Halloween Horror Nights 31 (UOR) - Speculation & Rumors

[captainryborg]

One less scarezone, one more house, and a show in BMG would help the congestion for sure.

 

[Parkscope Joe]

As he should, that ShieKra guy can't even spell SheiKra right

Tell me about it, ugh.

One less scarezone, one more house, and a show in BMG would help the congestion for sure.

Keep the same amount of what they have now and just add. They need another show to soak up crowds and another house.

 

[captainryborg]

Keep the same amount of what they have now and just add. They need another show to soak up crowds and another house.

If it is was a regular scarezone, I'd agree, but we need to eliminate a selfie zone - at this point it's more hindrance than helping. Let there be one selfie zone in Production Central and that's it.

I shouldn't have to walk around the other way around the lagoon to avoid SF but I very much was having to on that last week.

 

[shiekra38]

One less scarezone, one more house, and a show in BMG would help the congestion for sure.

At this point most of the scarezones are nuisances

If we didn't get a zone in San Fran and just opened the park to some "roaming" hordes I'd be fine with that

I'd rather them just fill NY to Hollywood (the back side) with actors

 

[Parkscope Joe]

If it is was a regular scarezone, I'd agree, but we need to eliminate a selfie zone - at this point it's more hindrance than helping.

I... huh? Why? This just feels like an "old man yells at cloud" situation.

 

[Tobias]

If it is was a regular scarezone, I'd agree, but we need to eliminate a selfie zone - at this point it's more hindrance than helping. Let there be one selfie zone in Production Central and that's it.

I can understand not liking the congestion of SF, but the core matter is that area just can't support stages/big props without getting crammed. Also with the way they've been doing scare zones throughout the park, every zone is a "Selfie Zone". That's not going to change unless they do a big overhaul on how they approach zones.

 

[SeventyOne]

One less scarezone, one more house, and a show in BMG would help the congestion for sure.

That's not going to alleviate the line of cars out to Universal Blvd waiting to park or the security line that stretches back to Spider-Man. That's not going to affect the 45 minute line for Twisted Taters. And it's not going to have that much of an effect on the hour-length Express queues they had to add quickly this year.

Again, a single night at a 3-hour MK holiday event goes for more than a FFP. The prices no longer reflect the crowd drawn. Even with a Burger King coupon on a slow night, admission shouldn't be much under $100. And multinight Express needs to be exponentially more, if they keep it at all. Price hikes are the only way to achieve meaningful crowd control.

 

[Casper Gutman]

That's not going to alleviate the line of cars out to Universal Blvd waiting to park or the security line that stretches back to Spider-Man. That's not going to affect the 45 minute line for Twisted Taters. And it's not going to have that much of an effect on the hour-length Express queues they had to add quickly this year.

Again, a single night at a 3-hour MK holiday event goes for more than a FFP. The prices no longer reflect the crowd drawn. Even with a Burger King coupon on a slow night, admission shouldn't be much under $100. And multinight Express needs to be exponentially more, if they keep it at all. Price hikes are the only way to achieve meaningful crowd control.

I really, really hate this attitude. You see it a lot more on WDW boards, but it’s just as bad here. The fact that HHN is “affordable,” particularly compared to WDWs offensively absurd prices, is great. Advocating big price hikes to limit crowds is essentially arguing that those with less money should be excluded so that YOU can have a better time. Quite frankly, if some folks find it too crowded, they can stop going rather then trying to lock out others.

We should encourage Uni to continue expanding capacity and applaud when they do so. We don’t want Uni generally or HHN specifically to become like WDW, attempting to stretch woefully inadequate capacity and milk every dollar from guests.

 

[captainryborg]

I... huh? Why? This just feels like an "old man yells at cloud" situation.

And I'm very much okay with accepting that position.

Although, I wouldn't exactly say that "selfie-created bottlenecks" is a "yelling at clouds" situation. It's annoying to plenty of folks.

 

[Lucky Planet]

If it is was a regular scarezone, I'd agree, but we need to eliminate a selfie zone - at this point it's more hindrance than helping. Let there be one selfie zone in Production Central and that's it.

I shouldn't have to walk around the other way around the lagoon to avoid SF but I very much was having to on that last week.

I said this before but without Simpsons and removing the fast and furious zone (and not being able to use the ET area) that's almost 50% of the park without zones or actors, almost half the park dead. hordes are the solution. maybe this is the end for props and stages, but removing zones just creates a lot of dead space.

At this point most of the scarezones are nuisances

If we didn't get a zone in San Fran and just opened the park to some "roaming" hordes I'd be fine with that

I'd rather them just fill NY to Hollywood (the back side) with actors

I can understand not liking the congestion of SF, but the core matter is that area just can't support stages/big props without getting crammed. Also with the way they've been doing scare zones throughout the park, every zone is a "Selfie Zone". That's not going to change unless they do a big overhaul on how they approach zones.

it's interesting and tricky because if the general public wants and prefers selfie zones, then changing it would go against what the general public wants.
in the Eddie zone, when Jack showed up, even moms wanted their baby to have a selfie with Jack lol. people made a line for selfie with Jack.
"but selfie zones are ruining the event and it is annoying"

and didn't they try to stop people from taking pictures in zones years before and this led to angry complaints? I remember that.
so designing zones to avoid selfies and making it harder could just upset the paying customers lol. this is beyond hhn. we are on a selfie/ tik tok era. it's the current culture. so uni could be making a lot of younger visitors very angry.
I'm not pro selfie, but I remember the drama of when people couldn't take pics and that was years ago.

people pay their hhn and they pay their entrance and they want their photo memory. (photo memories that all parks promote by selling ride pictures in general)

hordes without props could help with this as well. fast actors without decorations

but in 2012 we had hordes without a lot of props in the streets and it wasn't great either

 

[Crowboy]

I said this before but without Simpsons and removing the fast and furious zone (and not being able to use the ET area) that's almost 50% of the park without zones or actors, almost half the park dead. hordes are the solution. maybe this is the end for props and stages, but removing zones just creates a lot of dead space.




it's interesting and tricky because if the general public wants and prefers selfie zones, then changing it would go against what the general public wants.
in the Eddie zone, when Jack showed up, even moms wanted their baby to have a selfie with Jack lol. people made a line for selfie with Jack.
"but selfie zones are ruining the event and it is annoying"

and didn't they try to stop people from taking pictures in zones years before and this led to angry complaints? I remember that.
so designing zones to avoid selfies and making it harder could just upset the paying customers lol. this is beyond hhn. we are on a selfie/ tik tok era. it's the current culture. so uni could be making a lot of younger visitors very angry.
I'm not pro selfie, but I remember the drama of when people couldn't take pics and that was years ago.

people pay their hhn and they pay their entrance and they want their photo memory. (photo memories that all parks promote by selling ride pictures in general)

hordes without props could help with this as well. fast actors without decorations

but in 2012 we had hordes without a lot of props in the streets and it wasn't great either

Are actors told to pose for pictures? I’m sure it’s kinda dependent on how the actors feeling as I saw many people get rejected while asking for a photo, myself included. Perhaps people on stages are encouraged to take photos? Makes sense for distancing and COVID so I’m sure stages and selfies will return.
possible scare zone title tho? Stages and selfies?

 

[shiekra38]

Are actors told to pose for pictures? I’m sure it’s kinda dependent on how the actors feeling as I saw many people get rejected while asking for a photo, myself included. Perhaps people on stages are encouraged to take photos? Makes sense for distancing and COVID so I’m sure stages and selfies will return.
possible scare zone title tho? Stages and selfies?

The stages could be utilized for scares via water or air blasts or embedded speakers tied to a trigger

Honestly, I think that's the future of the zones, more elevated, more creative, and more triggered (lol)

 

[FaceBagman]

Honestly, I think that's the future of the zones, more elevated, more creative, and more triggered (lol)

Y'know, for all the disdain the Zombieland zone gets, the porta-potty zombie was a fun little gag that incorporated something fresh into a zone.

People still wanted to crowd it and take video though (or if they got drunk enough they actually would try going inside lmao), so idk.

 

[BradyG]

Do you guys think that budget cuts may happen this year because of the lower attendance? I certainly hope not, but I figured that I might as well throw this into the mix, since I think it’s interesting that expanding capacity seems to be a popular topic in this forum despite the attendance numbers this year.

 

[SeanPhilly]

Do you guys think that budget cuts may happen this year because of the lower attendance? I certainly hope not, but I figured that I might as well throw this into the mix, since I think it’s interesting that expanding capacity seems to be a popular topic in this forum despite the attendance numbers this year.

Was the attendance officially lower? Sorry if I missed that conversation, but every night I was there seemed nuts (and 4 out of my 6 nights were sold out).

 

[UniversalRBLX]

It's not as bad a situation you may think, just poor use of space & planning.

One of the oddest decisions they make is putting the arepas food truck by F&F that cuts the walking path in half. Putting a prop dead center in the S&F zone is an odd choice that has been happening for years, yet they somehow don't learn from it.

It's an argument we've had for years now, but selfies aren't something Universal can control no matter what they do.

 

[Kichkinet85]

Was the attendance officially lower? Sorry if I missed that conversation, but every night I was there seemed nuts (and 4 out of my 6 nights were sold out).

Had to have capacity restrictions. Even the longest wait was not close to a 180 minute wait we saw in past years.

 

[Brian G.]

I wouldn’t worry about budget cuts.

 

[Lucky Planet]

Are actors told to pose for pictures? I’m sure it’s kinda dependent on how the actors feeling as I saw many people get rejected while asking for a photo, myself included. Perhaps people on stages are encouraged to take photos? Makes sense for distancing and COVID so I’m sure stages and selfies will return.
possible scare zone title tho? Stages and selfies?

I don't know anything about the management or the actor side. but I can tell you what I see as a guest and what I hear from people.
years ago it was really hard to get a pic actually. not even a selfie but just an actor pic.there were countless times where I couldn't get a good picture of a specific character in the zone. I have no idea what actors are told, but there's definitely a difference over the years. 10 years ago it was harder.

personally I noticed two specific things from the past.
some years ago, maybe 5 years ago, the new York zone had those bat creatures, and whenever a person tried to take a photo (with no flash) the bats would cover their heads with their wings, I specifically remember people complaining and stuff and some time later I remember the bats stopped doing that. maybe it was coincidence but I remember someone from the parks mentioning the surveys (I think on another hhn forum) and the complaints
I personally never got to take a photo of those bats without covering their head. but I remember seeing other people's photos.

something similar happened In a zone called canyon of souls or something, like 10 years ago or so, it was by ET.

I remember you would try to take a photo of the zone (even without flash) and security and the zone managers would start yelling at you and cover your camera with their hands. and not because of the flash (I never use flash at hhn)
I remember this security guy really angry telling me that no photos were allowed,

but I'm not sure that could happen now, specially because the hhn instagram account and Twitter sometimes asks YOU to post your best selfie,
I think it was 2017 or 2018 or 2019 that hhn was pushing the hash tag "hhnselfie" or something like that and asking people to post their best pic.

so this was the hhn social media pages encouraging you and asking you to share.
I think I talked about that hashtag on this forum actually. my post my be here from that year.

The stages could be utilized for scares via water or air blasts or embedded speakers tied to a trigger

Honestly, I think that's the future of the zones, more elevated, more creative, and more triggered (lol)

one of those air blasts really hurt my ear really really bad one time. now I get worried about air blasts around the zone stages lol.

 

[Legacy]

I don't know anything about the management or the actor side. but I can tell you what I see as a guest and what I hear from people.
years ago it was really hard to get a pic actually. not even a selfie but just an actor pic.there were countless times where I couldn't get a good picture of a specific character in the zone. I have no idea what actors are told, but there's definitely a difference over the years. 10 years ago it was harder.

personally I noticed two specific things from the past.
some years ago, maybe 5 years ago, the new York zone had those bat creatures, and whenever a person tried to take a photo (with no flash) the bats would cover their heads with their wings, I specifically remember people complaining and stuff and some time later I remember the bats stopped doing that. maybe it was coincidence but I remember someone from the parks mentioning the surveys (I think on another hhn forum) and the complaints
I personally never got to take a photo of those bats without covering their head. but I remember seeing other people's photos.

something similar happened In a zone called canyon of souls or something, like 10 years ago or so, it was by ET.

I remember you would try to take a photo of the zone (even without flash) and security and the zone managers would start yelling at you and cover your camera with their hands. and not because of the flash (I never use flash at hhn)
I remember this security guy really angry telling me that no photos were allowed,

but I'm not sure that could happen now, specially because the hhn instagram account and Twitter sometimes asks YOU to post your best selfie,
I think it was 2017 or 2018 or 2019 that hhn was pushing the hash tag "hhnselfie" or something like that and asking people to post their best pic.

so this was the hhn social media pages encouraging you and asking you to share.
I think I talked about that hashtag on this forum actually. my post my be here from that year.

Ground actors are told they can accept photo requests, but they’re not obligated to. Stage actors are likely told the same thing. The big difference between now and then is that, I think, more performers are willing to have their pictures taken. Ten years ago, it wasn’t as popular among the cast.

(And if you’re wondering why that changed, being a HHN “influencer” wasn’t a thing then. Now, if a character/performer allows more pictures, it increases the odds they’ll become popular on social media).

The bats you’re referring to were in Grown Evil (2011), and they actually avoided pictures/covered their faces for safety purposes. The zone was dark, and the costumes spectacular. As a result the vast majority of photos were taken with a flash, blinding the performers and making it unsafe to scare. Because so many people wanted photos, and because the cast uniformly avoided them while adopting the “in character” behavior of hiding behind their wings, that’s the zone that garnered a lot of discussion.