855 Mayflower Road, Niles, MI
Year: 2015
Our 2015 haunt season kicked off in style with our annual visit to Niles Scream Park in Niles, Michigan. Located about 90 minutes from Horror Tourers home base, Niles is home to five different haunted attractions, all connected with a carnival-like midway section. The main attraction is the Niles House, which is a large haunted house filled with multiple themed rooms and numerous ways to wander through. Additionally, there are two smaller haunted houses (one in 3D), a hayride, and a haunted trail with both indoor and outdoor features.
Visitors can purchase tickets for each haunt individually, or can get tickets for all of them for only $30, a very good deal, especially when compared with the prices for some of our local Chicagoland haunts. The themes to haunts change every year, so each visit is different from the previous one, even for those who have been back year after year. The main house, haunted trail, and hayride are all about 25 minutes each, and the two smaller houses are about five to seven minutes in length, so plan on spending at least two to three hours on site in order to experience everything. As we have mentioned before, Niles is a throwback to family friendly entertainment with a Halloween twist. It's carnival midway hearkens back to state fairs and amusement parks of old, and its haunt scares some more in the form of old fashioned startles, sound effects, and animated props. If you're looking for Hollywood style effects and huge marketing hype you won't find it at Niles, but you will find a safe, family-friendly environment where individuals young and old can have fun, have some good food, play some games, and even get a few scares out of it, all for a very decent price. So how about the haunts? Are they any good? Well of course they are! Taking each of them individually, we loved the 3D haunt this time around. It was a House of Horror theme and featured clowns, dolls, and other creepy things that might scare you in the dark. Some of the 3D effects were excellent, including walls with holes in them through which clown faces seemed to float out of and an actor in a black bodysuit that had 3D effects on it that looked as though he was transparent. There were some good actors inside as well, including the aforementioned guy int he black bodysuit, who hid when we tried to look at him, then came out and danced as we left the room, and a creepy girl inside a cabinet to opened the door and screamed "I need more dolls!" Ashes to Ashes, the smaller "traditional" haunt had some excellent sets, including a classroom with an evil nun at a desk who berated visitors as they passed by as well as another, similarly evil nun in a library setting, and a new wooden structure on the outside where a very creepy (and excellent) actor dressed as a scarecrow was waiting for the unsuspecting to walk by. The haunted hayride featured a "Night Terrors" theme, which focused on dreams and things that people might fear. New this year was a movie at both the beginning and the end that set up the scenes visitors would see and also provided a cool scare as the hayride ended. Scenes to note were a pig-headed creature in a butcher shop behind a wire fence, a giant snake with a human head that lunged at visitors, a large castle setup with stained glass windows featuring the Frankenstein monster and his bride, as well as a very well-realized gargoyle costume on a live actor. Overall, the hayride is usually more comical and bizarre than scary, and that seems to be how it is supposed to be taken. Our hayride narrator had an outrageous European accent, much like the stereotypical mad scientist in the movies, and many of the individual scenes focused on sight gags or just the plain odd (such as a Moai head with a moving stone tongue). However, there was one good scare - a scene where a hidden jeep drives straight toward visitors as they pass by, turning at the last moment and coming quite close to the moving hay wagon. This year featured a water cannon that sprayed water on those unlucky enough to be close to it. |
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The main house featured a Stephen King theme this year, with scenes from numerous movies, including Silver Bullet, Carrie, The Shining, The Stand, Misery and more. Some standouts included the Misery room, where a crazed actress playing the Kathy Bates character comes out wielding a hammer and proclaiming she's visitors' biggest fan, the Carrie room with a prom night surprise, and our favorite, a swamp/jungle scene with waterfall where a giant wolf character comes out of the foliage to menace visitors. As usual, the set design was quite creative, from painted backdrops depicting the Colorado Rockies (setting of the Shining), to the main house area which was decked out like a hotel lobby (also from The Shining), to the outside facade of the house, which visitors see in the distance as they approach through a cemetery. It gives the setup an isolated feeling.
Finally, there was the Field of Screams, which is the haunted trail. In the past, this has been our least favorite for various reasons, including too much reliance on mazes, which resulted in getting lost and going in circles,too few actors, which made for long stretches with nothing going on, and very little lighting, which made props difficult to see. We're happy to say that this year's version was much improved, with much better lighting and better mazes, too. Although the mazes were there, they were relatively easy to navigate so the frustration level was low. The number of actors still could be larger, as often there was only one actor in a very large scene, and then no actors until a few scenes later. As the trail is primarily just that - a trail - more actors would mean more variety. However, where there were actors they were quite good. Special mentions must go to the creepy doctor/patient character who welcomed us to his maze of turns covered by white sheets, a creepy female clown who stalked us through another part of the maze appearing and disappearing randomly and giggling like a crazy person each time she appeared - good stuff.
Favorite scenes included a crashed hearse with a zombie actor hiding behind it who stalked us into the next area, a Friday the 13th/Camp Crystal lake setup with running water, forest/jungle scenes and even the Friday the 13th theme music (alas, no Jason, though), and a cornfield near the end that featured none other than our favorite, Mike Myers, hiding behind some corn stalks and silently menacing visitors - an excellent ending to a much improved Field of Screams!
Overall, Niles gives a huge value for the money. It offers over 90 minutes of haunts, games, food, shows, and even free movies (White Zombie and The Monster Maker were on tap when we visited), all for one low price. It's easily the type of place that one can take the entire family too, and kids of all ages will enjoy the fun scares, the humorous actors, and the nostalgic atmosphere that permeates the entire location. One can easily tell that Niles is a labor of love with a family feel to it, and it's easy to see why it's so popular. It's an effective kickoff to each haunt season for us, and we wouldn't miss it. Check it out!
Finally, there was the Field of Screams, which is the haunted trail. In the past, this has been our least favorite for various reasons, including too much reliance on mazes, which resulted in getting lost and going in circles,too few actors, which made for long stretches with nothing going on, and very little lighting, which made props difficult to see. We're happy to say that this year's version was much improved, with much better lighting and better mazes, too. Although the mazes were there, they were relatively easy to navigate so the frustration level was low. The number of actors still could be larger, as often there was only one actor in a very large scene, and then no actors until a few scenes later. As the trail is primarily just that - a trail - more actors would mean more variety. However, where there were actors they were quite good. Special mentions must go to the creepy doctor/patient character who welcomed us to his maze of turns covered by white sheets, a creepy female clown who stalked us through another part of the maze appearing and disappearing randomly and giggling like a crazy person each time she appeared - good stuff.
Favorite scenes included a crashed hearse with a zombie actor hiding behind it who stalked us into the next area, a Friday the 13th/Camp Crystal lake setup with running water, forest/jungle scenes and even the Friday the 13th theme music (alas, no Jason, though), and a cornfield near the end that featured none other than our favorite, Mike Myers, hiding behind some corn stalks and silently menacing visitors - an excellent ending to a much improved Field of Screams!
Overall, Niles gives a huge value for the money. It offers over 90 minutes of haunts, games, food, shows, and even free movies (White Zombie and The Monster Maker were on tap when we visited), all for one low price. It's easily the type of place that one can take the entire family too, and kids of all ages will enjoy the fun scares, the humorous actors, and the nostalgic atmosphere that permeates the entire location. One can easily tell that Niles is a labor of love with a family feel to it, and it's easy to see why it's so popular. It's an effective kickoff to each haunt season for us, and we wouldn't miss it. Check it out!