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Thorpe Park: General Discussion

They need to take a leaf out of some of the farm based scare parks for inspiration. What they have achieved on a much smaller budget absolutely leaks all over Fright Nights. My diagnosis is that Thorpe management watch too much TV and i prescribe a months of solitary confinement, in the middle of the woods, in an old wooden shack. There, they can brainstorm some new Fright Nights ideas. If there are no ideas, they can stay there for another month and so on, until something crops up.
 
No doubt those “enthusiast” staff will survive the shake up because someone will decide they know what guests want :rolleyes:
 
Some enthusiasts working at Thorpe Park got their mate to do all new audio (bit weird because thought they bought expensive IMAscore tracks only couple years back).
What? They've only had the IMAscore tracks 5 minutes! Haven't been back since the start of the season (where we got on 0 coasters on the first day, 2 on the second day) so until you mentioned this I was wondering "Why would IMAscore be telling people they are just wrong about the music and behaving like that?"
 
Some enthusiasts working at Thorpe Park got their mate to do all new audio (bit weird because thought they bought expensive IMAscore tracks only couple years back). This enthusiast guy then used it purely as a vehicle for his own status in 'the theme park community', same as when Alton Towers used him for Scarefest some years back.

Posted the audio on his channel and will tell absolutely anyone at every opportunity that he did it all, posing around the park like he's the new Fright Nights mascot. Also got his friends to make cameos in the radio station bit around Amity Cove with weird fanboy references.

It's just all very cliquey and weird. Whenever people have posted they thought the audio wasn't that good, he corrects them that they don't get it, or his mates go around angrily defending him online.

I swear this guy has been out only to get online attention for years, he always used to with his weird YouTube vlogs and podcasts (calling himself a broadcaster) where he used to post endlessly about how he Skyped John Wardley or visited his house. If you listen to the skype interview it's amusing how much he interrutps John to talk about himself or tell one of his 'hilarious' sarcastic jokes.

But I think it's an indication of a bigger issue. Also calling it "the UK's premier Halloween event" is a bit much, when it's mostly just recycled old props, lazy low budget mazes and teenagers jumping out at you.
@TakeYourMedicine worded it much better and more politely than I would have done.
Ah right. Thanks guys!
 
I hope saw reopens this year, in my experience it’s risky asking staff if it will reopen as when the chain snapped on swarm the best op on it who knows how much I like it said it’s done for the season, as much as I didn’t want to believe them I trusted them and look what happened.
 
Just wondering how common is it for a chain to just break? Especially on a B&M with one of their biggest track sections.
 
What? They've only had the IMAscore tracks 5 minutes! Haven't been back since the start of the season (where we got on 0 coasters on the first day, 2 on the second day) so until you mentioned this I was wondering "Why would IMAscore be telling people they are just wrong about the music and behaving like that?"
New Fright Nights audio, not park general audio
 
Just wondering how common is it for a chain to just break? Especially on a B&M with one of their biggest track sections.

I would think its about as common as other types of chains snapping, like bikes, motorcycles, chain saws, engine timing chains i.e. rarely, but does happen.

It's when you have three of four in close proximity to each other time or location-wise that you'd be questioning whether it was bad luck or poor maintaince or even just related to the location (cars located by the sea often suffer more under body corrosion than those not etc.).
 
I'm surprised if anyone can listen to a full loop of audio in Thorpe park, it's so quiet!

It's such a shame to lose the TV screens around the swarm as they kind of sell the idea of swarm, and without them the area was nearly silent. (Until the ride host needed an ops attention and then you'd hear "Faye ... Faye ... Nicky!" Really terrible audio wise.

Stealths audio was actually okay. Not sure where the bass was coming from but it grumbled. Quiet still other than the launch sequence, but the area at least had some atmosphere. The light shining up the track was nice.

The queue for Vulcan peak audio was okay if a little repetitive.

The voice in collosus station was ridiculous. Was generally getting laughs at whoever thought they could do that accent. And my god the rhymes, so weak. The collosus queue had no audio, which was pretty killer for the atmosphere.

The saw alive queue had no audio or it was super quiet from one speaker so you could hear some rustling if you were in that corner. Really didn't help the atmosphere (my run through the maze was short, dark and without scares, crap.)

The dome at the end was nice. The clown posse had been roving all day and made a great impression, some really great actors. The audio though was still very quiet, especially since in the dome at the end of the day, could've turned it up a notch or two.

Everywhere else outside was without audio and therefore lacking atompshere.

First time at fright nights and I got jumped scared once in living nightmare, otherwise it was very weak. I will never complain about Alton towers lighting again. Thorpe had floodlights in white, or disco lights flashing. Meh.

Edit : an example of how quiet it was could be that the little pocket speaker someone had brought along to help Thorpe get the atmosphere up was clearly audiable about 20 people ahead in the queue despite being about two inches wide and battery powered. This was in stealths queue, which was on the better end of the spectrum.

Apologies for the negativity, I actually had a good day, but as my first experience of frightnights I was dissapointed by the lack of quality.
 
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The voice in collosus station was ridiculous. Was generally getting laughs at whoever thought they could do that accent. And my god the rhymes, so weak. The collosus queue had no audio, which was pretty killer for the atmosphere.

Thorpe had floodlights in white, or disco lights flashing. Meh.

On Saturday the operator on Colossus was having to make announcements about the gates closing, either people not understanding what was being said or not hearing it.

That flashing floodlight on the bridge was a bit OTT
 
I find it utterly disgraceful that Fright Nights is as terrible as it is this year. From small things such as awful lighting choices parkwide to terrible rushed mazes, it amazes me to think this park has been running a Halloween event since the early 2000's. They have more experience in the scare industry than many other parks/events yet standards are at an all-time low.

To put it into context, Screamland at Dreamland Margate offers a far superior event, and has only been running since 2015 - how can a much smaller park put on a much better event than Thorpe, which have been in the scare business since 2004 (maybe even before)?
 
It seemed as though they were going for quantity rather than quality. There were many mazes plus scare zones (too many to do them all and still get night rides).

However they were all short and fairly unimaginative. The following is some opinions on the individual mazes so if you don't want spoilers, maybe skip.

Vulcan peak for example was more of a challenge following the rope (up and down, dissapears around corners) than it was scary. Plus not a single scare or actor the entire time I was hooded. I was expecting Molly crowe and what I got was a wander through an empty 'jungle'.

Blair witch was almost as quiet as the park, there was some great themed bits and the lighting was good. Generally just not very good and ended as fast as it started. Couple of actors got me though.

Actually quite enjoyed platform 15 though. The only thing I'd wishes for is some more effects in the tunnel, which was largely just dark and long with the occasional hanging shoelace, but it seemed to scare our group sufficiently as it was (at least I assume that was members of our group screaming wildly and not some speakers).
 
Some enthusiasts working at Thorpe Park got their mate to do all new audio (bit weird because thought they bought expensive IMAscore tracks only couple years back). This enthusiast guy then used it purely as a vehicle for his own status in 'the theme park community', same as when Alton Towers used him for Scarefest some years back.

Posted the audio on his channel and will tell absolutely anyone at every opportunity that he did it all, posing around the park like he's the new Fright Nights mascot. Also got his friends to make cameos in the radio station bit around Amity Cove with weird fanboy references.

It's just all very cliquey and weird. Whenever people have posted they thought the audio wasn't that good, he corrects them that they don't get it, or his mates go around angrily defending him online.

I swear this guy has been out only to get online attention for years, he always used to with his weird YouTube vlogs and podcasts (calling himself a broadcaster) where he used to post endlessly about how he Skyped John Wardley or visited his house. If you listen to the skype interview it's amusing how much he interrutps John to talk about himself or tell one of his 'hilarious' sarcastic jokes.

But I think it's an indication of a bigger issue. Also calling it "the UK's premier Halloween event" is a bit much, when it's mostly just recycled old props, lazy low budget mazes and teenagers jumping out at you.
I’m sure even some of the wanna twitter celebs even appeared on the merlin advertising email. I don’t know how anyone thought this could be a good idea
 
I’m sure even some of the wanna twitter celebs even appeared on the merlin advertising email. I don’t know how anyone thought this could be a good idea

The advertising promos did basically use the current Social Media person from both Thorpe and Chessie and some enthusiast YouTuber...
 
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