I've been going since 2002. I'll always have a special place for HHN 12, but realistically - here's my ranking of each year:
1. 18 - Strong houses, strong zones, great icon although weak icon house, helluva marketing campaign.
2. 25 - Strong theme & icon, house line-up mixed bag but does have couple GOATs, great zones, great shows.
3. 28 - 2nd Strongest house line-up, solid zones but didn't reach potential, fine show.
4. 21 - Strongest house line-up, but very weak zones with 7 being the only real stand out. Weak icon, with a weak presence.
5. 19 - Solid houses, solid zones, solid icon. Nuff said
6. 20 - Solid houses, solid zones, fine shows, Fear was a letdown, however.
7. 14 - Good attempt at the dual park. Houses were solid, zones bridged the parks well. Point of Evil was a big dud since it never worked.
8. 15 - Best overall story to date, good houses, good zones, Terra Queen great, Storyteller crap, as well as her house.
9. 27 - 3rd best house line-up, but OK zones besides Trick R Treat. Great shows anchored by B&T, but overall event suffered from lack of direction.
10. 12 - Caretaker probably scariest icon, with GOAT house, featured good executed concepts such as Treaks and Foons and Marvel/Villains.
11. 17 - Great Big 3 houses, solid supporting house line-up with great icon, but the parkwide scare zone was a bust. Did feature GOAT HHN archway
12. 26 - Solid house line-up, OK zones, but Chance was a huge letdown and her house is a WOAT contender. B&T was weak, but AoV was refreshing.
13. 13 - Solid houses with 2 GOATs but also 2 duds, fine zones, Director better served at USF, not IOA.
14. 16 - Should've been better given the concept. Great to see some returning classics, but only PS with Jack felt refreshing. Zones underwhelming, but the shows are some all-timers.
15. 24 - Another year that seemed to lack direction. Other than Halloween, houses were fine, zones and shows underwhelming
16. 23 - Hated parkwide Walking Dead, OK house line-up with AWiL and Cabin being memorable.
17. 22 - Save for Gothic, WOAT house line-up. Parkwide scare zones also felt uninspired and featured probably the worst B&T.