Ghostly Manor 2010 Review

This is City Blood’s 2010 review of Ghostly Manor.

What’s Good About The Haunt?
When you first arrive at Ghostly Manor, you’ll see their large castle facade. It features bright lights flashing on and off to Midnight Syndicate music. Then suddenly fog comes rolling out of a dragon’s nose and 2 creatures (Scarefactory) propel from the stone walls. This highly detailed and dynamic facade is a show stopper and simply the best design I’ve ever seen for the outside of a haunt. You’ll notice a lot of people snapping pictures with their camera phones and you may want to also. It’s quite stunning.

The outside facade isn’t the only aspect of Ghostly Manor that’s impressive. Before stepping foot inside the haunt you’ll enter a one of a kind queue line that resembles a forest. This forest includes a few static creepy props and a startling animatronic. After you’ve survived the queue line you’ll be next in line to experience Ghostly Manor. An animated skull named apropriately “Skully”, recites the rules while a video of Ghostly Manor plays on the TV screen next to him. After He’s done, you’re be off to enter the manor.

Ghostly Manor incorporates many different themed rooms into the haunt while still focusing on the haunted manor theme. You’ll experience a haunted forest, a maze of body bags, a polka dot room, a prison with a live execution, a hallway with severed heads covered with maggots, a haunted office, a twisted doll room and everything you could want in a haunted house.

The newest addition to this year’s Ghostly Manor is the brand new pitch black maze that’s inhabited by Freddy Krueger. The night we toured the haunt, the malfunctioning flashlights were not included in the experience. So more than likely when you visit you’ll be exploring this area with some pretty cool malfunctioning flash lights from the company Monster Tronics. 

Ghostly Manor has an incredible amount of animatronics that decorate almost every room. This includes The Impaler, an electric chair, Mongo The Monster, tight claustrophobia tunnels, a vibrating bridge, some CGI, a ghoul popping out of a dressar, hanging body bags and more. Props from Scarefactory, Distortions Unlimited, Unit 70 Studios and more can be seen at Ghostly Manor. Ghostly Manor doesn’t rely soley on eye candy, but instead uses animatronics as a way to distract its customers before an actor pops out to scare you lifeless.

The actors are great with a few who are able to pop up in more than one spot of the haunt. You’ll see them behind a window, when suddenly they’re right next to you a minute later. Another actor will be telling you to watch out for maggots and a few minutes later they’re dropping them on your head.

What’s Bad About The Haunt?
The new outside maze is too long. After about 5 minutes you’re waiting for it to end because there isn’t much going on inside this area of Ghostly Manor. It adds length to the haunt, but doesn’t add much value. There are also a few areas where there’s too much in the way. This is the case with the body bag maze. The body bags seemed to go on forever and it’s pretty difficult trying to not run into a wall because of the body bags blocking your vision. Ghostly Manor has some great props, but the claustropobia tunnel that simulates drowning in a swamp is not set up right or there’s something wrong with the prop. I tried my best to not step on the air bags and fall in the process, but I’m not sure if everyone will have my luck. These areas of the haunt can be fixed.

Customer Service:
If you want it Ghostly Manor has it. When you enter Ghostly Manor Thrill Center you’ll notice that there are plenty of arcade games such as Deal or No Deal. Near the arcade games is a large roller rink if you enjoy roller skating. Ghostly Manor also features an XD 3D Theater. There are many movies to choose from like Canyon 3D Coaster, Haunted Mine, Cosmic Coaster and Aqua Ride. Tickets per person are $7 a movie, 2 movies $12, 3 movies $16, 4 movies $20. There are also pleny of souvenirs and novelties available at Ghostly Gifts Gift Shop and plenty of good eats, treats and drinks .

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