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The Haunting

The Haunting (2016-2019 version) review:

Just thought I'd share my thoughts in the Haunting post 2016 and including the recent changes made this year. The new Haunting storyline is a mixture of stepping closer to its better and far more theatrical roots back from 1996 and sacrificing all quality to appeal to a young audience which probably isn't the main audience for the ride anyway which is both frustrating and disappointing to say the least. Dr Ghostman is perhaps the corniest and most unnecessary character I have ever seen for any attraction at a major park and puts a dent in any potential that the ride has of being judged a memorable and quality experience. The Institute of Metaphysical Research Van being used to look brilliant, like it was genuinely an asset of a military agency, and had a cool ghostbusters style logo. It's now painted black with a poor yellow 'RIPA' banner on it which looks more like a supermarket delivery lorry. The pre show has some cool lighting fixtures with a blueish florescence that fits the scene really well, but the video itself is very poor.

As can be seen with some pictures taken by Space Leisure in 1996, the original Haunting had a brilliant finishing touch, and this is what the park should be going for in my personal opinion. It wasn't 'too scary'. It was brilliant, and had a cool Ghostbusters vibe to it that kids would still love now.
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  • The facade looks incredibly poor underneath the top half of the building. The original gothic architecture has been replaced with cheap tacky looking fibers. Numerous signposts are dotted around the site which looks like they've been copy and pasted on Adobe rather than sculpted and painted as if they were real warning signs of an imminent danger. Look how cool the original facade looked.
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  • The corridor would be a great way to set the eeriness of the scene. No flat out jumpscares that kill the build up as you get closer to the library and the chapel, just something unusual and subtle. The flying skeletons really don't deliver on scariness or build up, despite the UV lighting (the smoke machines were a good addition but it still doesn't work). They are too 'out there' and 'tryhard'
  • The library's changes this year are excellent, and I really wasn't expecting it to be so good. The digital projection on the wall is nothing short of fantastic. This is one of those rare occasions where a projection has done better than an animatronic, as the previous Vicars were a little robotic and sometimes the pneumatic movements on the animatronics weren't properly synchronized with the audio. Really good job to DMP for making these changes, and the figures in the ceiling being lit up alongside the thunderstorm is an utterly fantastic tribute to the original and far better storyline. I really hope the Haunting shifts in this direction more and either brings back more elements of the original storyline which the ride was designed to be set around, or at least a new and different interpretation of that story. The ghost projections aren't very good.
  • The madhouse entry corridor has some poor stock videos placed in frames. Lenticular pictures would be far better, look far more realistic, and fit the style of the Vicarage.
  • The chapel itself is okay. The music starts off really well, with some melancholic humming as the madhouse starts up. The rest of the music track is pretty generic sounding haunted house music, the tomb in the middle with the hand needs replacing badly as it's just so anticlimatic.

Overall verdict is that the ride has some spots where it is quite good, but all of these elements are either from the original 1996 story, or were made this year in tribute to that story. Dr Ghostman really needs to go, and lots of work needs doing to improve the theatrical effects of the ride. The lorry would look great in a millitary style forest camo color like this
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Also the new story being set in 2020 and linking back to the year 1996 and the original Dr X mission would also be great. The Haunting has a potential to be a great ride, and with a bit of investment, it could certainly become that. When it was in its earlier days, I remember it was a really iconic ride at the park. When you brought up Drayton Manor with friends, they'd always bring it up and say how awesome the 'upside down bit' is. That isn't the case anymore. It's far more forgettable. But it doesn't have to be that way.
Any other opinions in agreement or disagreement would be appreciated.
 
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Haunting is doing very well this season its recieving a lot of good feedback and i personally cannot wait for a reride this season

Ciaran said:
It does! I think it’s a really effective effect too.
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It was one of my favourite effects the other being the bodies on the roof of the room with the vicar are they still there?
 
The vampire was the worst of them all. The head was to small compared to the rest of his upper body and they bats at the end . The 1 effect I do miss is the air blasts you got on the main ride. Having some air fans In there will also make it feel like your in the present of spirits and ghosts.
 
I appreciate the unfortunate Lightwater Valley incident that has happened over the course of the last 24 hours is a significant story, but let's keep discussion on here relevant to the Haunting. A thread has recently been made to discuss the incident here, where I have moved respective posts
Thanks! :)
 
Went on it today. Love the new effects on the ride. For starters in the 1st room I noticed there added smoke and 2 strobe lights. In the next room they added more smoke machines and lighting. It’s been done very well. The main room really needs work the sound was off.
 
Themeparksandy1981 said:
Went on it today. Love the new effects on the ride. For starters in the 1st room I noticed there added smoke and 2 strobe lights. In the next room they added more smoke machines and lighting. It’s been done very well. The main room really needs work the sound was off.
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There seems to be persistent problems with the sound in the mad house. It seems very anticlimactic without the sound on!
 
Excellent review from Kam above, some good points made. I must say that I do not think Dr Ghostman will go anywhere, the character makes the attraction far more family orientated, something the park need for The Haunting to fit in with their current movement in the family market. I don't think the corridor is too bad at all; the smoke, strobe and UV effects are great - I am quite fond of the effect in this room. Completely agree with what you say about the second room, it's great.

Themeparksandy1981 said:
Went on it today. Love the new effects on the ride. For starters in the 1st room I noticed there added smoke and 2 strobe lights. In the next room they added more smoke machines and lighting. It’s been done very well. The main room really needs work the sound was off.
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Glad you liked it! The new effects and the like are very much welcomed, it's nice to see the chair working also, as well as the lamp on the desk working (although not flicking), I thought the best part was the air blasts in the corridors to the chapel. I do agree, the chapel needs some work in the audio department. I feel like audio is a big part of a Mad House and the sound is weak in there, plus there are the intermittent issues people seem to be reporting here about the audio not working. I've noticed that the audio track starts loud, and then around 25 seconds in the volume drops - would like the park to take a look at this and potentially replace the speaker system to add even more atmosphere to the room.
 
Once again the sound was broken in the chapel yesterday. However today (we visit way too much) it’s working and they seem to have added some additional effects.

The video in the library also appears to have changed. The woman now turns into some sort of skeleton/zombie towards the end of it and is a lot scarier than before. Has anyone else seen this yet?
 
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They really need to change there sign as it really needs to say that the attraction fits 40 guests at a time every 15 mins. They could also have a batching area like Alton Towers does knowing that if you gonna make the next ride and a countdown timer to the next patch to go in so guests who join the queue before the batching area will be waiting at least 30 mins.
 
I think some signage changes to the Haunting could be welcomed. I often hear people in the queue confused as to why they are waiting, perhaps make it more obvious that the ride is on a 10-15 minute cycle. The 40 person limit could be a good one to advertise, especially considering the amount of school groups at the park who can't all fit on at once. Perhaps some signs dotted around the back of the queue and not just at the chain to the trailer?
 
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