than they already do. Universal only cares about selling more tickets than they do the overall guest experience.  There is nothing worse than a scarezone full of guests resulting in the scarezone experience being "blah".

[Kurseddragon]

You guys are pointlessly arguing like it'll make any difference to the actual event. It won't. Pretty much the end of story regardless of who's right or wrong.

 

And there can't be a show at Animal Actors. When it was used as a break room for a short time, we couldn't even touch the stage 'cause it fucks with animals during their show.

[JonaMar]

2 minutes ago, Kurseddragon said:

You guys are pointlessly arguing like it'll make any difference to the actual event. It won't. Pretty much the end of story regardless of who's right or wrong.

 

And there can't be a show at Animal Actors. When it was used as a break room for a short time, we couldn't even touch the stage 'cause it fucks with animals during their show.

I didn't see it as arguing. Just wasn't sure why so much as having WWoHP affected HHN and Grinchmas.

[WESKER69]

1 hour ago, Kurseddragon said:

And there can't be a show at Animal Actors. When it was used as a break room for a short time, we couldn't even touch the stage 'cause it fucks with animals during their show.

Back in the 97-2000 years of HHN they did have an animal actors show during the event... so anything is possible, if you just believe!

[aam1995]

The 2017 commercial is out and it's amazing!