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Scarefest 2019

Longest I managed to stay in Sub was 25 mins :D

Which to be fair is still not that long compared to other mazes at other attractions where that’s a normal length of time o_O

Scarefest mazes just need to be longer.
More actors and longer mazes
 
Matt878787 said:
Gutted scarefest is almost over and i chickened out going in any of the scare mazes for the first time.

Is it really true you can get lost by yourself in there for half an hour with actors chasing you around in the dark? It sounds traumatic. (Guess that’s the point)
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Brother my first SS run was 5 minutes because there were no actors and I happened to go the right way the first time. Honestly most of my group took 10. I guess you could chill in there for 30 minutes but you'd have to REALLY try.
 
The thing that annoys me about 13 is they close it early so they can have the queue clear by the time it drops below 5. Thorpe on the other hand keeps the queue open and stops when the temperature alarm goes off
 
spinba11 said:
The thing that annoys me about 13 is they close it early so they can have the queue clear by the time it drops below 5. Thorpe on the other hand keeps the queue open and stops when the temperature alarm goes off
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..and then turf out a thousand unhappy guests who waited an hour and didn’t get to ride, presumably?
 
"...based on our world-class themed accommodation" ha ha ha ha ha ha, Stargazing Sheds?!

Anyway, its a no brainer really that Scarefest is such a huge success, the chance of riding into the night and experiencing scary mazes is of course going to pull in more and more people. While the Scarefest period is still one of my most favorite times to visit the park, the atmosphere and depth of the scare attractions is not like it used to be. Emphasis is on getitng as many tickets sold for the mazes and maximum throughput now. However, its a business, and its there to make money, so who can blame them.

Call it progress or whatever you want, but the more people who visit, the less complex and less time consuming a scare maze can be I guess as more and more people want to experience it.

However, given these figures, I think there should be more Halloween attractions throughout the park, not just on Towers Street. Definitely needs to be a walk through scaremaze or two for next year !
 
That's an enormous percentage of guests. As such, and while this year's Scarefest seems to have been a strong edition, it's a shame nonetheless that Merlin clearly have the pursestrings on the event, and fixtures like scarezones and shows come and go depending on the year in question.
 
It would be interesting to see what the % was for pre 2015. Obviously the % of visitors was down the past couple years due to the incident and only last year due to Wicker Man have people started to return in much larger numbers.
 
I went to Nemesis: it was down
I went to Galactica: it was down
I went to Wicker Man: it was down
I went to Th13teen: it was down
This is getting annoying
Edit: I went to Spinball Whizzer: it was down
 
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Back in 2002 when Air opened, it also had a wind-speed restriction (and still does). There was only one anemometer on the entire park back then - on a Skyride pylon in Mutiny Bay. Shows how bothered the park was about recording wind-speeds very locally to the ride.
 
ringo said:
But the weather nor the stall was the cause of the incident. The ride and systems all behaved as expected it’s just that staff overrode the system and caused the incident...
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Operating the ride in contradiction to the manufacturer's guidelines was the catalyst to while incident.

Ever since then they've obeyed them implicitly. They have to really.

Another major incident, where they're found to have operated rides in conditions where the manufacturer's have instructed them not too, and the theme park may be no more

"He also pointed out there were estimated winds on the day of the crash of 45mph but the manufacturer's manual stated the ride should not be operated at wind speeds above 34mph"
 
Mikw said:
Operating the ride in contradiction to the manufacturer's guidelines was the catalyst to while incident.
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But you keep ignoring the part where it says that it wasnt above the manufacturer's recommendation, we quoted it in the previous posts. Where have you quoted that part about 34mph wind speed "on the day"? It's not in the public prosecution comments

HSE found it was the park's lack of procedure around multiple risks that caused the crash, one of which was resetting when wind caused empty trains to stall ("potential impact of wind on operation"). Ie it was under the wind recommendation, but there was no robust procedure to check that stalled trains had been cleared or they should have their own wind limit when sending empty trains to avoid stalling in the first place.

"The risk is created by the absence of a proper system of work when there is block resetting following a train coming to a standstill."

Mods feel free to move all this discussion to another topic. I just think its important to clear up the whole Smiler thing, even now people still blame the operator or the engineer, "human error" or rules not being followed, and it just aint fair.
 
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Had a great day yesterday. I didn’t do the 3 combi ticket mazes as I have done them before. But I did The Attic, Darkest Depths and the Dungeon’s. All 3 were fantastic.
The Attic:
Did this early and there were only 4 of us in the queue so it allowed for a much more close up/personal experience. Really liked how creepy it was and the actors were fantastic. Could of done with a finale as people have said but overall its clear they just put so much effort into attention for detail in this, so hats off to them.
The Dungeon’s:
The actors in the queue line for this were absolutely fantastic. Highlight of the night. They were very lively and putting a lot of effort in, scaring people and making them laugh in equal measure. The experience itself was very good and funny in most scenes.
Darkest Depths:
Again there were only 4 of us in our run through. As others have said its absolutely brilliant and probably the scariest of the 3 attractions even tho its designed for a lower age rating! Very lively actors and the fact its all in shipping containers is mind boggling. So much attention to detail again from the creators of this maze.
Got on tonnes of night rides as well. Wickerman was as crazy as it always is at night. 13 too is such an average ride in the day but at night it goes up so many notches.
All in all a fantastic day and cant wait for next year now
 
In case anyone has not found this already, there is a YouTube channel that has some official Scarefest soundtracks on it. The channel is owned by Simon Allen who is a Creative Manager and the Musical Director at Alton Towers Resort. It appears he has composed and produced most of the recent Scarefest soundtracks. I have attached links below.

Scarefest Soundtracks
The Welcoming Area Audio:


Freak Show Soundtrack:


The Attic Finale Soundtrack:


Darkest Depths Area Audio:


Other Soundtracks
The Alton Towers Dungeon - Main Theme:


Duel Soundtrack:
https://youtu.be/K4srAHZTHM8
 
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