Official 2023 Halloween Horror Nights 32 (Orlando)

[duder92]

This is going to be our first HHN, we are going on 10/20 and I bought express passes. We will not have park tickets for that day (moving over from Disney). We will be sure to line up early, but will we have any difficulty seeing all the houses in one night with Express Passes? Will it be a mad dash to get it all in, or will there be time to take our time a bit? Trying to get a judge of how effective the Express pass will be and what the pace of the night we should prepare for.

Thanks

 

[BGparadise]

This is going to be our first HHN, we are going on 10/20 and I bought express passes. We will not have park tickets for that day (moving over from Disney). We will be sure to line up early, but will we have any difficulty seeing all the houses in one night with Express Passes? Will it be a mad dash to get it all in, or will there be time to take our time a bit? Trying to get a judge of how effective the Express pass will be and what the pace of the night we should prepare for.

Thanks

Although I do not have first hand experience, based on what I have been reading it is possible even stopping for some food a couple times. That being said I do not know if it requires strategy or a fast pace to make It happen.

 

[keishashadow]

Wednesday 10/18
Behind the screams 3 house tour
Express pass night so as many houses as we can manage.

what time is your 3 house tour?

Do you have time to head back to room to take a break before HHN? As hotel guests you could use that entrance and still beat the gate crowd.

EP will be very beneficial. Wednesday is usually a bit slower but, you are getting into prime time for HHN in general.

This is going to be our first HHN, we are going on 10/20 and I bought express passes. We will not have park tickets for that day (moving over from Disney). We will be sure to line up early, but will we have any difficulty seeing all the houses in one night with Express Passes? Will it be a mad dash to get it all in, or will there be time to take our time a bit? Trying to get a judge of how effective the Express pass will be and what the pace of the night we should prepare for.

Thanks

Are you staying in one of the onsite resorts? If so, again, recommend you use the hotel guest special entry Vs the long stand by line. I’ve seen people at the gate well before 4 pm. Assume they wanted to see the opening skit.

appears are visiting on a Friday & late in the season. weekends are always busier, not as bad as most Saturdays.

Read the reviews that will be posted here as to strategies of which houses to visit first and develop your own plan of attack. During the night, be prepared to pivot by keeping an eye on the house wait times on the app.

If you stick it out to the end of the night, should be able to knock off many of the houses and all the scare zones by virtue of just walking from one house to another.

my crystal ball take for the busiest houses with the longest stand by wait-times: ST, Last of Us, the Universal Monsters one, Chucky & the ’dueling dragon’ one.

 

[keishashadow]

credit to HHNCrypts, a spec map of the entrances this year.

 

[CAPSLOCK]

So with 11/1 & 11/2 being added late, but included as Premier free ticket nights, do the experts here think they'll end up being busier than Halloween itself?

 

[macraven]

absolutely…. yes

 

[wmoon]

what time is your 3 house tour?

Do you have time to head back to room to take a break before HHN? As hotel guests you could use that entrance and still beat the gate crowd.

EP will be very beneficial. Wednesday is usually a bit slower but, you are getting into prime time for HHN in general.


Thanks for your advice. We have booked for 10 or 10.30 so should be finished by lunch so enough time for a bit of rest. We did same week last year 3 nights without express and managed everything plus some revisits

what time is your 3 house tour?

Do you have time to head back to room to take a break before HHN? As hotel guests you could use that entrance and still beat the gate crowd.

EP will be very beneficial. Wednesday is usually a bit slower but, you are getting into prime time for HHN in general.



Are you staying in one of the onsite resorts? If so, again, recommend you use the hotel guest special entry Vs the long stand by line. I’ve seen people at the gate well before 4 pm. Assume they wanted to see the opening skit.

appears are visiting on a Friday & late in the season. weekends are always busier, not as bad as most Saturdays.

Read the reviews that will be posted here as to strategies of which houses to visit first and develop your own plan of attack. During the night, be prepared to pivot by keeping an eye on the house wait times on the app.

If you stick it out to the end of the night, should be able to knock off many of the houses and all the scare zones by virtue of just walking from one house to another.

my crystal ball take for the busiest houses with the longest stand by wait-times: ST, Last of Us, the Universal Monsters one, Chucky & the ’dueling dragon’ one.

Thanks for your advice will try the hotel entrance and that will give us a bit longer for downtime than going to stay and scream.

Our tour is in the morning 10ish I think so time for a rest after a bit of lunch.

Looking forward to having express for the one night this year, we did the same sort of dates last year without it and we managed everything plus a few revisits but assuming with the line up it will be generally busier this time.

 

[namelessoracle]

This is going to be our first HHN, we are going on 10/20 and I bought express passes. We will not have park tickets for that day (moving over from Disney). We will be sure to line up early, but will we have any difficulty seeing all the houses in one night with Express Passes? Will it be a mad dash to get it all in, or will there be time to take our time a bit? Trying to get a judge of how effective the Express pass will be and what the pace of the night we should prepare for.

Thanks

You will be fine, but rushed. We have a rule now of never trying to check in to a hotel the night we want to Horror Nights now. We've been burned too many times with them not having our room ready till 5pm, which creates a mad dash of getting everything to the room and then getting to the event. We have missed Stay and Scream 2 times because they couldnt get the rooms ready fast enough. This seems especially bad at the "nicer" hotels. Cabana, Sapphire, and the Endless Summers get you your rooms pretty quick.

Hotel entrance is way faster. So you wont need stay and scream.

10/20 is gonna be interesting. Right before Halloween when people are most in the Halloween mood is popular, but later in the "season" is also usually less popular. its a weekend day too.

I think you will 100 percent get all Houses done. Its just a question if you will get both shows and whatever food booths you want too. But if you take hotel entrance and are willing to say till close, you will get all houses done.

 

[duder92]

what time is your 3 house tour?

Do you have time to head back to room to take a break before HHN? As hotel guests you could use that entrance and still beat the gate crowd.

EP will be very beneficial. Wednesday is usually a bit slower but, you are getting into prime time for HHN in general.



Are you staying in one of the onsite resorts? If so, again, recommend you use the hotel guest special entry Vs the long stand by line. I’ve seen people at the gate well before 4 pm. Assume they wanted to see the opening skit.

appears are visiting on a Friday & late in the season. weekends are always busier, not as bad as most Saturdays.

Read the reviews that will be posted here as to strategies of which houses to visit first and develop your own plan of attack. During the night, be prepared to pivot by keeping an eye on the house wait times on the app.

If you stick it out to the end of the night, should be able to knock off many of the houses and all the scare zones by virtue of just walking from one house to another.

my crystal ball take for the busiest houses with the longest stand by wait-times: ST, Last of Us, the Universal Monsters one, Chucky & the ’dueling dragon’ one.

Thanks for the reply. We are staying at Royal Pacific. Plan is to check in and then head to the Hotel Guest entry. How early should we be in the Hotel line?

Is it worth considering buying early entry, just so we can que inside the park vs being in the hotel line, or is that overkill with having Express Pass?

The houses are our priority, and the ability to somewhat casually enjoy the atmosphere as we walk between them, with little desire to go see any shows. After watching a bunch of videos on YT, it seems like we should be ok, but its always nice to hear some real world experience for how the night feels while trying to see all 10 with EP.

 

[duder92]

You will be fine, but rushed. We have a rule now of never trying to check in to a hotel the night we want to Horror Nights now. We've been burned too many times with them not having our room ready till 5pm, which creates a mad dash of getting everything to the room and then getting to the event. We have missed Stay and Scream 2 times because they couldnt get the rooms ready fast enough. This seems especially bad at the "nicer" hotels. Cabana, Sapphire, and the Endless Summers get you your rooms pretty quick.

Hotel entrance is way faster. So you wont need stay and scream.

10/20 is gonna be interesting. Right before Halloween when people are most in the Halloween mood is popular, but later in the "season" is also usually less popular. its a weekend day too.

I think you will 100 percent get all Houses done. Its just a question if you will get both shows and whatever food booths you want too. But if you take hotel entrance and are willing to say till close, you will get all houses done.

Looks like you replied same time I was replying. Thanks for the info, that covers alot of what I was looking for.

I dont think I can move our trip around to avoid check in and HHN on the same night. If the room is not ready in time, we are prepared to drop our bags with the desk and head to the resorts line prior to gates opening.

Looking forward to our first HHN, after years of Disney/Universal visit, the wife finally felt she could do HHN, so hopefully she makes it out ok, lol.

 

[macraven]

duder92…..

The show is worth it !
It’s a great hoot…

Pull up some of the older shows to get an idea that some things are a do not miss

 

[keishashadow]

This seems especially bad at the "nicer" hotels. Cabana, Sapphire, and the Endless Summers get you your rooms pretty quick.

I’m 50-50 with room being ready before 3 pm at CB.

as long as not booking a suite, the deluxe hotels generally have a room ready before then as long as you aren’t picky as to which specific location, especially at RP as to building #

with little desire to go see any shows. After watching a bunch of videos on YT, it seems like we should be ok, but its always nice to hear some real world experience for how the night feels while trying to see all 10 with EP.

you should be fine! The show is a bit of a time suck as you need to factor in wait time in line for it.

Have noticed that The nearby houses do often see a surge in the standby lines when it lets out.

it will be my first time not being in S&S area for HHN when we have family joining us in Oct this year (who don’t have day tix).

I’m going to try it out one night the first full week in September to see how it works out this year Vs S&S. Will report back here. depending on when the park is cleared of day guests, told it can open anytime after 5 pm.

Hope to read some reports here from those who do the opening weekend!

 

[glamdring269]

I'm booked for a RIP tour but have a potential in on a private tour. Is this basically a no-brainer decision to always go private? Only risk I can see is that the private tour might not do the same route I would do if it were my private tour but on the other hand it's not like I have a choice over the public RIP tour route either. Any other risks I might want to consider (outside of someone stealing my money)?

 

[CAPSLOCK]

I would go with the private every time. You may want to double check that they plan to prioritize houses (you'd think that would be obvious, but I've heard of groups that want to basically bar hop).

 

[keishashadow]

Any other risks I might want to consider (outside of someone stealing my money)?

There is one ‘owner’ of a private tour.

They communicate their desired itinerary to the guide.

As a guest you are basically along for the ride as to itinerary.

You are already recognizant of the major risk

 

[ShadeDK]

Based on the house entrance spec map, there's going to be A LOT of walking this year. Even more than usual. We'll have one or two houses with that long walk around MIB, and having the entrance for The Last of Us over by MIB even though it's in the parade float building (Weeknd/Hill House/Monsters/Seeds of Extinction in prior years) is a trek.

Another thing we don't know is where the house exits will be set up. I've seen some speculation that The Last of Us and Monsters may send their exits all the way back towards MIB. If so, that's going to be a long circuit to get those houses done.

One interesting thing I caught today - per Uni podcasts just put out, all of the scare zones this year are connected to the Oddfellow storyline. For those new to HHN, the design team puts a lot of lore into the event - you can enjoy the event on the surface, but also can dive pretty deep to find house/zone/event storylines that are interconnected with each other (whether in the same year or from previous years).

 

[namelessoracle]

There is one ‘owner’ of a private tour.

They communicate their desired itinerary to the guide.

As a guest you are basically along for the ride as to itinerary.

You are already recognizant of the major risk

What is even worse to me is the possibility that they dont rip you off, but decide that spam repeating Stranger Things rather than hit every house is their top priority that evening.

Also if the "primary guest" decides they really want to take a break for an hour and miss a couple of houses because they want to get their drink on, you cant really do anything. For public tours that I have been on, the guide takes a vote if the group is out of alignment for what thats worth.

I did hear you get a credential that works as "unlimited" express for the rest of the evening including the houses after for private though. So if you saw things were going bad I guess you could bail?

 

[macraven]

Like keisha said….

The person that paid and booked the private tour owns it and calls the shots for the evening event.

 

[soniam]

Keep in mind that for private tours, the tour guide needs to take some breaks. I think it's usually an hour total for mine, which start at 5:30 and run until closing, 2am.

 

[keishashadow]

One interesting thing I caught today - per Uni podcasts just put out, all of the scare zones this year are connected to the Oddfellow storyline.

leading to the million $ Q for many…in what shape or form will Jack be presented this year