In a late addition to our Halloween season lineup of events, we had the opportunity to visit Frightmare near Gloucester on 22nd of October 2016. This event offers 5 unique scare attractions, and we were so pleased we were able to experience it! Frightmare is the South West's largest Halloween event and offered a new maze for 2016, The Offering!
CAGED: EVOLUTION
Enter the seemingly abandoned research facility, until you realise the messed up, mutated human/animal hybrid inhabitants have lived on. Only one race stands in their way and it's ours... The Caged are not endangered, you are!
The makeup and costumes were really effective at making the actors look like the human/animal hybrids. The actors were also very active moving around and done a great job at making a variety of noises to really fit in with the theme and create the scares. The length of the maze wasn't too long and the story line was quite tame to some of the attractions. Overall, it still was a strong maze in the lineup and if we had to sum up the maze in one word, freaky would be the word.
Themeing & Story: 6/10 | Actors: 7/10 | Scare: 6/10 | Overall: 6/10
THE OFFERING
Enter into the previously unknown catacombs after hearing of a recent mysterious sighting, but beware of the beings and spirits that may be inside, who feed on fear... your weakness is their strength. Don't let them get too strong, otherwise you may not make it back out to normality.
This maze started off with a lengthy claustrophobic section, and another section where you had to duck with gaps to see the actors at head height so it was unavoidable! Actors continued to scare us throughout, so much, that at one point we had 5 actors surrounding us! Themeing was a little sparse, but we still felt immersed, and the great makeup and actors ensured we were scared. In the end, the maze could use some minor changes to make it as strong as the other attractions but new for 2016, it definitely left a fright!
Themeing & Story: 5/10 | Actors: 7/10 | Scare: 7/10 | Overall: 6/10
SEANCE: 1975
The Crest manor stands empty for decades after a failed exorcism, with the place thought to have been the cause for many mysterious disappearances over the years. Dare you enter the manor yourself and take part in a seance to find the definitive answer to the haunting!?!
This attraction had an impressive amount of themeing, as well as great acting. Heading into the first main room, and as the name may have given away the idea of the attraction, it started with a seance around a table with lots of clever effects in the room including spinning picture frames, it was really effective and clearly a lot of thought and attention to detail had gone into that section alone. The rest of the maze went through lots of creepy scenarios and different scares, including an extremely foggy strobe finale, which overall made for a great experience.
Themeing & Story: 9/10 | Actors: 8/10 | Scare: 7/10 | Overall: 8/10
FRIGHT HOUSE: PLAYTIME
Step into the creepy house and meet it's freakish inhabitants... be prepared for the fright of your life!
Frightmare like to use an introductory video for each of their mazes, and this one was particularly great at creating the creepy atmosphere ready, though the noise of what was about to come at the end of the attraction overpowered the sound of the video at times - not sure if that's a good or a bad thing, but we were definitely scared in anticipation! Once inside we met a lot of clowns and creepy characters who done a great job with a variety of jump scares and following us through parts of the attraction. The themeing was a bit mixed with some plain sections and other parts nicely themed. The ending which we were expecting, took us by surprise when the chase scare... doubled!
Themeing & Story: 6/10 | Actors: 8/10 | Scare: 7/10 | Overall: 7/10
HAUNTED HAYRIDE: JAILBREAK
Climb aboard with the crazed prison guards and enter the cutting edge penitentiary where some of the worst prisoners are allowed to roam free, but remember, you're now on their territory...
This attraction is just simply incredible. Having already experienced the Haunted Hayride at Tulleys Shocktober Fest and being highly impressed, we thought this would need to be something special to beat it. The trailer towed behind a tractor on this version was a lot less open than the ones used at Tulleys, but we soon realised this didn't make much of a difference as we were still getting the up close and personal scares as well as great humour which had everyone screaming & laughing. What makes this attraction so great is the unexpected twist along the way which had us in shock what was going on and what was about to come, with surprise after surprise. What makes it even more unique and incredible to deserve such a high rating, is the sheer scale of the attraction and the number of staff/actors incorporated into it was just completely unexpected.
Themeing & Story: 10/10 | Actors: 10/10 | Scare: 9/10 | Overall: 10/10
SUMMARY OF EVENT
The event had a central dome area with bars and stalls around the outside and a small stage in the middle for entertainment acts, there were also some funny and gruesome roaming characters which made for a great atmosphere. The mazes, though varying in quality, were all great attractions and do scare you due to the excellent actors, with Seance and the Haunted Hayride being some of the highlights of this year's Halloween attractions we've experienced. We would love to return again next year to see what they have to offer, and think you should check it out too!
