This year I received an email that they were holding an Open House / Dry Run night prior to opening to the public and we were invited to check it out. We met the owners of this haunt a few years back at a HauntX convention in LA and really hit it off. Unfortunately we never got a chance to check out their haunt due to the fact they run it only on Halloween. This haunt was a little ways away, but completely well worth it.

The theme this year, Ravenswood Asylum 2, is a sequel to a theme they had used a few years ago. The first thing you will notice about this haunt is the attention to detail throughout. Going just once is not enough, after the haunt we were privileged enough to get a behind the scenes tour and were just astounded by the little things we did even notice the first time through. We were all really impressed by the very simple yet wholly effective ways they were able to achieve such detail. Everything was extremely tactile, there were things dangling from the ceiling, lights flickered, there were whispers coming from all sides, and the actors murmured.

While on the subject of actors I was really impressed that not a single one used a “Boo” or “Rawr”. Every actor there that night was fully into their character and for the most part it was hard to tell that some were not there (not all their actors could make it to the dress rehearsal). Every actor felt like they were fully enveloped by their character and at time you forgot these were actors in a haunted attraction.

One of my personal favorite items of the haunt was their “Hellevator”. This elevator was one of the most convincing elevators I have experienced in a haunt. We even heard another guest ask if they had added a basement to their haunt. I will not say too much more as I do not want to ruin any surprises, but this was a 1st rate effect. It truly is something you have to experience.

Do not miss this haunt. We thought that we had seen the gold standard for home haunts with Hauntworx, but the obvious love, care, and attention to detail makes this a home haunt that other home haunts should be envious of.

I normally do not do this but this haunts website is a little hard to find unless you know where to look for it so I am providing a link to the it here.

Summary:

Pros:

• The actors at this haunt are my new “Gold Standard” for home haunts
• The decor was 1st class, and put some pro-haunts to shame
• “Hellevator” effect was one of the best elevators I have ever experienced

Cons:

• The only con I can come up with is that it is only open “full scare” on one night Be sure you catch it if you can

Overall we give it our best zombie rating of 5 out of 5 zombies.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 27th, 2008 at 2:30 pm and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.