Scarefest: 16-31 October 2010 [NO SPOILERS]

General discussion regarding the UK's No.1 Theme Park. Talk about anything and everything Alton Towers here.
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oldgitBEN

What do we want for next years scarefest?

After hearing that the Fo1kS is probably not returning next year due to the poor state of the soil the hotels are in need of a replacement... rumour has it a circus/clown concept is in development.
So the hotels are in need of a new attraction.

Heres a few (as ususal midless) thoughts of mine:

The Park
If they manage to pull of another year with only 1 maze in the park I'll be gobsmacked why not put the Boiler House Marquee on park and have that as an already well established 2nd maze on park. Its good with the queues due to its short length and a worthy candidate to take on the park.
As for the positioning I initally thought about the front lawns but the queues would be unbarable so I have two potenital locations: under nemesis or in the black hole tent (in which case a marquee wouldnt even be needed.
Apparently this year a BH maze was considered but the entrance bridge was unstable, in which case why not use the entrance round the back of the basketball game?

ToTT I loved the layout this year and the lenght just the lack of story line, rubbish into video and lack of actors at the start let it down but it would be quite easy to ammend these and how about re-using the 'oven' scene to help with batching and making the queue abit quicker.

Duel: Live do not change a thing it was perfect this year

Hex: Live must become a permenant attraction, how do Alton miss this?

Murderers Mayhem to become a temporary replacement for Marauder's Mayhem like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GV-PB9o3hI
It just needs a strobe light and some cloth to cover the outside walls

Haunted Hollow: Live surley this is the 'family' answer to scare mazes, close off the Gloomy Wood side and have groups guided through the Hollow meeting the deceased ghosts and ghouls burried here. Ideal as it would leave the families at Duel: Live.

Park Theming
While the scarecrows dotted about this year were quite nice we need to see more and not all just crammed in on Towers Street, get some fog machines in FV and actors just wandering around entertaining - the Wraiths must be coming back for the new area too.


The 'Resort'

ATH - Room 13
Ok so I understand why the hotels dont have mazes any more due to the family market and when Room13 existed it was very busy and full of adults so lets re-live room 13 but hold it in the conference centre!

New Maze - the Big Top
an actual circus tent on the current Field site, with creepy circus music played around inside would be all the old 'entertainers' of the mythical circus who's acts went one step too far and killed them. And of course it leads itself to scary clowns and an evil ring master as the main charachters.

The School of a 1000 screams
To go where Boiler House has been, because we love our zombies and would miss Field too much. Join Sammie as she returns to Altonville school but the teachers have already been infected - you've been naughty... to the headmasters office.

Murderitas Party
From 9pm Ma Garitas takes on a whole new look and feel, bathed with red lights, a DJ - hence some decent music, most parks manage to have a special halloween bar and/or nightclub and I want one *stamps feet* now.

--

Any ideas or rumours from you guys?
Moley

Personally I'd like a HHN style build-up to the event. Make a website, create a central character and/or storyline and let it develop online for 2 months or so before the event kicks off in the park. This will give all the mazes and other attractions a back story to make them and the event even more immersive IMO.
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Gloomy Dude
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Circus/clown themed maze? That would certainly flush out the boys from the men :P I can't fault any of those suggestions Ben. I think 5 mazes asking a bit much though. And from the sounds of it, Hex:Live was phenomenal. Also, I especially love the Marauder's Mayhem idea and something slightly more adult in the evening like you've suggested with Ma's wouldn't go amiss.

I'm hoping to make next Scarefest my first, so I have nothing to compare to at the moment.
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Why not have a Scare Maze on the path of Haunted Hollow - There is enough space. A mixture of in door and out door sections would be a good mix for an awesome scare attraction!
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onair
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I thought this years was good and great to see so many characters out on park. Some nice ideas there.

The main things that is needed in 2010 is some kind of show on park like Fright Lights.

Also I still feel on park lighting could be improved. In 2009 i think Chessington had the best Halloween lighting, it really looked impressive in places. The front of Towers could be lit with spooky projections and colour ( not with fanta or twilight ads :wink: )

Btw great job on the lights in the Alton Hotel this year looked great.

I also really miss the old ice shows. Was nice to sit down in there after a long day on park.

Really hope they come up with something great for the new area in 2010.
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Nemesis LIVE?
actors in the queuline and all that stuff?
:lol:
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If they are not going to fill the black hole tent then a maze in there would be awesome... Isn't the tent massive inside?

Duel: Live! was amazing! They really should add a really scary maze like se7n at TP to really scare the hell out of thrill seekers. The air tunnel is plain so i think during scarefest 2010 they should add lights, fog and projectors saying: YOU PLAN TO FLY... BUT YOU WILL DIE! MUWHAHAHAHAHAHA! Any thoughts on the tunnels (Oblivion or air)
The terror of the towers que scared me alone! Does anyone know it's throughput? (I'm guessing it's really poor)

Advertising needs to be more thorough contemplating 1 attraction every year. A decent storyline needs to be added to Duel: Live! Like: The ghouls and zombies have been released; do you dare challenge them?

MY THOUGHTS ENTIRELY! :lol:
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Some of your ideas sound quite impressive ben, especially with the mazes.

I'd like to see another maze on park, only needs to be a short, but effective maze. Something to help spread the queues out, rather than the masses queueing for just one maze.

More halloween theming around the park. Whilst Towers Street was very impressive, once you had left there you wouldn't of known there was a scarefest event on such was the lack of theming elsewhere around the park.

Would like to see Duel live again next year, with a similar amount of actors than this year. But just raise the scare factor a bit. I know Duel live is more aimed at families, but surely kids these days aren't that wrapped up in cotton wool that a couple of loud boo's or bangs isn't going to traumatise them for life?

Ramp up the fear factor after 6 or 7pm. Alton Towers seem to be to scared to scare people this year and last. Again we come down to oh, it's for families. But people young and old love to be scared, even if it does give them nightmares. :shock: get a few extra scares in for the last couple of hours, ramp up the tension in the park maze(s).
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I would love to see another maze on park. I really wanted to go to TBH and Fo1kS but we were so tired by the end of the day and the extra cost put some of the group off so we gave it a miss. Two mazes on park would be great and I agree that some of the ideas you guys are coming up with are great.

The theming this year was great but most of it was based around pumpkins. It would be nice to have certain areas with different types of scary theming.
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Looking at the photos, I think Alton should look at putting coloured filters on the flood lights around the big rides. The thing Thorpe do right is light up the rides green etc, this makes the rides look more intimidating.

With Alton, it just looked like it was lit up by car park lighting. If these lights had a mix of green and red filters on them it would create an amazing atmosphere around the rides. What would be amazing but wont happen is for fog machines placed around the areas to make it seem more mysterious. (I almost went for a play on words then but decided not to as it was cack!)
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[quote=""oldgitBEN""]Apparently this year a BH maze was considered but the entrance bridge was unstable, in which case why not use the entrance round the back of the basketball game?
[/quote]

Oh no! When was this discovered?
SAM93

I absoloutely love that idea for mardauders mayhem! If they did that it could be really good!

Wonder if it would be possible to get actors on the platforms while it was moving around to scare people? Possibly a bit dangerous but still would be good!
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I would like to see that happen to Mardauders Mayhem, without the music they used on that one. I would like to see them incorporate the lighting effects with a sinister pirate theme music. There could a small back story about Pirates spirits coming back from Davy Jones Locker.
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[quote=""oldgitBEN""]
Why not put the Boiler House Marquee on park and have that as an already well established 2nd maze on park. Its good with the queues due to its short length and a worthy candidate to take on the park.[/quote]


Yep, a great idea - in addition to your ideas for location I can't see why it couldn't be placed in Haunted Hollow perhaps... or maybe a 'family' version of it if needs must.

[quote=""oldgitBEN""]
Apparently this year a BH maze was considered but the entrance bridge was unstable, in which case why not use the entrance round the back of the basketball game?[/quote]


Can't see why a company with as vast resources as Merlin couldn't sort this little problem out by next Halloween. They'll have to anyway if they want to use BH tent in future. Would maybe be a good venue for a paid maze to replace F1000S? Or a free maze if Haunted Hollow was used for a paid maze.

[quote=""oldgitBEN""]
ToTT how about re-using the 'oven' scene to help with batching and making the queue abit quicker.[/quote]


Yep definitely a good idea. Mid-point batching was badly needed this year. I'd guess the throughput must have been only 200 per hour or so (group of 10 every 3 minutes), which I can't see much possibility for improving on.

[quote=""oldgitBEN""]
Duel: Live do not change a thing it was perfect this year
Hex: Live must become a permenant attraction, how do Alton miss this?
Murderers Mayhem to become a temporary replacement for Marauder's Mayhem
Park Theming
While the scarecrows dotted about this year were quite nice we need to see more and not all just crammed in on Towers Street, get some fog machines in FV and actors just wandering around entertaining - the Wraiths must be coming back for the new area too.[/quote]


All the above ideas I think would be great - also as someone else mentioned, use colour gels in the temp lights around the park.

[quote=""oldgitBEN""]
Murderitas Party
From 9pm Ma Garitas takes on a whole new look and feel, bathed with red lights, a DJ - hence some decent music, most parks manage to have a special halloween bar and/or nightclub and I want one *stamps feet* now.
[/quote]


Excellent!
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Luke

[quote=""nickn5""][quote=""oldgitBEN""]
Why not put the Boiler House Marquee on park and have that as an already well established 2nd maze on park. Its good with the queues due to its short length and a worthy candidate to take on the park.[/quote]


Yep, a great idea - in addition to your ideas for location I can't see why it couldn't be placed in Haunted Hollow perhaps... or maybe a 'family' version of it if needs must.[/quote]

I've always thought that would be the easiest way to have a second maze on park. The structure is designed to be moved around, the only question would be location. I guess the front lawn could work as someone else suggested, but I've always thought the area next to Rita's Grill - behind where the Trick or Treat Doors were placed, would be a suitable location. I can't think of anywhere else with enough room tbh, except perhaps towards the back of Ug Land, either where Bone Shaker or Ug Swinger used to be.

[quote=""nickn5""][quote=""oldgitBEN""]
ToTT how about re-using the 'oven' scene to help with batching and making the queue abit quicker.[/quote]


Yep definitely a good idea. Mid-point batching was badly needed this year. I'd guess the throughput must have been only 200 per hour or so (group of 10 every 3 minutes), which I can't see much possibility for improving on.[/quote]

They were actually batching groups of 10 every 70-80 seconds this year, it's clearly something they've looked at since 07/08, and they managed it perfectly throughout the whole event. Groups were cacthing up with each other though as you say which was a problem - the Oven is too near to the end to really work properly (presuming they use the same direction), ideally they'd have something halfway through - I've always thought the revolving bookcase was a brilliant idea (they used it in 2003 after the Banquet scene - roughly halfway) to separte any groups that had caught up, in time for the maze and cage scenes.

Personally, I’d like to see them prioritise the current 3 mazes, before looking into a fourth maze. Don’t get me wrong, I’d be thrilled if they do announce a fourth maze for 2010, but I just think they need to get the consistency right with their current mazes. If they do decide to have a fourth, a return of Room 13 might be a good idea, with the BH moving on park perhaps?

I’d like to see more actors in all 3 of them, a couple of scripts in TOTT with improvisation - it missed the laughs this year, and the return of Esmerelda and the old Master to TOTT! Fright Lights would be nice too, but I wouldn’t want them to ever prioritise quantity of Halloween attractions over the quality. For me, TOTT should always be the priority (like it was this year - and look how well it’s been received!)

Ah this topic has gotten me all excited, but also sad because I realise it’s so long away!
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I thought Scarefest this year was brilliant and TOTT was nothing short of a word class scare attraction, at night the que-line and atmospere were just amazing and i can't wait to go again next year.

One thing that was a little disappointing was the lack of actors around the park, the only actors i saw at night were the wraiths in ug land which has been a normal feature of recent anyways. I think this needs to be looked at for next year, having several actors around the park at night, 1-2 in each area would just top off Scarefest for me.

I also think Alton should look into opening later or possibly doing a night opening maybe on Halloween itself. Because it's a busy period it can take a long time to get on all the rides and attractions in the park itself and i didn't even get time to try the paid mazes which did disappoint me and i just wish the park had been open that little bit longer.
SAM93

well Scarefest this year was in my opinion very good, the mazes were top class and there was a great atmosphere! However there are definitely areas wich could be improved, so here is what I would like to see from Scarefest 2010!

*On Park:

- This year TOTT was amazing and definitely needs to remain the mean focus of the event, keeping it up to the standards it has reached as what was an amazing scare maze! The queue line had an amazing atmosphere and the maze had some truly terrifying scenes. I know some people have mentioned that there was no scripted sections to it and that it lacked story line. I will say that I partially agree on the story line part... but I really don't think that this maze needs the scripted sections and is fine with its current structure! So for next year Towers just need to keep it mainly the same, just working on the balance of scares and story line to make it flow with some form of story. But a definite congratulations on this years maze... truly amazing!

-I think that for the park could really do with another maze, as I think that only one maze included in entry price is a bit poor. Even if this year it is only a small maze just to fill the gap until the park has funds to bring in a bigger better maze on park. For this, keeping it on the small scale they could just do a smaller less scary rated maze in the conservatories in the Gardens. There is plenty of space for a decent maze to be put in there, could even be something similar to the scenes in the Biosphere in the Doctor Who episode Waters of Mars, could be okay.

-Duel Live to make a return, this year it was a good attraction for families with a couple of decent scares for younger children. Was done really well with the introduction section with the butler and the hooded figure at the end and general good acting within the ride itself. My only problem with this one though was the fact you could always see when the next actor was coming as you saw them jump out on the car infront. My simple resolution for this is to leave one car empty between each filled car, then fill the cars with 4's rather than 2's to keep the capacity around the same.

-Hex Live, sounds like it was a great addition to the Scarefest Line up, so with a bit of fine tweaking it is a must to return to the event next season.

-Haunted Hollow Live, it was great for the family so I really think it should make a return for next year.

-As previously mentioned by Ben, I think the Idea to transform Marauder's Mayhem into Murderer's Mayhem is a great idea and could be done at a relatively low cost.

-Trick or Treat Door's, always fun for the family.

-More general park theming, been said for the past two years now. Towers just need to place a bit more of the Towers Street style theming around the rest of the park... Plies of Hay-Bails and pumpkins etc. As well as more spooky lighting at night, to try and distract from the bright flood lights.

-Dark Forest Live, obviously with the addition of the new area and ride next year I think this could go down well, turn the area into a kind of scare zone with live actors wondering the pathways such as the Wraith and other creatures! Possibly upping the ante after about 8pm giving some real scares possibly like at Terenzi Horror Nights.

-Later opening on the weekends of the event and the main Half-Term Holiday week, till possibly around 10pm. However I am not sure if there are restrictions in place about late nights like this?

*At the Resort:

-Still keeping two mazes at the resort, The Boiler house and a return of Room 13 as it has been mentioned that the soil at the hotels is in a bad condition after 3 years of corn growing. Keep the Boiler house as it was this year, possibly with a couple of changes, but people have generally said it was an awesome maze this season.

-A show of some sort such as the old Dance with the Devil show.

-The Trick or Treat rooms to return for the family market, as well as a couple of more scare orientated Scare Rooms like back in 2007.



Into the Future of the Event:

-Another on Park maze, possibly in the Black Hole tent themed to some form of future life sustaining experiment gone wrong, zombies etc.

-Return of the Field to the Resort Line up.

-More on park actors.

-Another on Park Scare-Zone Like at Terenzi! Possibly in Forbidden Valley playing on the theme of Nemesis, with scenes and actors like the ones seen in the old Nemesis X promotions. This area could become one of the Main features of the event with Forbidden Valley remaining open late after the rest of the park like the Resort Mazes till 11pm with Nemesis, Air and Ripsaw staying open. An extension of this idea could be to open the gates at the bottom of FV by Air's first drop and extend the Zone out onto the Air Car Park, to create a proper Terenzi Horror Nights Scare-Zone :D .


Perhaps not entirely realistic, but I believe that the plan for next years event is achievable! I just wish that my thoughts for the future of the event beyond 2010 could become reality one day... It would be an amazing event!
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Two things I look forward to each year are Rally GB and Scarefest. Sadly they are close together so it's a painful year of wait! They'll have a damn fine job of beating TOTT next year!
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Out of interest, had anyone come across the dates planned for scarefest 2010?

According to the staffordshire moorlands site it will run from Sat 16 - Sun 31 Oct 2010
Can only assume Adrenaline Week is planned to return again.

It also lists several other events planned for this closed season starting January.
All of which take place on saturdays.
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considering the theme, SW6 Live would be nice, like what Thorpe Park did with Saw: The Ride this year.
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