Nights of Terror was...weird. Very small amounts of scareactors (the rated-R house had a total of two), and some decent sets. One house was built in an existing restaurant that had been closed, and it was pretty good. One was set in an all-girls school that had burned down, which started out cool but ended kind of strangely. The rated-R house was set in a series of crime scenes evocative of
Se7en, which, again, had cool sets and some neat dummies, but only two actors. And honestly, the only thing that made it any more adult than an HHN or HOS house was that the actors could cuss up a storm an' get away with it. Oh, and a few naked dead people. The fourth one, which ended up being my favorite, was a walking tour inside the Titanic exhibit, but all the tales the tour guides told were ghost stories.
Really, it felt more like being led through a tour of sets rather than going through a haunted house, if that makes any sense. Due to the lack of scareactors, I was kind of left with just appreciating the scenic design, which was cool at some times and confusing at others.
Overall, though, it was pretty much what I expected. Interestingly, the
Orlando Weekly (our local weekly alternative newspaper) reviewed both HHN and Nights Of Terror here:
http://www.orlandoweekly.com/artsculture/story.asp?id=11066
...which isn't an altogether bad review, with the exception of some blatently wrong facts and some peculiar opinions. But I think the fact that they refer to Nights Of Terror as "keeping Universal honest" is a little generous, because there's really no comparison between the two. It's kind of like comparing a county fair to the Magic Kingdom - two entirely different playing fields.
