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Scarefest 2023

For the time being they should just drop the 4th attraction and go back to 3 mazes. The 4th attraction has always been relatively poor, so they’re clearly stretching an already thin budget to its absolute limits.

If Attic returns with mazes replacing Darkest Depths and Altonville, that has the potential to be a great line up. If they can find some spare change down the sofa for a scare zone or two, even better.
 
Max said:
For the time being they should just drop the 4th attraction and go back to 3 mazes. The 4th attraction has always been relatively poor, so they’re clearly stretching an already thin budget to its absolute limits.

If Attic returns with mazes replacing Darkest Depths and Altonville, that has the potential to be a great line up. If they can find some spare change down the sofa for a scare zone or two, even better.
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I think that 2019, the first year I went, has been the best in recent years, they had two new mazes with 3 returning mazes, 5 mazes total with Project 42 being the weak link. I think COVID kicked Scarefest in the knees as that has to do get rid to two mazes, and create a new one designed especially for social distancing, which impacted the overall experiance of the mazes.

I really do hope that after last years 'anniversary celebrations' that the planners have realised how much they need to improve.
 
Hazza said:
I think that 2019, the first year I went, has been the best in recent years, they had two new mazes with 3 returning mazes, 5 mazes total with Project 42 being the weak link.
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Really enjoyed 2019 as well, although in my head I wouldn’t include Darkest Depths as a main attraction due to it being a family maze (Although 2019 was by far its best year anyway!)
 
with Thorpe Park putting maze tickets on sale this week, thr announcement of prices, unlimited scare maze pass and also hr fact they have a nee maze this season, could we see announcements from Alton Towers soon? It’s usually august time we get some hint from the park. Also surprised the Hearst isn’t on towers street yet, sure that’s appeared earlier than this previously.
 
Hopefully it'll be sooner rather than later - I skipped last year after the lineup being super stale but did miss doing Towers in October. There's got to be something new - whichever maze has definitely ended up in the bin is the real question.

Think the last time there was an unlimited maze pass was 2013, maybe 2014?

Edit: looks like it was only ever a thing in 2013.
 
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mo237 said:
Hopefully it'll be sooner rather than later - I skipped last year after the lineup being super stale but did miss doing Towers in October. There's got to be something new - whichever maze has definitely ended up in the bin is the real question.

Think the last time there was an unlimited maze pass was 2013, maybe 2014?

Edit: looks like it was only ever a thing in 2013.
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It was there for two seasons, 2012 and 2013 I believe.
 
Yeah the Freedom Pass was 2012 and 2013, but in 2013 they applied a restriction so you could only use it once an hour I believe. Which I remember causing a bit of a riot amongst enthusiasts.
 
I had one both years, but mainly only used it once maybe twice a visit. It just worked out a lot cheaper than buying scare maze tickets if you planned to visit more than a couple of times during scarefest.

That of course was when we had really good mazes which changed every year. Now if towers offered a unlimited pass I wouldn’t be bothered.

The issue you got once a small minority of People just kept going round and round the mazes all night, just causing issues for the staff and regular guests
 
With this new bit of Nemesis marketing getting closer to Gloomy Wood, I think we may see some kind of Nemesis scare maze. We had one for Smiler and we had one for Wicker Man, so would make sense to have one for Nemesis.

There was rumour of a maze going behind the curse in the Alton Towers dump yard. So it would make sense to put a nemesis one there. With the entrance going in near the toilets (make the toilets one way in only near curse) and start the queue up towards where that ex gloomy wood shop is.

They could easily do it with a mixture of shipping containers and outside area behind there if they wanted.
 
I’d love to see a Nemesis scare zone as opposed to a scare maze, similar to what we had with Dark Apocalypse in 2016. Maybe ramp up Sub-Terra a little bit too with some more scare actors at the end? And if we see Nemesis testing during scarefest it would all tie in with the story
 
When do we think they are announcing the mazes because it feels late in the year to announce the mazes?
 
Hazza said:
When do we think they are announcing the mazes because it feels late in the year to announce the mazes?
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It fluctuates. Pre-Oktoberfest and the other events, the maze line-up was typically revealed any time between June-August. I remember one year we had the reveal literally within the first few weeks of June.

Nowadays, with all the other events they need to market, as well as summer, we typically see the reveal towards the end of August or start of September.

I expect it’s with the marketing team at the moment to determine when they release the info and in what way.
 
Danny said:
This year it'll be revealed in the form of interpretive TikTok-approved memes.
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Don't give them ideas Danny! 🤣

If they do indeed have a Nemesis maze this year I would assume that they will integrate its reveal into the current promotion campaign somehow.
 
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I notice that the Hearst on Towers Street hasn’t arrived yet. It usually appears in July, but I guess it has appeared later than now the past couple of years as well.

Looking back on previous posts it was out:
2015 - 21st August
2016 - 23rd July
2017 - 26th July
2018 - 25th July
2019 - 26th July
2020 - 27th sept (guessing was so late due to covid)
2021 - 12th August
2022 - 21st August
 
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Doubt it would happen due to space restrictions & cost, however an extended Nemesis SubTerra with full scaremaze tent section at the end of the current ride would be brilliant!

Extend the storyline while working in themes for relaunch next year.
 
We do a few scare attractions for halloween the best being xtreme scream at twin lakes and what makes them good are the roaming actors that feeling of immersion across the whole area not just the scare mazes.

Alton towers is perfect for this they already have pre determined areas that they can use. Obviously during the day it wouldnt work but they could come to life after 4pm when it goes dark actors around wickerman, gloomy wood forbidden valley really make it an event that attracts a wider audience
 
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