What should come and go for Halloweekends?

^ Yes Peggy is the lady that is in charge of hiring the Screamsters. You can still apply, but you'll be on a list to contact if they need you. Just like Zeek said, people will either quit or randomly not show up. So there may be a chance that you'll be contacted to be a Screamster this year.

I have a feeling Terror Island may be a little more popular this year....haha

You're probably right, though the reasoning isn't very logical. The haunt is going to be dark, and flooded with fog. It will be almost impossible to even catch a glimpse of the construction site. (Not that there will be that much to see during Halloweekends anyway -- unless you have a strange attraction to footers.)

^ Haha, I was thinking the same thing. And not to mention the fact that you need to keep moving through the zone. I remember last year where people would stop and take pictures of M. Force going by. That caused quite a few problems where the people would get backed up and cause no movement.

^^ Actually, I suspect that dredging will come long before footers--of which this ride, unlike a coaster, will require fairly few.

For those of you that were wondering when the houses open each day, here are the times for this year:

Open Fridays at 8 PM
Open Saturdays at 5 PM
Open Sundays at 1 PM (3 PM on Oct. 11)

It is crazy to think HalloWeekends is THIS Friday! I wait for this event all season long.

The park is really looking great! It's always exciting to see the 1st sign of HalloWeekends pop up during the Summer months, and to see the progress over the months and what it all finally transforms into. These last 2 weekends were really exciting to see that the park is almost fully transformed and ready to go.

The Toy Factory looks amazing. I love the big Jack out front. I wonder if the Toy Truck will play any music (since I see there is a loud speaker on top...) I am sure they have something cool planned for that.

I am really curious to see what Eerie Estate has in store for us. I have heard such great things about both houses, this year should be a real treat!

Aside from the Midway Monsters and magic show I have not seen any of the HalloWeekend shows, so I am really looking forward to all of them as well.

I am most excited for the return of CornStalkers. This zone blew me away last year. I knew it would be good, but wow! I have been to a lot of Halloween events and CornStalkers is one of my all time favorite Halloween attractions, and is by far the best corn stalk/corn field attraction I have been through. The whole feeling of the zone is surreal, I love it!

Another part of Halloweekends that I love is the Monster Midway Invasion parade. What's not to love about a Halloween themed parade.

I could go on and on, but I will stop for now.

As for the future of Halloweekends, and maybe it was already mentioned on a previous page, but I would love to see a Haunted Train Ride, or Halloween story train ride. Something Halloween themed, especially since they already have the skeletons, which could be nicely incorporated.

On Saturday night the truck was playing some really creepy music.

I'm looking forward to halloweekends. This year seems to be the best year yet.

CornStalk said:
Aside from the Midway Monsters and magic show I have not seen any of the HalloWeekend shows, so I am really looking forward to all of them as well.

I caught about 30 seconds of the Red Garter show. It won't be worth seeing again. Part of the greatness of that show in the past was having a live band performing. With a DJ and dancer/singers they might as well just pre-record it and have them lip-sync.

pointperson said:
On Saturday night the truck was playing some really creepy music.

Awesome! I can't wait to check it out.

I agree. Each year, especially these last few, the event has really improved greatly.

lol That is about how much I caught of it the other night too. The show was going on as we walked by so we peeked in. That was all we needed to see as well. Like you said, without the live band it makes it much less appealing. I know the performers work hard for it, but for that kind of show the more live aspects the better.

Here are some behind the scenes pictures of terror island, and the toy factory. There are also some great shots of millennium force from on the island.

http://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Thread/56468.aspx

Also was able to see the new red garter show, and unfortunatly it is as horrid as I was expecting. Bring back the band. Parts of the show were a joke and we could not help but just laff at how bad it was.

The girls did an o-k job singing, but that was the only bright spot of the show. It had nowhere near the energy and excitement that the monsters rock show had.

I also noticed that chris lynn is back this year in the cenntennial theater.

The latest Blog Entry came out yesterday. Dave is back!

When you see Dave under the show lighting - he's actually pretty creepy. His animation wasn't working Saturday night, but his lights were. I hope to see him back in action the next time I'm at Happy Jack's.

I would be surprised if the animation aspects of Dave are up and running. He's been sitting around for quite some time, I'd expect him to just be stationary. He's still creepy looking with the lighting.

So I wonder if the screamsters on Terror Island get especially keyed up for today , since Sept. 19th is International Talk Like A Pirate Day?

Last night (friday) was pretty lame as far as haunts go. Most screamsters were just standing there talking to eachother or walking around not doing there jobs. It was really obvious in Cornstalkers. Last year it was my favorite. Last night, it was pathetic. Terror Island was bad compared to last year too. Fright Zone was pretty good, thanks to the sliders. Such a cool looking job! Hopefully the suckyness of the zones will improve over the following weeks. I hope it was just 1st week things. Things that can be fixed.

I didn't have the chance to go through Happy Jack's because it was around an hour wait, but Estates was amazing! This was a fun zone and made up for the bad jobs the other zones were doing.

Yeah, seems like the screamsters get more charged as they go along through the season, judging by past years. I skipped the first weekend so they can practice up a little more.

I'll tell ya what though...take a young blond girl with you, and suddenly every screamster in the park has something to work for! They LOVE easy targets. As a 6 ft+ tall guy, I'm ignored otherwise.

Would love to hear more reviews of Halloweekends 09 though... Really excited, especially for Happy Jack's & Eerie Estate.

Timing is such a key factor when going through the Haunts. It can really make or break the whole experience. Went through all of them last night, and aside from one room in Toy Factory everyone was really on their game.

Terror Island was so much better when I went through it last night vs. all of the times I went through last year.

That sucks everyone was messing around when you went through "Your mom is too fat..." It really is a bummer to go through an attraction when people are just standing around, goofing off, and acting like they could careless about what they are supposed to be doing.

Andy, I was wondering that exact same thing about the Terror Island gang lol

I know that there are some zones that are also at Kings Island, but are they the exact same layout, or does the attraction vary by park. Is the attraction the same in every park? KI has a Club Blood, and a Corn Stalkers, but are they the same as the one's at CP? Thanks.

First, long time reader, seldom poster.

I went to the park this Friday and it was the first time I had ever been to Halloweekends so I was pretty excited to experience all the haunts. However, I have to say I was pretty disappointed with it. Maybe I was expecting too much?

We were a group of 4, two guys, two girls, we are in our mid 20s. We found the Zones to be pretty underwhelming, CarnEvil and Terror Island were very "meh." At one point we had a screamster go with, "Hey! Look, that ship is on fire." And I really didn't understand the hide in a corner and then make a B-Line to follow someone...but they didn't do anything, they just walked behind us until we saw them out of the corner of our eyes and then they walked away.

The Fright Zone was pretty cool, the sliders especially. However the two girls in our group were constantly being hit on in the Zone, it was pretty ridiculous.

As far as the Houses go the best one when it came to sheer scares was Undertaker U and it wasn't even close. Sure it lacked the details of Erie Estate and Happy Jakes, but man, we jumped constantly in this house and the actors were dead on-no pun intended...well maybe a little. They knew how to use the corners and more importantly knew the right time to jump out and get us, right before we made a turn. It was a blast! And that bridge? Whoa man, I was still swaying once I made it across.

As far as Happy Jake and Erie Estate the details were great, however the actors left a lot to be desired. The construction of the houses made it pretty obvious where they would be hiding and their timing was awful. We would be walking past, see them in the corner, and then they would jump at us. This was especially true at Erie Estate, Happy Jack got us once I think.

I don't want to sound like I am complaining. We had a great time. We decided on a Friday because I had read on here that it is pretty dead-ok I'll stop after that one-and it was true. I think the longest line was Maverick and it was about 20 minutes. So we did have a lot of fun, I guess I was just expecting some truly terrifying Houses and outside of Undertaker U they didn't deliver.

Maybe we went too eary? It was the very first night. We were talking to a Magnum Op about it and he said that the screamsters do get better as the season goes on because they know what they are doing by then. Maybe I should try the second Friday next year?