So is Halloween Horror Nights really one big conga line!?!?

[MainStreet408]

Ok, first of all I'm not trying to bash HHN at all. I actually have never been before :hammer: However, I'm planning a trip for next October to WDW and will definitely include a night of HHN. I have been researching it and I've seen quite a few people complaining about being in one giant conga line through all the houses. Now every weekend in October, my friends and I always go to a haunted house up here in NC. Now I'm sure that these houses do not get nearly the volume that the HHN houses get. One of the creepiest aspects of these houses though is how you are in groups of 5 - 10 and there is nobody else around. Walking into a dark room with 5 actors popping out of nowhere with chainsaws revving, it's great!! Now if you are in one big conga line stopping and going throughout the house, how do the scareactors jump out at you? Once again I am not trying to bash HHN, I am just curious as to how these houses can be as terrifying as everyone says they are. No matter what, I am still going to HHN next year and I am sure that I will have an excellent time. Thanks for the replies! Happy Halloween!!

 

[napnet]

I went on a Wed night last year and it wasnt that bad. Make sure you go on a weekday otherwise the crowds are just insane. The haunted houses are fun and very good. They freaked out my wife.

 

[PencilTest]

Definitely try going on an off-peak night (Thursdays and Sundays). There're usually less people. Unfortunately, conga-lining does tend to happen frequently. I think the ride-and-show people attempt to break it up a little bit, but I know they're trying to get as many people through the houses as they can to avoid hideous wait times.

They probably frown on this, but you can try to hang back a little bit through each room, just enough to give you some distance between yourself and the group in front of you. Plus, it'll allow the scareactors to reset for a second. But you didn't hear that from me.

 

[notnothin]

Definitely try going on an off-peak night (Thursdays and Sundays). There're usually less people. Unfortunately, conga-lining does tend to happen frequently. I think the ride-and-show people attempt to break it up a little bit, but I know they're trying to get as many people through the houses as they can to avoid hideous wait times.

They probably frown on this, but you can try to hang back a little bit through each room, just enough to give you some distance between yourself and the group in front of you. Plus, it'll allow the scareactors to reset for a second. But you didn't hear that from me.

Yeah, I'd have to say this was my biggest complaint during the event last year. Every house was teeming with people waiting to get in (thank God for the express pass). Once in, it was next to impossible to be 'scared', as you would always see the scareactors jumping out at the people just in front of you. When this happened, the effect was totally lost, and it happened more often than not. The number of people even on an off-peak night was unbelievable, but I guess that's just how it goes for this event.

 

[JROK]

One of HHN's biggest problems is it's popularity... people want the lines to be pulsed, which they were until about HHN 8, but with the pulsing comes longer wait times... and then people complain about the long wait times, so in order to reduce them, they don't pulse...

As mentioned above, you can self-pulse... it's effective and nobody will get mad at you... it'll help to make the event better for you as well... in Terror Mines this year they are actually pulsing... but still this does not stop the conga line problems... people walk at different paces... people will freeze before entering a scene and that causes the line behind them to catch up, or they may run through a scene and they'll catch up with the group ahead of them...

Unfortunately because the event sees around 400,000+ guests in about 3 weeks, the lines will be long, and unpulsed houses... As everyone has said, the best time to go would be about the 3rd or 4th week of the event on a Thursday or Sunday... or get Express Passes...

 

[GaryT977]

Yeah, I'd have to say this was my biggest complaint during the event last year. Every house was teeming with people waiting to get in (thank God for the express pass). Once in, it was next to impossible to be 'scared', as you would always see the scareactors jumping out at the people just in front of you. When this happened, the effect was totally lost, and it happened more often than not. The number of people even on an off-peak night was unbelievable, but I guess that's just how it goes for this event.

I got comped in last year by a friend of mine, and we also got express passes for the houses, most of which had wait times of 90 minutes or more. Normally, I am one of those people that is easily startled by people coming up behind me and poking me, stuff like that. The houses at HHN were basically single file lines with people in various guises jumping out at you from poorly hidden locations.

The friend that got me in got taken by surprise several times and seemed to really enjoy himself. I was not even close to startled the entire night. In fact, the highlight for me was when one of the characters in one of the houses said 'look, it's Eminem!' (I was blond at the time). Maybe the problem for me was that everyone I talked to had built it up into this insanely great thing, and it just wasn't.

I guess it's worth trying once, as they do put alot of effort into it. Personally, I won't be attending again until and unless they make some drastic changes.