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The Haunting

The problem is they will need to pay top money for actors/actress for it to really work as if I’m just getting paid minimum wage and just working round different groups every 15 mins.
They need a way to have automated doors and you got a story line to follow and then you really only need 1 member of staff in the mad house, 1 operating the ride and 1 loading the pre show.
 
Themeparksandy1981 said:
The problem is they will need to pay top money for actors/actress for it to really work as if I’m just getting paid minimum wage and just working round different groups every 15 mins.
They need a way to have automated doors and you got a story line to follow and then you really only need 1 member of staff in the mad house, 1 operating the ride and 1 loading the pre show.
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And automated doors are cheaper to build and maintain than actors... yeah...

Besides. They don't need actors, just staff members who will go along with the story. It's not a lot to ask from your workers, surely.
 
Anth0ny said:
I’ve visited many times over the past few weeks, and had many strange rides on The Haunting…

As a huge fan of The Haunting, I always look forward to the storyline, immersion and atmosphere of the ride. I’m sorry to say this has been single handedly destroyed by a worker on my last few visits.

During the truck video, the staff member behind the boards shouted “Hi There!” when Dr X introduced himself. He also made ringing noises and held his hands to his ears when the video mentioned “Staffordshire Police”. The same guy makes beeping sounds when the video tape is running. He then proceeded to repeat lines from the video, like “we need your help”. He kept banging on the metal boxes at the front, and kept screaming at certain points throughout the video. On one occasion, he or another worker kept banging the door into the skeleton corridor, distracting the group and making the video inaudible.

The conduct in the projection room is by far the most abnormal. Firstly, when this guy works on The Haunting there’s 2x workers in this room, but everybody else leaves it with 1x worker…

When the sequence begins, he shouts “here we go”, which completely detracts from the immersion and makes it obvious a button has been pressed. When the portrait says “I am the lady of the house”, he yells loudly from the back “No you’re not, I am!” When the portrait says “did nobody warn you to keep away”, he yells loudly “They did, but I chose to ignore them”. He then paced the rear of the room, repeating phrases like “the lady of the house” in a weird, disconcerting voice. On another cycle, he seemed to be responding to the questions the portrait projection asks with either “Yes” or “I have” or “They are” — completely unnecessary and strange.

Perhaps one of the most strange things I’ve ever witnessed is the worker blatantly making meowing sounds like a cat. He kept repeating them and then shouting “Where’s that cat noise coming from” and “who let out a cat” — what’s The Haunting got to do with a cat, and how does this add to the immersion in any way? On one of the rides, he placed his hands on my shoulders, and was tapping guests on their shoulders. Surely this isn’t something that Drayton Manor allow, given the signage doesn’t state that live actors are present, or that they may touch you?

When in the ride itself, the same worker asks guests over the tannoy to “raise their hands in the air like you just don’t care” whilst the worker physically in the ride is trying to get things ready, further slowing things down. He also continued to scream strange phrases down the tannoy throughout the ride, making any themed audio inaudible. Myself and the other customers were completely bewildered by his behaviour.

I don’t want to drop this guy in it, but these strange things only happen when he’s working on The Haunting, and that doesn’t feel right to me. I’m up for comedy as much as the next person, but this just seems very extreme and far too regular.

I can’t imagine what less regular customers are thinking — I’m a regular and I’m confused!
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Yes i had a similar experience today, with the staff talking over the video and also banging on the crates at the front.

What i thought was strange was the member of staff with the wet floor sign banana on his head and walking through the ride with this on, other that that confusing bit the ride was running well although it had quite a lot of down time
 
A wooden clad Haunting with AI footage, no real storyline, and an unimaginative theme. Or, the decent-ish product that’s there now…

I know which I’d pick! Looping don’t have the ability to produce a high quality outdoor attraction, let alone something that literally relies on the theming.
 
For us , when we go through with children , the only bit they seem to get scared about is the library element. However in our experience it seems to be the noise level which I do admit is far too loud and the graphic lady of the house. When it used to be the animatronic I don’t think it was as scary as it was more like a 90’s theme.
 
Anth0ny said:
A wooden clad Haunting with AI footage, no real storyline, and an unimaginative theme. Or, the decent-ish product that’s there now…

I know which I’d pick! Looping don’t have the ability to produce a high quality outdoor attraction, let alone something that literally relies on the theming.
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They can produce High Quality outdoor attractions with Frontier Falls, Gold Rush and Adventure Cove Rapids
 
Trooper Looper said:
And automated doors are cheaper to build and maintain than actors... yeah...

Besides. They don't need actors, just staff members who will go along with the story. It's not a lot to ask from your workers, surely.
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Just saying for the record, I would love to be an actor for an actor-led experience, even if it was just a temporary event one :D
 
Right with a budget of £250000 they could have a ride to be proud of.
For Starters remove the Ai signage, RIPA signage and the B&Q shed.
Continue removing the Ivy and repair the window frames but what they look real like Alton Towers have with there windows on the curse and add lighting behind.
Repaint the building and get the cellar door working like it was before.
Keep the Audio outside but add the vicar voice laughing every now and then.
The bulbs in the lights replace them with flicking bulbs and add misters.
All signage updated with telling guests it’s a maximum of 32 guests per 15 mins.
Also the Trailer it needs to go as it wasn’t even around back in the day and build a building to look like u are entering round the side of the house.
You enter and there a new video and it features the sheriff of Frontier Falls who reports strange going on at the former vicarage and needs our help.
You enter the cellar and you see the Skeletons still and you hear the vicar laugh again.
You enter the library and the lady of the house is replaced with a projector of the vicar and they play his former audio but keep all the current effects.
You enter the mad house and the grave is still there but the moving projectors are back but there of the vicar and when the grave opens the vicar pops out instead.
When you exit the press buttons have been removed and replaced with a video of the Sheriff thanking us for our help.
 
The haunting where they having a lot of TLC in the queue line
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The ride itself has really had a lot of downtime this year. On our last 3 visits it’s broken down twice while we were queuing and once were we were on it. The ride started fine but only the outer wall was moving so they stopped it and had to get Maintenance out to get the outer wall back into the park position and then reset everything so they could run the cycle but they left the mic on in the control room so all you could hear was them talking over.
 
Went on the other day! I've never seen it in such a good state in a long time! Everything was working minus 2 smoke machines, and the projector looks a little brighter and sharper now! The Garden still looks great with Everything cut down.

The madhouse seems a bit smoother now aswell, which is a wlays a big plus!! The audio seems a bit louder than usual in there aswell!
 
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