Slasher Review
Scarefest returns for another season at the Alton Towers Resort, with returning mazes being Altonville Mine Tours: Tinys Revenge, The Attic: Terror of the Towers and Haribo Trick or Treat Town. A refreshed and upgraded Daz Games attraction now with the addition of Panic Reloaded. And new attractions for 2024 COMPOUND themed to Nemesis Reborn and the Phalanx and Amigos in the Afterlife based on the Mexican Dia de los Muertos festival. Also returning is the free Wicker Man-themed scare zone Burial Grounds. Scarefest also has shows on the main stage and the Alton Ancestors show, but due to time constraints, we sadly missed those. Strangely the strongest attraction for us on the day was Burial Grounds with some great close-up interaction and impactful near misses with weaponry. The weakest attraction was sadly The Attic which seemed to lack cast and scare atmosphere aside from the general aesthetics.
Top Tips-Pay the extra £10 for the Spooks and Frights package, we believe that having 2 hours to complete 4 mazes would have been quite the rush especially with the mazes being spaced apart.
Things that Bite-We felt during our run that alot of the mazes were short on cast members which sadly killed the scares and atmosphere.
Value for money-Unfortunately with a good conscience I don't think I can say its value for money, we paid £50 for the Spooks and Frights, yes we had MAP but if you didn't have it is another £69ish on the gate and maybe £30 online which makes Scarefest quite an expensive day out.
Stalker Review
On the 21st of October, we headed to Alton Towers Resort for Scarefest 2024, The main draw was the new for 2024 COMPOUND and to try Daz Games: Panic Reloaded which we hadn't experienced last year due to running out of time. We had good weather and low winds which was good for the coasters and we started the trip with a high amount of excitement for what was to come. We booked the Spooks and Frights package at £50 a pop which felt steep but we didn't want to be in a rush with the 2-hour time window for the mazes. There was the usual bunting, straw bales and themed-up frogs on Towers Street, but in comparison to other Merlin attractions, the ambience felt a little flat. Although the work on the hearse was greatly appreciated.
We started at the back of the park with Nemesis Reborn which was running 1 train ops, So not a great start to the day but we were still optimistic, Nemesis Reborn was a little rattly but nothing as bad as what some make it out to be, it was still enjoyable and the theming of the station is still something to be in awe at. After a trip over to Curse at Alton Manor it was time to head to our first scare attraction of the day.
The NEW for 2024 Phalanx Maze "COMPOUND" housed in a similar building to Thorpe Park's Survival Games. We arrived pretty close to the maze opening so the queue line was almost dead. But we did like the effort of the theming on the entrance to the queue line. We arrived to the the first of a few Phalanx operatives, some were more aggressive than others which added a nice contrast before even entering the attraction. We arrived at batching and our group was made up of Myself, Dane, Abby and 4 others from another group. A smallish group seemed promising for what lay ahead.
We entered the maze and were immediately taken by the level of theming inside the very first room, seriously impressive design but before long we were ushered into segregation chambers and the story was narrated by the female featured in the promotional videos and we were told that we were suspected to be part of "Seek the Truth" the counter organisation of The Phalanx. With the story complete we were sent into the attraction alone, the vibe was Project 42 meets SubSpecies which is not a bad mix at all. This is where things went downhill for me sadly, I was expecting a physically impactful attraction like what SubSpecies was but the physical interaction was basic at most. The best part of the attraction for me was when I was with Abby and we entered a cage strobe section, being shouted at for being part of Seek the Truth and then I showed my Phalanx tattoo which urged the cast member to rush me through the gate shouting "He's one of us, LET HIM THROUGH!" leaving Abby behind. I do feel however this moment might have been my downfall as not long after a scene with a familiar alien suit I found the exit and was out of COMPOUND feeling a little short-changed, this was further bolstered by the fact that Dane and Abby exited a full 3 minutes after me, Now this is the issue with the free flow maze, if your guest gets out too fast they feel cheated, Had we had more time we might have headed back in for another go, Don't get me wrong what I saw of the maze was beautiful and the cast were some of the strongest I've seen at Towers, I just wish I had seen more of it rather than being in the attraction a total of 4 minutes.
Feeling slightly deflated we headed to our second attraction Amigos in the Afterlife. I'll be honest I'm not usually a fan of the family attractions and we usually miss them out but it was on our ticket so we thought why not? Amigos takes over the old Dungeons building and features a beautifully bright facade to welcome in the younger visitors. The attraction was a very story-led experience with tasks set for you to proceed to the next room and some great use of blacklight and UV Paint to bring the Mexican theme to life or death as it may be. Each of the characters was fully realised and the scripts were delivered well and keeping in the tone of the attraction, the main highlight was the reuse of the Plague Doctor scene featuring the Tequila Worm whose name slips my mind, but the one main effect from the original scene was used to create a great family fright which Abby didn't know was coming, so that was fun and hats off to the double act of the room with the best line of the day "If your parents don't join in they don't love you" this still makes me giggle now, It was a shame not to see the boat ride used but I can imagine there were reasons behind that choice being made, Amigos features some traditional style scare maze corridors that give the younger guests a chance to see what the scare mazes are about, We do have to mention the one scene that was a little crass and disjointed was the "wrestling scene" the acting wasn't great on our run and the whole scene felt a little uncomfortable. But other than that Amigos is a great starter maze for the families and fits the brief it was designed to fill.
While myself and Dane took a break Abby headed into the Haribo Trick O'Treat Town, this was her thoughts on the attraction.
The premise of the attraction was that you walked through a Halloween town with different doors that you knocked on in a variety of different ways, The cast behind the doors were the residents of the town and featured a police officer, the mayor, a farmer, a cat, a gravedigger and a witch. They either gave you a trick or a treat, The tricks were things like a spray of water or a blast of air and the treats were its sponsor namesake Haribo's, They were generous with the sweets and I came out with about at least 20 bags of sweets, The sets which comprised of the houses were made of Haribo sweets, so Haribo fried egg roofs and gummy worms in the dust bins. I believe this is a great addition to the Scarefest lineup providing a fun and interactive walkthrough for the younger guests.
We then decided it was time for more frights after the spooks and headed into the gothic Towers for The Attic:Terror of the Towers, The queue line was relatively short but we still ended up at the back of a group of about 14, like many time before we missed out a bulk of the story as the narrative cast member started before the entire group was in, luckily we knew the theme of the attraction but those new to The Attic it might have meant missing something important later on. With this scene complete we headed up the many flights of stairs into The Attic itself, now we try and be as positive as we can and mention the things that uplift an attraction but sadly this time round we could find no saving grace other than the beautiful set design. The cast members I assume due to training were all saying the same lines and none of those lines were memorable for the right reasons, the main ones we heard were "We are in the Attic" and at some times just "ATTIC" being screamed in our ears, add to this the overused "Come play with us" and that pretty much summed up 80% of the attraction, we will give kudos to the few who tried to use their spaces wisely but this year it very much felt like scare and reset where sustained theatrical moments would have worked better. Also, a lot of the minimal scares achieved were directed to the front of the group. With the demon finale looming would this be its saviour, in a word...No, The demon in past years has been up in our faces and visually intimidating but this year we got "Raaaaah" not a great ending sadly to such a spooky attraction. Has The Attic had its day, from that run through it sadly feels so.
Craving scares we felt it was time to venture into the mines for Altonville Mine Tours:Tinys Revenge. What seemed like a short line was actually hidden to reveal a lengthy queue once out of the tunnel, So we were expecting a big group on our run and we weren't wrong, I think our group maxed out at around 15 with us being at the back again. Once again we missed the start of the narrative in the preshow and was almost outside of the tent due to the group size. What we did see of the preshow was entertaining and the cast member who "died" on the table did a great job of contorting their body.We then entered the maze and no word of a lie, and this might have been down to casting again but for the first 2 minutes, there was not a cast member in sight leaving us all wondering when the scares might start. The first cast member that we spotted was a dishevelled cheerleader in a wooden cage who did a fantastic job of selling the trapped theme and genuinely tugged on the heartstrings with their performance, but after this point, the majority of the cast members dialogue was lost in the audio combined with a lot of the scares being front focused yet again. The further we got in the more it felt like the auditioning period hadn't been very fruitful as it felt like the entire cast was about 6 actors/actresses from start to finish, we could be wrong and just missed them but the run through the mines felt at times devoid and in a rush to get us out, then we come to our most painful moment and it hurts me to say this but what should have been a wild and frenzied chainsaw attack scene was just lacklustre and without any effort, we all left the mines saying "is that it" Never a line we want to utter but sadly it is what summed up our experience.
Starting to feel short changed with our £50 ticket price we decided it was time to try out Daz Games:Panic Reloaded. This was something new for us as we didn't have time to experience Panic last year, We knew the basics of the game, there was no queue but we soon found out once we had gotten our wristbands where the queue was hiding, In the holding shipping container. After a collectively agreed cringe-worthy performance from the titular Daz Black/ Games it was time for the absolute chaos of the attraction/game within, My symbols were an Oblivion arrow and a flame. On first entry into the arena, it was very much feeling like a pop-up event and it was evident you were in the hospitality suite. And this is where the problems begin, maybe it's just down to our group not enjoying this type of attraction where others will love it but I feel so sorry for people cast for this attraction as they possibly have the hardest role on site, There is not much cohesion, just a mass of around 25/30 people all running around in the dark looking for symbols with the occasional strobe-lit interaction with some of the strangest looking scare "creatures" I've seen, Like a cross between Slender Man and Jimbo's Baloney Demon, while none of it seemed to make any sense, And again this is down to set and costume choices which is out of the hands of the cast. I will say that we enjoyed the sound effects and drama as each minute passed. I can get why people like the game for a competitive addition but it never once felt like a traditional scare attraction to us and we know it's not meant to be, again this is just our opinion and others may love the format, The chaotic nature of the game meant you didn't really get that many scares but rather ran into cast members who at times seemed just as uncomfortable as we did as guests but that's not to say that this was the case with all the cast, some genuinely revelled in the terrorising of guests which was great to see. Again I can't stress enough how difficult it must be to act in this attraction and even though we did not get many traditional scares, we can appreciate how hard the cast were working in that space. And whoever was in the white costume certainly made their presence known throughout the game and was obviously memorable.
Feeling very confused we decided to take a break from the scare and hit some more rides including the revamped Hex:The Legend of the Towers. There are some spoilers ahead so if you haven't experienced the new Hex then skip ahead.
The new way Hex works is that the bulk of the queueing now starts outside with batching taking place at the entrance to the Towers itself, As you venture in you will notice although it's still dark there is a lot more accent lighting and that the batching counter for the portrait scene has now gone, The portrait scene still remains but is now hidden behind double doors that I had to double take as swear ive never seen them before, The cinema room now features new lighting effects to time in with the storm and fire aspects of the video which was great to see, Now on the Octagon where alot of work has gone in, the whole experience feels more cohesive and visually impressive but a warning there are stronger strobes in this section now, Finally onto to vault, This is where is divides opinions, We personally loved it, there is more accent lighting in the ceiling and amongst the pillars and the classic soundtrack remains, there are some extra effects towards the end of the ride which some are labeling "DiscoHex" but we personally didnt mind them but that will be down to your opinion when you experience it.
Feeling a little more uplifted by Hex we decided it was time to finally hit up the Wicker Man scare zone "Burial Grounds". Now anyone who knows me knows how much I adore Wicker Man and The Welcoming too from years back, but knowing it was just a scare zone my expectations were not high, But boy were we wrong, right from the start the actors were up in our faces delivering high-quality impact scares and sustained scares from a distance, The cast members that had weapons were not afraid to get up close and personal with them and at one time came that close "whilst remaining safe" that I felt the breeze from the item as it passed my face, Combined with low visibility smoke sections and even fire interaction this was shaping up to be a great attraction that also we must mention is free. We felt that the scare zone in comparison to the scare mazes would be toned down, but if anything it was toned up, Every cast member was on point and was delivering scares wherever possible and towards the end, it was truly an assault on the senses. If it were based on set alone then COMPOUND would have taken our top spot of the day but the way every cast member of Burial Grounds worked their space and bear in mind a lot of them were scantly dressed or topless in the cold, we all left saying the same thing, Best experience of the day and that run was better than the interaction we got in most of the mazes.
So there we have it, we have reached the end of our Scarefest 2024 experience and it has truly been a mixed bag, fantastic theming as always and fully immersive but in some of the mazes the scares fell flat,COMPOUND is a great addition to the line-up, we just hope should it return next year that we see more of it, Attic and Altonville seem to have had their day and Panic Reloaded is just a very strange choice for Towers and we feel it would be more suited at Thorpe Park. Burial Grounds blew us away but across the park, it did feel like the casting had trouble recruiting enough to fill the mazes.
Thankyou to all the cast and crew who were there on the day we attended, all in all we did have a fun day but we can't help the event as a whole needs a more cohesive refresh for the years to come.
Scarefest has now finished but if you want to book a trip to AltonTowers you can do so at the link below.
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