Halloween Horror Nights 32 (UOR) - News & Info

[Mad Dog]

How was the crowd tonight?

 

[Legacy]

Glad to hear someone else had the same reaction. This is a bad look for a large company that has this much history putting on events like this.

All it takes is for one person to eff up royally and then one person to miss that eff up. Unfortunate nature of having such a big operation with a lot of moving parts.

Hopefully nothing too serious happened, and hopefully everyone gets well.

Oh, what frustrates me is that I understand exactly how something like this could happen, which is what frustrates me even more.

It essentially boils down a lot of management operating in the loosey goosey “whatever works” mentality of the aughts when the event now actively touts itself as the world’s premier event.

 

[GA-MBIT]

Yeah, it seems like only the front 3 zones were affected (Oddfellow, Zodiac, Jungle). Shipyard still had their full costumes and masks tonight. No houses were affected from what I could tell. I can see it being as simple as someone in charge of cleaning/washing the masks each night using the wrong kind of solution or chemical and that not being caught until the next work day.

Honestly though, the zones were really good tonight. Especially Zodiac and Jungle were doing great! I imagine because of not having to worry about the limited visibility in their masks, and probably most of the performers getting a natural second wind of energy from the new looks for their characters and the new energy that a face role brings. I enjoyed it quite a bit given everything! They were a lot more in-your-face, lots of big movements and scares, and some great vocalizations from a lot of performers that haven't been given the chance to. Plant, Mantis, and Cougar from Jungle come to mind, as well as Virgo, a number of the Elementals, and quite a few others got some unusually good scares in tonight from what I saw.

How was the crowd tonight?

Surprisingly, the park was pretty dead. I arrived around 10pm and was able to do every house except Chucky and TLoU by the end of the night. That's including a good chunk of our time spent zone-watching, taking pictures with the M3gans, resting on some benches and overall taking our time with the event. We were even able to run thru Stranger Things and Yeti twice. By about 1140pm or so stuff started to trickle down to about >45 min waits for everything except Chuck, TLoU, ST4. By 110am, everything was >25 min (basically a walk on for most house locations) except the headliner three IPs which were all now >45 min. Never seen it get this dead across 13 visits. Wednesday night was busier even haha!

I'm feeling some biiiiiig changes to Rush of Fear in 2024.

 

[TheCodeMan95]

I was going to say - if it were a mask issue I'd imagine it would have happened before mid-October? Or if it's the same cleaner they've been using?

Also, it pains me to say because I FINALLY bit the bullet and got RoF this year - but I imagine it's probably just going to straight up be GONE.

 

[Grabnar]

I was going to say - if it were a mask issue I'd imagine it would have happened before mid-October? Or if it's the same cleaner they've been using?

Also, it pains me to say because I FINALLY bit the bullet and got RoF this year - but I imagine it's probably just going to straight up be GONE.

Not sure what cleaner they usually use but in my experience these kinds of screw ups are usually someone not labelling a spray bottle properly and mixing up solutions.

 

[Midnight Detective]

Yeah, it seems like only the front 3 zones were affected (Oddfellow, Zodiac, Jungle). Shipyard still had their full costumes and masks tonight. No houses were affected from what I could tell. I can see it being as simple as someone in charge of cleaning/washing the masks each night using the wrong kind of solution or chemical and that not being caught until the next work day.

Honestly though, the zones were really good tonight. Especially Zodiac and Jungle were doing great! I imagine because of not having to worry about the limited visibility in their masks, and probably most of the performers getting a natural second wind of energy from the new looks for their characters and the new energy that a face role brings. I enjoyed it quite a bit given everything! They were a lot more in-your-face, lots of big movements and scares, and some great vocalizations from a lot of performers that haven't been given the chance to. Plant, Mantis, and Cougar from Jungle come to mind, as well as Virgo, a number of the Elementals, and quite a few others got some unusually good scares in tonight from what I saw.


Surprisingly, the park was pretty dead. I arrived around 10pm and was able to do every house except Chucky and TLoU by the end of the night. That's including a good chunk of our time spent zone-watching, taking pictures with the M3gans, resting on some benches and overall taking our time with the event. We were even able to run thru Stranger Things and Yeti twice. By about 1140pm or so stuff started to trickle down to about >45 min waits for everything except Chuck, TLoU, ST4. By 110am, everything was >25 min (basically a walk on for most house locations) except the headliner three IPs which were all now >45 min. Never seen it get this dead across 13 visits. Wednesday night was busier even haha!

I'm feeling some biiiiiig changes to Rush of Fear in 2024.

Last night was so light in crowds compared to September that we did 3 houses entirely alone. To give comparison I may have done 3 houses alone with my group in the past decade before yesterday

 

[UniversalRBLX]

How was the crowd tonight?

Not busy at all, quite shocking. This is typically the busiest weekend for HHN… and while the park was full, Stranger Things was a near walk-on the last hour.

Peacock Bar was empty, and all the food booths (outside of Surfer Boy and Chucky) had long lines.

HHN has been flipped upside down… September is now the busier period. Once Rush of Fear got canned, you can tell the event has decreased in attendance.

I fully expect changes to the Rush of Fear pass next year, but no need to remove the other 3, just your standard annual price increase.

 

[JungleSkip]

I fully expect changes to the Rush of Fear pass next year, but no need to remove the other 3, just your standard annual price increase.

I’m ready to be wrong, but I dont think this will have the effect some people think it will. FFP+ isn’t *that* much more expensive than ROF. I expect most people just to move to that, resulting in more FFP+. You might save some busy Saturdays, but otherwise more crowds throughout

I think a lot of people got caught trying to upgrade ROF Into FFP like in the past. Taking away ROF will just have them buying FFP from the jump

 

[Jake S]

Taking away ROF will just have them buying FFP from the jump

My hope, and perhaps this is also naive, is that removing ROF would help spread crowds out more evenly over the two-month period. Of course, if most of the people buying ROF are locals who are willing to spend a little more to get FFP... well, yeah. We're not going to see much of a difference except higher crowds in October.

 

[JungleSkip]

My hope, and perhaps this is also naive, is that removing ROF would help spread crowds out more evenly over the two-month period. Of course, if most of the people buying ROF are locals who are willing to spend a little more to get FFP... well, yeah. We're not going to see much of a difference except higher crowds in October.

I think it has a chance of just creating the opposite. As an out of towner, I’d much rather come later in the event when weather isn’t obnoxious than in September. Getting rid of ROF will make that a much easier decision

 

[Crypt Keeper]

I’m ready to be wrong, but I dont think this will have the effect some people think it will. FFP+ isn’t *that* much more expensive than ROF. I expect most people just to move to that, resulting in more FFP+. You might save some busy Saturdays, but otherwise more crowds throughout

I think a lot of people got caught trying to upgrade ROF Into FFP like in the past. Taking away ROF will just have them buying FFP from the jump

Yup, if they get rid of RoF, I'm just gonna jump to FF or FFP. That way I can go in September AND October.

It also doesn't surprise me that the crowds are lower due to all multi-night passes being unavailable for purchase/upgrades. I know quite a few people who purchased/upgraded their FF/FFP just before RoF ended.

 

[TheCodeMan95]

I will have to compare prices, but if they drop ROF, I may just do Frequent Fear if the bump isn't that much. If anything I'd do base Frequent Fear and add Express to 1 or 2 individual nights.

 

[SeventyOne]

My hope, and perhaps this is also naive, is that removing ROF would help spread crowds out more evenly over the two-month period. Of course, if most of the people buying ROF are locals who are willing to spend a little more to get FFP... well, yeah. We're not going to see much of a difference except higher crowds in October.

Based on the September crowds this year, this seems unrealistic. The event is more about the "hang out" than the houses at this point, so why not just hang out more nights? All this would really do is further fuel the preference wave among the "normals" that HHN is too crowded, which we can see the effect of now that RoF/FF have been removed.

While they may or may not remove RoF, prices still need to go up for multinight tickets, at least FF and FF+, Or keep a moderate increase on FF but cut Sundays, then two levels of "plus" (tho that starts to get incredibly confusing).

 

[TheCodeMan95]

I'm still fully onboard with just doing 1/2/3/etc night tickets, with just Frequent Fear acting as the "annual pass" for the event (and it giving it a massive price increase)

 

[ultimateforce]

Last night the crowds REALLY started to drop off fast around midnight right as the chilly air started breezing in. I ended up putting on my jacket I carried around all night.

 

[Heisenberg]

I think Universal expected tourists to pick up in October, August and September are slow because of the school and the terrible weather. But tourism has been bad at Disney and Universal (inflation, interest rates) this year and locals didn’t upgrade to FF (rent, inflation, interest rates)

 

[HHN Maddux]

And to cap off what's usually Hell Week, tonight has been very quiet. Blood Moon currently has no wait, Last of Us and ST4 are sitting at 60-minute waits.

 

[Mad Dog]

The HHN World turned upside down...............Ticket changes are probably certain....if not....then there will be issues again next year.

 

[UniversalRBLX]

WDW has been ridiculously busy the past 2 weeks, so it doesn't seem like the economy is impacting attendance in Orlando as much either.

Universal might have just found the perfect balance of HHN crowds.

 

[UNIrd]

Meanwhile, HOS Tampa was a total s--- show last night. Took over an hour just to park and that was with doing some F&F-style maneuvers (family). Once inside, the ride and house times were all upwards of 100 minutes. Never seen a night at HOS like that EVER.