Haunt Tour 2012 - Day 3 Part 2

House of Shock
www.houseofshock.com
New Orleans Louisiana

House of Shock is an entirely unique breed of cat.  It is more of an event than a haunted house.  This place draws big crowds looking for fun.   The party atmosphere is feed by a phalanx of vendors as you approach the entrance.  Food, booze, arachnid rides, and tattoos are the order of the day.   There was a great hard rock band playing when I arrived.

I bought the $50 VIP ticket due to the size of the line which was a couple of blocks long.   The VIP line was much shorter than the general admission line.  I got into the staging area within a couple of minutes and stopped.   The line didn't move a foot for 45 minutes.

Here's how I think things work at HOS.   They put on a hell of a stage show in the queue area.  I'm talking freaks, geeks, pryotechnics, and video.   Over the top acting of scenes.  Imagine a Korn concert with a plot.  What none of us in the realized was that they shut down the haunted house during the show and we were supposed to watch and enjoy the entire thing.  The people around me were just pissed that the line wasn't moving.

Speaking of people in line.   I really enjoyed my 45 minutes next to the five bald tattoo artists.  Hearing about how hard it was to form a really good white power gang really added to the overall experience.  

Once the show was over, everything changed.  The VIP line emptied like a beer bong at a skinhead convention.   There was no queue management at all.  We went through the haunt conga line style with out stop.  The overall vibe was not scary.   To me it was like a forced march through Pirates of the Caribbean.   There was lots of eye candy but how could you be scared seeing the couple 10 feet in front of you confront zombie guy jumping out from a corner.  The other necessary bummer was the placement of a security person about every 20 feet with the mandatory blue polo shirt and flashlight.

Set detail was generally good.  Animatronics few and far between.  This makes sense since there would never be time for a reset.

I'm glad I went and except when skin head told me how cool it was that someone my age would come out and have fun;  I enjoyed myself.   Had I had a better understanding of the experience in advance I would have enjoyed it a lot more.

2012 Haunt Tour - Day 3

Rise: Dark Souls Unleashed

ww.risehauntedhouse.com

Hammond Louisiana
 

Rise is a walk-through haunt and zombie paintball attraction located about half way between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.   I was surprised to find that there were practically no lines when I arrived around 7:30pm.   While chatting with the ticket lady I found out why.  She said I was about 30 minutes ahead to the coming wave of customers...  Friday night High School football was just finishing up and then things would get crazy.

 

This is the little haunt that could.   Only operating 15 days this year, this haunt includes a number of aspects rarely seen outside of long established urban haunted houses.  The haunted house is located in a standard metal building.  What sets it apart is that this haunt has a great facade disguising this fact.  A nice touch.

 

The queue line is partially indoors.  The indoor portion of the queue is a nicely detailed interior scene.  Again, something rarely seen outside of heavy weight haunts.  

 

The walk-through haunt had strong continuity with each room flowing smoothly into the next.  You started in a library that flowed into the parlor and so on.   The sets were detailed and the design felt consistent rather than "we went to the thrift store and threw all the stuff around the room".  The interior reminded me of Dent School House in Cincinnati.

 

The staff was uniformly enthusiastic and it was clear they enjoyed what they were doing.   Actors generally had good timing and a couple actually startled me. 

 

It is well worth the $15 admission price.

 

Zombie paintball makes me happy.  For those of you not familiar with this particular sport; here's a brief intro.   Members of the zombie eradication squad (you)  are loaded into a open sided trailer with benches and paintball guns attached to rails.   You get towed down a path past a series of small scenes of zombie infestation.   Brave actors in heavily padded suits stumble around and get shot by 20 or so patrons at the same time. Not since the Romans threw the Christians to the lions has there been so much fun for so many people at once.   Brilliantly; management stops the trailer for five dollar paintball refills.   Crack cocaine is not this tempting.

The crew clearly enjoys the entire process and encourages mayhem at every turn.

Paintball is $15 with one nearly mandatory $5 refill.  There is a combo ticket for $26

Phobia Haunted Houses

Haunt Tour 2012 - Day 2

Phobia Haunted Houses

5 attractions + 3 more zombie themed haunts daisy chained. - $80 per person









The attractions are available ala carte but to do everything will cost you 80 bucks.  I went through almost all of the attractions in about an hour.  (Exile caught fire and I had to leave).  There were virtually no lines so consider my experience speed haunting.

Mind Control Haunt- Asylum themed-walk through.   Very good use of strobe lights in novel applications.   My favorite was a hallway with cleats along the walls allowing an actor to approach you while literally climbing the walls while back lit by a strobe.  Very cool.   Detail was good and the actors were enthusiastic and athletic.  Really good crew here.   Down side is that it was a short experience.

Darke Institute - Another Asylum themed walk-through.  Felt very much like Mind Control.  The crew was good.   Not a lot of animatronics in use.  Both Mind Control and Darke Institute did a really good job of designing the haunt so the actors could cover multiple scares through out the haunt.

3D Clown Phobia - I'm not a big fan of 3D haunts - there I said it.   As 3D haunts go this was a rough one. The paint work was pretty basic.  The high point was the use of some pre-printed textiles to cover walls and to act as curtains.  The actors were spirited but the masks and make-up were pretty rough.

Claustrophobia - A pretty standard walk-through with a deafening sound track.  It started with a vortex tunnel which I found a bit jarring.  Again, the actors worked really hard at putting on a scare.  One of the actors did an impressive The Grudge style floor walk.

Dawn of the Machine - I've saved my favorite for last.   The concept for the haunt was clear from the beginning.   Sort of zombie meets Terminator.  The sets were well dressed and conveyed the story that the machines were taking over the human hosts.  Think evil Borg.   There were numerous animatronics that supported the theme.  These anamatronics were built locally and had a consistent style and feel.   The actors were solid but worn down by the Houston heat and humidity by this time.   I was really impressed with one young actress that did some amazing contortion moves in an elevated cage.  Kinda like yoga on crack.

These five attractons would take 2-3 hours if there were any significant lines at all.

Sometimes the Scares are Real

Haunt Tour 2012 Day 2

Phobia Haunted Houses - Houston Texas

Fire.   A small electrical fire broke out tonight while I was in the Exile: Zombie Apocalypse.  It was late and I was the last and only patron in the venue.   As I came around a corner one of the actors broke character and told me to back away.   There was acrid smoke in the air followed by the rolling cloud of a fire extinguisher blast.  Actors were calling for supervisors.   Another actor with his face covered against the smoke told me that tonight was his second night and this was serious shit that he'd never seen before.

The actor that told me to back off came back to me and calmly said he was going to lead me out of the attraction.  He said there had been sparks and flames from some of the wiring.   We calmly cut through some of the display areas and left the venue.  I looked for and never saw a lighted exit sign.

The actor walked up to two guys that seemed to be charge and explained the situation.  One said he'd check and he entered the attraction.  The other guy just stood there.   Nobody reacted with any sense of urgency.  At no time did the emergency lighting come on.  

Really it was just a short with some burned insulation.  Luckily it did not spread, and the attraction was practically empty.  

Haunt Tour 2012

Kingwood Asylum - Kingwood Texas

This haunt offers a family friendly hour each night where the scares are turned way down.  I skipped the family friendly hour and went for the full scary version.    I enjoyed the haunt but it was small.  The first two visitors were coming out the exit before the fourth group was admitted.  The interior portion of the haunt had good detail and made good use of the commercially available haunted asylum videos.  It was fun to see the classic flying crank ghost at one point during the tour.  In an effort to expand the experience they use and outside area for a graveyard scene.   It felt like tombstones on the front yard rather than a graveyard.   Use of fog and lighting would have gone a long way.  And love it or hate it the last scare was chasing patrons out with a chainsaw.

Full price admission was $20.   Take advantage of coupons or the discount for a food donation to get full value for your money.