SFMM Fright Fest 2012 ... don't miss it!!!

[sir clinksalot]

We were lucky enough to get an exclusive walk-through of the ALL NEW Willoughby's Haunted Mansion at SFMM today. We'll have a complete update for Friday's "In The Parks" but I'm telling you all, I was HIGHLY impressed with what the park has done with this maze. It's totally all new, some really awesome effects and a "trick" that I haven't seen in a maze yet that I won't DARE spoil.

I also have some news on the new Blackout maze and I think it's going to be very good. Very simple concept but something that will blow people away.

If you've been on the fence about going to Fright Fest I think you will be very impressed.

EDIT: The update has been posted!!
http://micechat.com/13078-six-flags-right-fest-ever/

As a teaser, below is the facade of the new Willoughby's.

[JesterMn]

Wow, that looks pretty good already! We just renewed our SFMM passes after taking a year off, and I definitely plan to attend their haunt. Many of their mazes are new to me since the last time I went. And the maze lines were pretty manageable the last time I was there. Is that still the case?

[sir clinksalot]

^ Obviously if you go on a Saturday night it's going to be busy no matter what. But Friday's/Sunday's are generally pretty good days to go.

Oh, and the Fright Feast in it's new location ... heavily themed dining experience. We got to take a look at what they were doing but no pictures since they were still working on it.

[madmonkeygirl]

Cool I wsh we could fit this in but we are so jam packed with events things places to go I don't know how we will manage.

[dth316]

That's actually a very good facade. Better than HHN's Silent Hill, Alice Cooper and TCM facades for sure.

[sir clinksalot]

I started putting together the update today ... I can't wait to share it with you all on Friday!!!

[sir clinksalot]

Really cool Fright Fest commercial.

[SoCalbma]

That's haunted house looks tight.

I have basically done Universal and knotts Haunt this past weeks and I have the urge to go visit more haunted attractions. I'm planning on going to Queen Mary's Dark Harbor again sometime in Mid-October, but am thinking about doing the fright fest at Six Flags.

I remembered reading online that Six Flags mazes are cheesy and of lower quality.

So, my question to you Sir Clinksalot, is it worth going to Fright Fest? How is the quality of each maze? and should I invest in the express pass?

[sir clinksalot]

In the past, the SFMM mazes were a little more cheesy than Knott's or Universal. There will still be a couple this year that are. But the one maze we saw (Willoughby's), the other new maze we heard about (Blackout) and the awesome new maze from last year (Aftermath) will insure that there are at least 3 quality mazes. Haven't seen the Black Widow one yet but I have high hopes for it. The Jokers Hideout, Chupacabra and Slaughterhouse will be decent. Cursed is the stinker of the bunch.

The thing with SFMM is that if you have a season pass, it's essentially only $10 for the mazes, so you get what you pay for. The other difference is, they don't close the park before the event starts. So even if you don't have a Season Pass, for 1 price can essentially have 13 1/2 hours in the park with the mazes.

As for the express pass, I'd recommend it if you go on a Saturday night. The one thing SFMM does BETTER than any of the other SoCal haunts is crowd control. They only allow 10-15 people in the mazes every 1-2 minutes. This means that the lines may move a little slower but it also means that once you are in the maze you will not get any "Haunted Lines".

Once you are in the park, you can experience all of the Fright Fest stuff (except mazes) with your regular park ticket or Season Pass. So even if you don't do the mazes you can still get a taste of Fright Fest.

[JerrodDRagon]

If you have a Season Pass go...its ten bucks and that's a hard deal to beat

Of course Knotts and Universal cost more...so they are better but Six Flags is still a good deal and fun (also go on colossus backwards)

[dth316]

I have free tickets that expire at the end of the year, so I decided to skip my usual pre-summer trip in effort to check out Fright Fest this year since it'll only be $10 for the maze pass.

Paying GA and an extra $10 on top of that for the mazes, I'd say "hell no." Last time I went to Fright Fest was either 2005 or 2006 and it was the worst Haunt I'd ever been to in my life. Home Haunts, Independent Haunts and small time theme park Haunts (Scandia, Fiesta Village, Castle Park) were even better.

I've gone to great detail about it before, but to sum it up: it was overcrowded in the scare zones, with long lines for the world's crappiest mazes and extra long lines for the coasters (talking beyond summer lines, 2 to 3 hours). I went through one walkthrough maze (Brutal Planet) and the log ride overlay.

Brutal Planet was supposedly the best maze they had there at the time, so I waited an hour for it only to walk into the most bare maze I've seen in my life with chainlink fences for walls so you could literally see into every "room" before you went through it. I already knew, if that was supposed to be the best, I wouldn't bother waiting an entire hour for the other ones.

After that, I figured if I were to do at least one other one, it'd be the log ride since I like log rides anyway. Turned out, there was maybe 2 or 3 actors on the ride with SOME fog up in the hills and ZERO decoration (literally, zero). Then after the drop back toward the station (which is about a good 30 - 45 seconds), the log was sinking into the water. With the water already up to our ankles and filling the bottom which is a problem in of itself, water was pouring in from the top every so often with literally only the slightest inch of the top of the log being the barrier between actually floating along and sinking into the lagoon. Obviously this is a maintenence issue, but the ride overlay was crappy in of itself, so this was just the icing on the cake.

As for the scare zones, they were a joke. Just spiderweb everywhere and the monsters had no tact for going through large crowds. When the local teens would get scared beyond actual belief for zero reason, since it was so packed, their jumping and running away would literally shift the entire crowd with some people falling over. Despite this, the monsters continued to "chase" after them. I can't blame a monster for trying to get their scare, but when it's harming everyone else in the crowd because their victim is acting ridiculous - STOP and MOVE ON.

Didn't even bother with the shows. This was back when it wasn't an upcharge event, so I got my money's worth (well, hardly) during the day on SOME of the coasters.

So after taking some time off from, in my opinion, the worst Haunt I've ever been to, plus talk that last year was kinda good and this year is planning to be better than ever, I've decided that since I got the free ticket anyway, I might as well check it out and this time actually make an effort to do all the mazes.

[JesterMn]

^I can say a lot has changed since then. I remember not only huge, huge lines, but also unruly crowds, people smoking everything you can imagine, and obnoxious teens cutting in front of you every chance they could get. It was bad.

But it was also in the days where there was no upcharge for the mazes. Anyone with a season pass had access to the mazes. IMO, charging a nominal fee really eliminated a lot of the bad crowding, and was also able to up the quality of the mazes. It's still going to be lower on the list in terms of quality, sure... but if you do a price comparison, and time spent in lines (which will be much less than you'd find at HHN or Knott's), it ends up being not a bad deal, relatively speaking.

[sir clinksalot]

Went to Fright Fest last night, had a really great time. I definitely recommend the Express Pass, it was VERY crowded and it only the first weekend of FF. It's only going to get busier.

There are 3 stand-out mazes, 3 middle-of-the-road (but fun mazes), 1 maze that's "ok" (based on what they have to work with) and only one that was a complete stinker.

I'll put up my full review later this week but it's certainly worth the trip.

As far as the crowds, I didn't see ANY issues and they have taken measures to eliminate line-cutters by utilizing the "Maze Tickets".

Basically when you get in line they give everybody a ticket that has a number on it and you have to hand over that card to get into the maze. They've utilized the same approach in the past for new coasters and it always works great.

Security was certainly present and we even went through one of the mazes with a group of LA County Sheriff's who were perhaps taking a break. Pretty funny.

[JerrodDRagon]

^we I hope lines don't get too bad...going next week and getting the tickets were you eat at the all-you-can-eat buffet before hand so hoping we'll get on everything..though last year we did and by the end of the night ALL mazes were walk on

[sir clinksalot]

^ As we were walking out last night (about 10pm) the only maze that was a walk-on at that point was Chupacabra.

My suggestion to everybody is to do Blackout first. They only allow 8 people in at a time, every 1 1/2-2 minutes.