Does Universal have the best Halloween Horror compared to anywhere else?

[71jason]

Strange, we went on September 27th and the express pass folks were whizzing through the lines. Matter of fact, the longest we waited was probably 30 minutes. We never had anyone yelling at us or rushing us.

Crowds get worse the further into October you get. Which results in longer lines, and ops people trying to hurry you through the house. (Again, some are better than others--no complaints about the soundstage houses this year, but Havoc and lately La Llorona have had horrible ops.)

 

[HTF]

Strange, we went on September 27th and the express pass folks were whizzing through the lines. Matter of fact, the longest we waited was probably 30 minutes. We never had anyone yelling at us or rushing us.

Things can be a little exaggerated around this section of the forum lol. I mean for someone to say they were not impressed by HHN but they were blown away with BGW almost made my head explode. Not trying to take anything away from BGW but it's not even close in terms of theming, entertainment, show quality, and execution. The budget for AWIL alone was more than BGW's entire event.

On top of that the chief complaint about HHN is price, crowds, and the flashlight brigade in the houses. Can't really do anything about price and crowds unless your smart enough to buy in advance on line and plan out your visit by taking advice from numerous sites about accomplishing HHN completely by 9pm. I guess it's ok to drop 100 bucks for admission to the MK and 500 bones a night for a Best Western or excuse me Disney Resort but at Universal, highway robbery...

Then you have the flashlight brigade. The event is a victim of its own success, is that an excuse heck no. It sucks and the best thing you can do and I do it EVERY night I go is take the damn survey. I've gone 8 times this year and at the end I will finish with a written complaint about the flashlight brigade to Corporate. It's gotten much better this year with the exception of two houses. It's never gonna go away but the process can be smoother and less intrusive. I guess once other parks are handling 35-42k guests each night we can see how they handle it and learn from them.

Finally to answer this question yes it's the best overall event but Orlando just isn't the scariest. The Hollywood HHN is much scarier as is Knotts Scary Farm and BGT HOS IMO, but in terms of the overall event, nothing comes close to HHN in a theme park setting.

 

[tissandtully]

Things can be a little exaggerated around this section of the forum lol. I mean for someone to say they were not impressed by HHN but they were blown away with BGW almost made my head explode. Not trying to take anything away from BGW but it's not even close in terms of theming, entertainment, show quality, and execution. The budget for AWIL alone was more than BGW's entire event.

On top of that the chief complaint about HHN is price, crowds, and the flashlight brigade in the houses. Can't really do anything about price and crowds unless your smart enough to buy in advance on line and plan out your visit by taking advice from numerous sites about accomplishing HHN completely by 9pm. I guess it's ok to drop 100 bucks for admission to the MK and 500 bones a night for a Best Western or excuse me Disney Resort but at Universal, highway robbery...

Then you have the flashlight brigade. The event is a victim of its own success, is that an excuse heck no. It sucks and the best thing you can do and I do it EVERY night I go is take the damn survey. I've gone 8 times this year and at the end I will finish with a written complaint about the flashlight brigade to Corporate. It's gotten much better this year with the exception of two houses. It's never gonna go away but the process can be smoother and less intrusive. I guess once other parks are handling 35-42k guests each night we can see how they handle it and learn from them.

Finally to answer this question yes it's the best overall event but Orlando just isn't the scariest. The Hollywood HHN is much scarier as is Knotts Scary Farm and BGT HOS IMO, but in terms of the overall event, nothing comes close to HHN in a theme park setting.

I didn't really have a problem with flashlight brigade the night I went. That would have annoyed the **** out of me and totally would have complained. How is AWIL puppet faring? Seems like it gets really close to guests and could cause issues.

 

[BryceM]

Does anyone know if Universal plans to bring scare zones back to HHN?

 

[71jason]

Does anyone know if Universal plans to bring scare zones back to HHN?

They are back this year. All based on The Walking Dead, which I found kind of boring, but otherwise the same as any other scare zone in the past decade.

 

[HTF]

I didn't really have a problem with flashlight brigade the night I went. That would have annoyed the **** out of me and totally would have complained. How is AWIL puppet faring? Seems like it gets really close to guests and could cause issues.

The puppets are holding up pretty well considering the heavy use and abuse lol. They're going into storage and not being destroyed contrary to what someone said on another HHN site.

 

[HTF]

They are back this year. All based on The Walking Dead, which I found kind of boring, but otherwise the same as any other scare zone in the past decade.

Next year will be different... Location location location...

 

[JT3000]

We did Halloween Horror Nights in early September. Spent nearly $350 on two passes and two express passes. The express passes didn't work. We still waited at least 45 minutes per house.

Two things - 1) The event doesn't even run in early September, and 2) There's no conceivable way you waited in every house's Express queue for 45 minutes. The worst house for Express is usually in the parade building, and even IT rarely gets that bad. Usually 20 minutes tops. The only other consistently problematic queue this year has been Evil Dead. Most other houses are nearly a walk-on with Express, especially early in the event.

Next year will be different... Location location location...

What location would that be?

 

[tissandtully]

Next year will be different... Location location location...

Diagon Alley Zombies? Are they even gonna be allowed to do anything there?

 

[71jason]

Next year will be different... Location location location...

In fairness, if they had consolidated all the zombies from the barn to ET, keeping the existing set pieces--it would probably be the greatest scare-zone of all time. I just wanted something--anything--else by NY and SF and the entrance. Throw me a vampire or a twisted fairy tale character or an angry, molesting tree. Anything but zombies.

 

[BuddyThomas]

Two things - 1) The event doesn't even run in early September, and 2) There's no conceivable way you waited in every house's Express queue for 45 minutes. The worst house for Express is usually in the parade building, and even IT rarely gets that bad. Usually 20 minutes tops. The only other consistently problematic queue this year has been Evil Dead. Most other houses are nearly a walk-on with Express, especially early in the event..


What location would that be?

EXCUSE you for basically calling me a liar, but I don't recall you being there by my side when we went, so how do you know what my experience was??? We went on opening night. It was either the 17th or 18th, I think, which admittedly is not the technical "beginning" of September, but this was the last night of our trip that began earlier in September, so whatever.

And we DID wait endlessly in the express lines. And once in, we were zoomed through as if the buildings were on fire and about to collapse.

So yes, it was a mob scene, and no, I am not a liar about the waits.

 

[JT3000]

EXCUSE you for basically calling me a liar, but I don't recall you being there by my side when we went, so how do you know what my experience was??

I don't need to be there with you, I'm already there with someone else on any given night. I have more than enough experience to know when you're wrong, so no excuse needed.

We went on opening night. It was either the 17th or 18th, I think, which admittedly is not the technical "beginning" of September, but this was the last night of our trip that began earlier in September, so whatever.
And we DID wait endlessly in the express lines. And once in, we were zoomed through as if the buildings were on fire and about to collapse.

The event began on the 20th. So, by your own account, your trip ended before the event even began. Need I say more?

 

[BuddyThomas]

I don't need to be there with you, I'm already there with someone else on any given night. I have more than enough experience to know when you're wrong, so no excuse needed.



The event began on the 20th. So, by your own account, your trip ended before the event even began. Need I say more?

Yeah you need to say more, like "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to sound like a condescending jerk." I told you I didn't remember the exact date. You can ask anyone who was there on the opening night. It was a total mob scene. Some people. Sheesh.

 

[71jason]

You can ask anyone who was there on the opening night. It was a total mob scene. Some people. Sheesh.

I was there opening two nights. Decent crowd, as HHN always draws these days, but hardly a "mob scene." Also had express, pretty much walked into every house.