RingMaster

Like I said before, there's a difference between pro wrestling and the wrestling seen in Half-Pint Brawlers. Pro wrestling is, as you just said, purely scripted, and if there is blood involved, it's usually stage blood. Half-Pint Brawlers do what they call Backyard Wrestling, which is all real, with real blood. Backyarders also use real weapons in their arsenal, like baseball bats wrapped in barbed wire, fluorescent light tubes, and staple guns. Backyard Wrestling picked up momentum a couple years back when the infamous Insane Clown Posse got involved, as well as had two video games made for last-gen consoles (PS2 and Xbox). Also, the Half-Pint Brawlers are on Spike TV, a channel made mainly for the adult male crowd. The same adult male crowd that loves the good ol' taste of beer. You only need to look at several vids of them to see their fanbase. ...and it's working. Yeah, and if it further hurts the image of the park to the point where attendance at both the Haunt and the park itself goes down (and even to the point where the Haunt name itself may be tarnished and other Cedar Fair Haunts may become hurt by it)....well, at least we'll know the marketing gimmick worked.

Well, Mr. Springer WAS once the good ol' Mayor of Cincinnati. Maybe this was all his idea.

A bit harsh coming from me, but if Kings Island jumps another spot in the list for Best Halloween Attractions next year, I'm not going back for the Haunt. I thought it was bad enough that they're number five as it is with what all happened last year, but now with backyard wrestling involved (of which it involves the real bloodshed and violence shown in the trailer above), they've pretty much opened door for any sort of violence to come into the park, staged or real, monsters or guests. And I know it's in a (somewhat) secluded area within the Festhaus and not out in the open for families to catch a peek and get offended by, but there's two things still wrong with this: 1) It's the Festhaus. The most popular place to eat in the park has the most graphic experience in the park hidden inside its doors. Don't think it will have that much of an effect? Think back to last year's Ghouls Gone Wild when the "late-nite" version debuted. All that was different was shorter skirts and a swear thrown into the mix. Was nothing compared to Dead Awakening/Hot Blooded at the Showplace Theater. 2) Drunks don't stay in one place for too long. Especially when they're in the middle of an amusement park, at night, during October, and there are haunted houses to mess around in. Unless the shows are continuous in the Festhaus (which they aren't according to the schedule on the site), then they'll get up and go run around the park causing a ruckus (most likely attempting to recreate some of the moves they just saw during the show with catastrophic results).

....wow. Really? I can definitely understand why Planet Snoopy deserves the title of Best Kids' Area what with their vast array of kids' coasters. But there is no way our Haunt deserves the number 5 spot for Best Halloween event. Not when there are seven other Haunts in the chain that have yet to be recognized and are, in some cases, better than ours, without resorting to shock value marketing-wise (celebrity skeletons and live farm animals notwithstanding).

They're too busy fuming over the fact that, instead of getting a Beemer Invert or a Timmy Hyper, we're getting a 300-foot-tall Zephyr with the same name as the other three being installed at three other parks in the chain.

Which, once again, I do not see them adding a Doll Factory maze (or even a Scary/Feary Tales maze) to the lineup anytime soon, as it fits the creepy, bloodless, goreless tone the park is now trying to shy away from. Although, I could possibly some themes from the Slaughterhouse rub off onto a Dollhouse maze, what with undesirable bodies and internal organs being shipped off to the butcher shop and a particularly graphic scene involving how one actually MAKES a doll out of a human being (too graphic to recount here). EDIT: Saw the werewolf picture for Wolf Pack. Hopefully the rest of the wolves look just as scary as that one and it should be a good maze.

Tomb Raider was down the second half of the 2007 season as they were taking out the third row for the following year. Scrambler was closed because half of the ride was taken down for the queue line for Massacre Manor (which now utilizes the Skyline Patio as the queue and Scrambler is now open).

....spelled werewolves wrong. I was assuming that the site would resemble more like Scarowinds with the X in the title, seeing as how this is the tenth year our Haunt has been around; it would at least explain why it's taken so long to get the site up and running. But I guess an anniversary celebration isn't all that important to them (the park's 35th and The Beast's 30th were pushed aside to promote Firehawk and Diamondback).

Huh....selling it on eBay for $65,000, and we're getting a flat ride that costs $5 million. Or, rather, the original price tag as $150,000 on the blog site from last year, and we're getting a flat ride that costs $5 million. Granted, yes, Coney Mall is finally getting a much-needed flat ride installed for next year, but to have simply ONE attraction cost five million (let alone a flat ride, of all attractions) is not only overkill, but also really a poor decision money-wise. Several small flat rides can be bought for that amount and placed in several areas of the park and not just Coney. Even a GCI woodie could be installed for another mil or two. Firehawk, Thunderhawk, Dominator, Possessed, and Carolina Cobra were all moved from GL. Why can't Big Dipper be moved as well (despite Villain and Raging Wolf Bobs being demolished)?

...so... ...how about that WindSeeker? I hear it's gonna be 301 feet tall! Can't WAIT to ride it next year!

I don't exactly think that midget wrestling will bring thousands through the gates but hey, at least it's something different... If a skeleton of Steve McNair and a couple of live goats can bring thousands through the gates, then surely a couple of half-pint brawlers could do the same. Oh, wait...

I always assumed that, with the replacement of the live animals with their stuffed and fluffy counterparts, the story revolved around that particular incident, to the point of the owners of the butcher shop deciding to use human meat as means making a living (or in this case, KILLING). In fact, it made it even funnier to see the "On Strike" posters hanging up around the pens, as if the live animals actually DID go on strike. It would've been amazing to see a Chick-fil-A style marketing gimmick with a bunch of anthropomorphized farm animals holding signs saying "Eet Mor Humin" and protesting in front of the maze, to give the maze that darkly comedic feel, something the event desperately needs.

Don't worry; you still have the Dippin' Dots/Lemon Chill Guy and Cabana Girl to tell you everything you need to know...

Had the rest of the event been as ground-breaking and revolutionary as they claim it to be, then I would agree with the display being "a work of publicity-stunt brilliance." As it stands, though, with the extreme disappointment I felt with Slaughterhouse and the fact that several mazes have yet to receive a major overhaul since their inception (four of them turn 10 next year), I feel more attention needs to be paid towards actually MAKING the event ground-breaking and revolutionary instead of just throwing a couple of swimming pools of blood on everything and getting everyone to believe it's brand-new (although there are some things they do get right and have done really well).

Okay, part of me is really excited for this show as it makes for a wildly different experience the Haunt has to offer and it's "little people" WRESTLING. But the other part of me is really worried that this will bring out more rude and rowdy crowds than normal, as some HPB fans are normally of the loud, drunk, and insensitive variety.

I like everything about that ground plan except for taking out the path directly in front of Eurobubbles. With that plan in place, it creates a bottleneck at the end of Coney Mall to where it will be hard to maneuver by the entrance to Vortex. It'll make things worse come Haunt time next year when Urgent Scare opens back up and three big attractions are ten feet away from each other (US, Seeker, and Tex). Not unless they take out the last garden block and the two smaller blocks next to Tex's queue. But I do love the idea of having that bathroom moved up from its prior location. It'll make the walk from Firehawk/Flight of Fear to the nearest restroom that much more bearable .

Except this is the same expensive ride rendering that said Diamondback would have lush foliage and rocks in the splashdown lake and that Backlot Stunt Coaster would have lush gardens sprinkled throughout the ride area. I would've preferred the ride to have a more clever name like Windstorm, Maelstrom, or Hurricane (or even awkwardly-spelled variations like WyndStorme or Hurrikana). But, as it stands, a second thrill ride that towers 300+ feet is IMPRESSIVE.

This makes me wonder if the animals that were supposed to be in Slaughterhouse last year are back this year or if they just got fed to a pack of wolves or something of that nature. If they aren't, in fact, coming back, I want to see the whole second half of the maze completely redone to further detail the inner workings of the actual shop itself; to me, it seemed as if the whole maze was riding on having live animals in there as a form of shock value and nothing else. When they were axed from the maze (no pun intended), it showed that the rest of the attraction was very bare bones and nowhere near as intriguing or detailed as some of the previous mazes (in a twisted sort of way, Cut-Throat Cove had more detail than Slaughterhouse). The talent in there was awesome, I'll give them that. But the surroundings and scenery just fell flat on its face and I was just not impressed with it at all. Especially when Urgent Scare last season upped its game and added onto the last third to make it the best maze I've ever seen/walked through, the butcher shop set-wise just plain sucked. EDIT: Again, the talent in Slaughterhouse was really really good. I just hated the look and setting of it is all.

So apparently a thrill ride HAS to be a roller coaster now? It can't be a flat ride like Delirium or Drop Zone or even smaller rides like Shake, Rattle, & Roll or Monster? And does this mean it also has to be 200+ feet tall and be made by either Intamin or B&M? I guess this also means that Drop Zone, Delirium, and Tomb Raider weren't worthy of press releases either, then?

Geez, everyone's voracious for any form of news or rumors involving the Haunt to the point of getting ready to gang up on and pounce on an unsuspecting victim. All I can say is just go lay down; everything will be revealed in due time.

You are, of course, talking about a company whose flagship park has built four Timmys in the past ten years (five if you count Shoot-the-Chutes). Not to mention their last Beemer was close to 15 years ago (Mantis), and the fact that they only have TWO Beemers in their lineup (the rest are five Arrows, two more Timmys, one Toboggan, a Schwartz, a Komie, and a Dinn).

The only reason why Flight of Fear still has the flood lights on to this day is to keep people from line jumping in the hangar. If you recall the old days, there would be two instances in the preshow area where the entire hangar would go pitch black to simulate a complete system shutdown (as per the government official "pulling the plug on the whole operation", so to speak) and reset itself. Well, every time that happened, numerous amounts of people saw that as an excuse to hop over rails and get further and further into the line (although it was quite difficult to maneuver in the darkness even WITHOUT trying to cut in line). Thus, the floodlights came on, and line jumping came to a (supposed) standstill.* *Rumors suggest that the reason the majority of the lighting and special effects remain either off or unfixed is due to the floodlights being on, as it negates that simulation of a system shutdown as mentioned earlier. Also, and I know I'm gonna get flamed for this, but Universal has its fair share of instances to where effects be broken and remain unfixed for quite some time. The Incredible Hulk coaster, as well as a lot of attractions at Islands of Adventure are under the same situation that Flight Deck is to where paint is chipping and fading or going into disrepair (a good chunk of which was restored to its original beauty just weeks prior to Harry Potter's Grand Opening). Several effects on Revenge of the Mummy are usually turned off in the slow months and sometimes don't get fixed for quite a while when broken (or they go into lengthy rehabs that last up to a full year at times).

I actually very distinctly remember the MTV Soundwave concept on the Paramount Panel survey. The art showcased for it was the queue area, which was almost exactly like FoF's. It even had the saucer. I think they may have added some lighting or something. But you know... it was Paramount... it would have looked beautiful for a few weeks then everything would have stopped working. Other concepts that I remember on the survey were an indoor snow playing area, and yes - a family-friendly roller coaster themed to the blockbuster Paramount movie, The Italian Job. I also remember a new preshow experience for Tomb Raider (Chamber of Fire), a Mission Impossible-themed stunt show (which became Hollywood Stunt Spectacular at Canada's Wonderland for a year), a Vekoma Tilt Coaster themed to Top Gun, an outdoor ride themed to a car wash filled with Nicktoons, and, of course, an indoor/outdoor dark ride/coaster themed to SpongeBob SquarePants. But on Firehawk, I very distinctly remember a lot of marketing hype surrounding the ride, specifically the fact that it was "Kings Island's first flying roller coaster." I know this is true because the celebration of the park's 35th anniversary got shut out to promote Firehawk (much like The Beast's 30th anniversary got shut out to further promote Diamondback).

Seems like a very bittersweet way to say the coaster is not returning next season by installing a Haunt inside its station. Though it may not be permanent and the maze could move to another location the following year (see Cut-Throat Cove and CarnEVIL).

Things are looking mighty hairy within the confines of the Son of Beast station. One can only hope that the vampires next door aren't overly territorial, and I wish each party will stick to their individual neck of the woods so as they don't get into any fights during the event.