Sawboss wrote:

Some of those actors were really going for it. So sad I'm not going this year, hoping they bring The Welcoming back next year in some form in a different location.

I don't think the welcoming will return at all but maybe a welcoming themed scare zone near SW8.

My review of Scarefest opening day:

Towers Street has been decorated wonderfully as usual, I just wish there was more Scarefest theming & props spread throughout the park.

Our first maze was TOTT, we got the first public run through of 2017 and I must admit that I thought it was better than last year. Whilst it is still far from being a great maze and it definitely needs a major overhaul, I thought that the actor performances were far superior this year.

Next up was Sub Species, which I had mixed feelings on. On the positive side it is still the most intense maze I have ever done and I got properly lost so was in the maze for over 10 minutes. The audio is fantastic and the element of being alone also benefits the maze massively. However, there were definitely less actors than last year, I found myself walking for several minutes without any scares and there was a noticeable lack of any aliens, which were a real highlight of the maze in 2016.

The last of the 3 "towers" mazes that we did was Mine Tours. I went in with decent expectations after having enjoyed the maze last year, but was bitterly dissapointed. Again, there were very few actors, I had one scare throughout the entire maze. The maze itself is done well, but is very short and the new ending is just as pathetic as last year's, if not more so.

I was very pleased with Freak Show this year, the new props are great additions and there are more actors who all seemed to be less afraid of actually trying to scare you than last year. Thumbs up! Still not a patch on the old style scare zones though, and with Dark Apocalypse gone, Scarefest needs another scare zone for next year.

Parkwide themed lighting is a disgrace, as has been mentioned already. Even the staff on Nemesis were complaining about it!

Just as a side note, why is there a severe lack of bins in The Smiler's queue? It was looking more like a rubbish dump than a queue line by the end of the day.

The last thing we did was The Welcoming. Our time slot was 8:45pm and I am so glad that we booked a night-time slot, it would have been much much worse during daylight hours. That aside, I LOVED IT! It is now my favourite Scarefest maze! It is not as intense or unnerving as the other mazes, but it is beautifully themed and is quite long. I'm not going to give spoilers but there are lots of great elements, tricks and effects one in particular that took my breath away. They got the hooded section just right, not too long and not too short. The actors did a brilliant job in this section also! I really rate The Welcoming, my only criticism is that I think the group sizes could be decreased, especially when it only has a 15 minute wait and I think that the ending could do with some tweaking to make it a little more memorable. Overall, great addition to Scarefest and I'll be gutted if it doesn't return in some form for 2018!

I would expect it to return, just in a different location. They don’t spend money on great theming to use for just a year!


Now... I’ve just came back from Scarefest and done 2 mazes, Mine Tours and The Welcoming. I’ll give a spoiler free and a spoiler filled review below!


Mine Tours

Last year this made became my favourite maze across the board, and did it deliver in its second year? Not really. Whilst the maze is still fantastically themed and the story is still (mostly) there, it seemed to lack something this year that made me love it previously. That being said the headlamps are now far more noticeable and are really disorienting this year. I still adore this maze and so I still really enjoyed it, just a shame it didn’t stick to the standard of last year!


The Welcoming: Be Chosen

This is by far the strangest maze I’ve done, and whilst the theming and costumes are brilliant there isn’t really an clear story behind this maze. I don’t quite get what was supposed to be going on and at one point something happened that still has me scratching my head! Overall it’s a good maze, but for me I think if it’s going to return, it needs a bit of a rethink!


Below are my spoilers reviews...




Both the mazes I did were really good, but for some reason neither seemed to match the standard of Mine Tours 16, so I hope over the next few weeks things change!

From what I've seen the lighting this year is terrible, and if they've not sorted it out by my visit at the end of the month I'll be very disappointed. The can't have incredible lighting one year and just not bother the next and not expect complaints, especially when there are no scare zones away from the centre of the park. No matter what the mazes are like, and I've heard good and bad about all of them, they have completely lost the atmosphere that makes Scarefest so good. I messaged them to ask whether it will be improved over the coming week but didn't get a proper response.

Wow, from what I can tell atmosphere send to be really down this year, especially considering the stellar year they had last year. Hope it gets sorted for the main portion of scarefest in a couple of weeks!

I wouldn't worry too much. Events always tend to improve over time as changes are made! I've heard that filters are going on to some floodlights this week. Let's hope that is true!

I've seen enough complaints on social media to hopefully have them get their act together anyway!

I'm a little disappointed on hearing about the lights this year, especially as last year was the first time I have visited during Scarefest and I was completely blown away by the atmosphere in the park, so much so, I am going back this year. I do hope what you have heard is true, Justin, and the lights get sorted out.

random question, but for anyone who did Sub Species in the previous years...what was the hidden ending, and how was it compared to the normal one? (I'm not sure what the normal one is either, I'm a bit far from AT but I'm curious about the mazes). I've been wondering this for ages, thanks!

undeadarmy wrote:

random question, but for anyone who did Sub Species in the previous years...what was the hidden ending, and how was it compared to the normal one? (I'm not sure what the normal one is either, I'm a bit far from AT but I'm curious about the mazes). I've been wondering this for ages, thanks!

I believe it was something to do with an alien animatronic but it kept breaking so it was removed for 2016, the alien was an alternate ending to the chainsaw ending as far as I'm aware. 

ohh, that's wild. do you know what the animatronic did/what it looks like? ive literally heard no one talk about it, must have been really hard to find tbh

Just going back to the lighting for a moment (it matters to me  ) I was delighted to find this reply on Facebook: "Hi Owen, we're planning for all the lighting to be as per last year for the main week of Scarefest, starting 20th October."

Let it be known that I said, the welcoming wouldn't be scary and would feel much more like a 4 pumpkin maze, that they over rated to sell more tickets...just saying

Anyway can anyone tell me, how much scarier is sub species, compered to Altonville Mine Tours, Uncover the Legend of the Skin Snatchers?

Sub Species, in my opinion, was poor last year. Mine Tours was very good and put me on edge. Although I can't say what this year is like, Mine was far better!

undeadarmy wrote:

ohh, that's wild. do you know what the animatronic did/what it looks like? ive literally heard no one talk about it, must have been really hard to find tbh

After the dark section, where the actors had lights that flash in front of their faces, there is the bridge that took you outside of the Towers. On the chainsaw ending route you end up with the crawl tunnel at the bottom of the steps.
The bridge is split in two, and a staff controlled sliding door determined which ending you got. The other ending had a lower capacity and did have some technical problems.
You went through a fairly detailed and tight maze, which had you stop at a finale, where a surprising large alien "flew" out of the darkness towards you. It was actually fairly impressive, but was a shame that many didn't get the ending.

Count-Vonduel wrote:

Let it be known that I said, the welcoming wouldn't be scary and would feel much more like a 4 pumpkin maze, that they over rated to sell more tickets...just saying

Anyway can anyone tell me, how much scarier is sub species, compered to Altonville Mine Tours, Uncover the Legend of the Skin Snatchers?

The theme for AMT is much scarier than Sub Species in my opinion, but since you can actually get lost in Sub Species & the actors are often much better, I'd say Sub is scarier. It's subjective, though, so you might find it to be the other way around.

It all comes down to personal opinion, I thought Mine Tours was absolute rubbish this year and Sub Species (whilst weaker than last year), was still good.

Will probably miss sub species then!
When the scariest thing I have ever been in is CoS 2010 and paj del terror at Blackpool (on my own mind you),
Then going in one of the UK's most intense mazes seems like a good way to turn myself off mazes for a good few years!

Hi guys, we are going to scarefest on the 22nd and 23rd and were wondering whether we get our maze tickets when we get there? We looked online but saw no individual maze tickets for sale online and we only want to do tott, the welcoming and hom, not sub species or the Altonville mine tours. What should we do?

Arrive for 9:30 or something and buy them as soon as you get in.
Ask for HoM, it never got sold out last year so you should be quite safe with that one!