The Calendar has flipped over to October, and it is time for us to review Halloween Horror Nights (HHN) 31. Having purchased the Frequent Fear Pass, we have now been nine times as of this writing. We also had the chance to do a 3-house Behind-the-Screams daytime lights-on tour, and Scareactor Dining experience. All of this will be covered below, so lock your windows, bolt your door, and turn out the lights. This article is going to get you ready for spooky season. Warning there may be some intense photos ahead from the daytime house tour.
At this point in the season we wont go into the logistics of what HHN is. You can find that info in our preview article. This article is going to give you a run down of our thoughts on the event overall, and some hopefully fun stories along the way, so grab some popcorn.
Our tale begins with a daytime tour through 3 of the haunted houses at HHN this year. This is an individual purchased VIP tickets, even that needs to be booked well in advance as they sell out quick. You can choose between a 6-house tour and the 3-house tour. For timing purposes we chose the 3 as the 6-house tour is around 6 hours with a not-included lunch break.
The 3 house tour comes with 3 predetermined mazes which for this year include, Halloween, Fiesta de Chupacabras, and Spirits of the Coven which is the order we did the houses in as well. I couldn’t be happier, and was anxious to wear my newly purchased Halloween 2 RSLVTS shirt. Check in happens in the old Blue Man Group theater and then we are led into the backstage portion of the park.
Halloween: Unmasking the Horror Tour
I will preface this section by telling you we are huge Michael Myers fans, and watch the movies even during the non-Halloween season. When we found out that this was on the 3-house tour, we couldn’t wait to get in here and snap photos. One thing odd about the tours is there are certain rooms you are not allowed to take pictures of. Our thought is to keep you in suspense a little as the last scene of this house is amazing, and one of the spots you cannot take photos.
As you see above during the daytime tour they leave the lights on and you can grab photos of the scenes. During the evening you cannot take photos in the mazes, but even if you could they wouldn’t come out that great anyways. There are a lot of special effects going off in the form of, fog, strobe lights, movie dialog, and of course music. All of these elements really give off a creepy in your face vibe. Enjoy the slideshow below of the rest of the Halloween haunted house daytime tour.
Spirits of the Coven: Unmasking the Horror Tour
Next up on our tour is Spirits of the Coven maze. This haunted house looks really great during the event, and is very photogenic during the daytime tour. While this isn’t our favorite maze this year, it still has a really good story, and vibe to it. The idea behind this maze is a witches coven is creating spirits out of love struck men during prohibition. They use flapper girls to attract them in!
Fiesta de Chupacabras: Unmasking the Horror Tour
Last up on our tour is the Fiesta de Chupacabras maze. This particular maze isn’t too scary, however it is beautiful looking. It takes place in a small village which is very colorful, and really plays into the Chupacabra legend just as beautifully. From entering and seeing the mask maker to the eventual reveal of the Chupacabra itself! You can see I came face to face with the Chupacabra and lived!
While we highly recommend the unmasking the horror tour for HHN, we will caution you that this experience is expensive, and is really dependent on the VIP host. Our host was average at best, but we managed to still have an amazing time seeing the haunted houses with all of the lights on. Also you are sort of gambling on which houses you will go through as these sell out very fast, and in most cases before all of the houses are even announced.
Scareactor Dining Experience Halloween Horror Nights
Another addon you can purchase for HHN is a Scareactor Dining Experience which we did. This is held at Louie’s Italian Restaurant. Not only do you get a buffet style food experience, but they also have some of the scareactors wandering around the dining room. Also as a bonus, Michael Myers and The Mummy were included in the professional photos which are also included. Hopefully you don’t get Mike Wazowski’d like I did below with Michael Myers!
You also get to enter Universal Studios early which gives you a huge advantage on getting to the mazes before everyone else. Normally that ticket which is referred to as Stay and Scream is 30 dollars on it’s own, so why not spend a little extra for the scareactor experience? We say go for it!
Halloween Horror Nights Misc. Food
Also we have tried various food from multiple food booths at HHN and can suggest a couple that we feel are better than the rest. Let’s start with the Peperoni Skull Pizza. This is a skull shaped pizza stuffed with peperoni on top of marinara sauce. It really is a great tasting snack and has the HHN look to go with it. We found it a bit hard to cut up and share, but it is easily something you can eat with your hands if you don’t mind the mess.
Our second not-to-be-missed food comes to you courtesy of Meetz Meats. This little area is hidden near Starbucks in a sketchy looking alley way. The décor alone is worth the visit as most of the food is themed to rotten looking meat. Now the one item we will recommend from here and showcase is the Spicy Fried Chicken “Offals” pictured below. This chicken isn’t too spicy, but it really is good. It is one of those sauces that is both sweet and sour, and we grab this chicken every time we go.
Halloween Horror Nights Haunted House Rankings
Here we go our final rankings of all of the haunted houses at Halloween Horror Nights 31! You will get both lists from me and Emma. When we think about the haunted houses we consider several factors, The scenes, do they tell a story? How obvious is the story? Are the set designs immersive putting you in the elements, and of course the placement of the scareactors.
UPDATED 10/31/22
Universal Monsters Legends Collide was awarded best house of the year internally. In our opinion this is warranted. Having gone through the maze multiple times including four times on Halloween night, we agree that this house delivers on, story, scaring, and the team members. The scareactors in this house really bring it when it comes to startling guests. The use of one particular room where you come face to face with all three legendary monsters including a flying Dracula is Halloween Horror Nights perfection!
Below you will find Emma and I’s rankings of the houses. Of course your miles may vary on how you feel if you have been to the event, but it is always fun to talk about such things, so here he go from favorite to least with some commentary to follow, for context we used a 5 point ranking system denoted in the ().
| Kevin’s List | Emma’s List |
| Universal Monsters: Legends Collide (5) | Universal Monsters: Legends Collide (5.1) |
| Halloween (5) | Halloween (5) |
| Dead Man’s Pier: Winter’s Wake (5) | Dead Man’s Pier: Winter’s Wake (5) |
| The Horrors of Blumhouse (3.5) | 5 w/o Freaky | Fiesta De Chupacabras (3.8) |
| Bugs Eaten Alive (4) | The Horrors of Blumhouse (3.5) | 4.8 w/o Freaky |
| Decedents of Destruction (4) | Decedents of Destruction (3.4) |
| Fiesta De Chupacabras (3.5) | Bugs Eaten Alive (3.3) |
| The Weeknd After Hours (3.5) | The Weeknd After Hours (3.3) |
| Spirits of the Coven (3) | Spirits of the Coven (3) |
| Hellblock Horror (3) | Hellblock Horror (3) |
Undoubtedly there are varying things going into rankings as always. One of the things we try to calculate is the story of a haunted house. For instance Halloween follows the already laid out path of a movie so it is hard to mess that story up. Also for both of us we love the Halloween franchise, so it is no surprise it shows up at the top of both of our lists.
The surprise on our lists for anyone who hasn’t been here will definitely be Dead Man’s Pier: Winter’s Wake. This haunted house delivered on so many levels it really does get edged out by Halloween based on our personal bias’s. The set scenes in the house are superb. The house really tells a very obvious and creepy story all while scaring you at the same time. We always let other guests know not to miss this when we get the question, “which house should we not miss?”
Rounding out some of the other mazes, both Emma and I feel that Horrors of Blumhouse would have been amazing if it didn’t have the “Freaky” part in the front. The Black Phone portion of the maze is awesome. The Grabber totally is creepy and all over you in the maze. As the season went on the grabbers really got more brave!
Bugs: Eaten Alive, Decedents of Destruction, and Fiesta de Chupacabras also really tell great stories you can follow through, and are super enjoyable. We especially like coming face to face with the Chupacabra itself multiple times, and also like saying Chupacabra in general!
Of course at the bottom of our lists are The Weeknd, Spirits of the Coven, and Hellblock Horror. We aren’t saying we don’t enjoy these, but they just aren’t on the same level of the ones above them on our rankings. I will say that Spirits of the Coven is a beautifully designed maze but the scareactors inside it are not very well done on the makeup side. By the time HHN 31 ended we were left wondering what Hellblock horror even was.
Final Thoughts on Halloween Horror Nights 31
If you are still with us I thank you! We covered a lot above on one of our favorite events. This year has only 4 well known themed haunted houses which are referred to as intellectual properties (IP) like Halloween for instance. This means Universal created the other 6 haunted houses from scratch which in itself is amazing. Also they used a unique icon this year in “Little Boo” the pumpkin, and also the Pumpkin Lord pictured below based on last year’s event.
In closing we will also suggest this event as it is so much fun. We didn’t even touch on the 5 scare zones which are mostly excellent this year. Universal does a good job at creating a spooky, and fun event. Just remember some tips — arrive early if you don’t buy the Express Pass, avoid Friday & Saturday. The lines become a lot shorter the closer to closing time you get. And the biggest tip, DON’T GO ALONE!!!!! See you in the fog!
OH my GOSH!! Thank you for taking this tour for me! I’m too scary to go!
Glad you enjoyed it 🙂
Nice, informative and scaaaaaary