It's that time of year again!!!!

Haunt 2011 mazes have been announced! And the 3 new entries are...

Delirium
In the deep recesses of the mind, on the clouded brink of insanity, lies the hellish wasteland of delirium; a place so gruesome that your imagination fails to comprehend the horrors. Illusion and paranoia are your only anchors to reality. Welcome to your worst nightmare!

Invasion Beneath
LIVE FROM KNOTT’S BERRY FARM: Details are sketchy but eyewitnesses report that the Calico Mine Ride has been invaded by creatures of unknown origin through a large fissure in the earth’s core. The creatures posses advanced weaponry and are extremely hostile. The military has just infiltrated the mountain to try and rescue the survivors and combat the violent attacks. Stay tuned.

ENDGAMES: Warriors of the Apocalypse
The world as we know it has ended. The survivors in this barren desert have scavenged to rebuild society. The rich and the powerful have turned all others into slaves for sport. Enter the post apocalyptic arena where gladiators are forced to battle to their deaths for entertainment. Are you game?

RETURNING MAZES

Fallout Shelter (in 3D)
Locked in a cement grave for decades, hidden deep below the depths of the lake, an abandoned fallout shelter is crawling with human /genetic hybrids, toxic mutants, and a host of nuclear freaks all hungry for carnage. Grab your Geiger counters and put on your radiation suits, these residents are ravenous.

Sleepy Hollow
Ghosts and ghouls, witches and goblins, long legged beasts and things that go bump in the night are all at your heels as you travel through Sleepy Hollow. Specters and phantoms and legends of long ago haunt the living. Can you outrun the Headless Horseman? Can you keep your wits, or will you lose your head as well?

Virus Z
Welcome to Pleasanton – Population: Zero. The highly infectious virus Z has turned the entire town into cannibal zombies and you’re this week’s special. Hordes of bloodthirsty corpses roam the small town in search of fresh meat. Help has arrived, but they are not on a rescue mission – they are here to wall off the entire town from civilization.

Lockdown: The Asylum
The inmates really are running the asylum in this nightmare prison, and insanity reigns supreme. The inmates are out of their cells and their minds. And don’t scream for help, this hostile takeover has the authorities running for cover!

Terror of London
Step back in time and into the fog-filled streets of London where a host of infamous characters are on the prowl terrorizing city dwellers. Step lively or you may fall victim to Jack the Ripper’s blade or Dr. Jekyll’s twisted experiments as Big Ben rings out. God save the Queen…..and you!

Dia De Los Muertos
Venture into the forbidden jungle of El Chupacabra where sacrificial blood rains down from the sky. The screams of La Llorona, the Weeping Woman, echo around you and the creatures of the night crawl from their crypts, the “Day of the Dead” has arrived!

Uncle Bobo’s Big Top of the Bizarre (3D)
Step right up! Don’t be shy! Welcome to Uncle Bobo’s Big Top of the Bizarre. Inside you will find a villainous variety of vaudevillian visages to vex even the most valiant voyeurs! It’s the greatest slaughter on earth with clown carnage galore!

The Slaughterhouse
Folk’s from near and far come a-runnin for Farmer Willy’s world famous BBQ! You can smell the sizzling meat from miles away. Farmer Willy will think you are prime
beef as he sets out to auction you off to the highest bidder, tenderize you with his chainsaw, and grind you into a tasty meat treat. Bon Appétit!

The Doll Factory
A trip to the Doll Factory reveals a twisted museum of death and disfigurement as you are pursued by the Marionette Murderer, a psychotic killer who turns his beautiful victims into life-size porcelain dolls.

Corn Stalkers
It’s harvest time and the crop is you in Corn Stalkers. Plunge into rows and rows of rotting corn and try to evade the blood thirsty monstrosities seeking to impale you on their razor sharp scythes.
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These of course replace Club Blood, Black Widow Cavern and Labyrinth.

Now my personal opinion is well, like usual. First for the departing mazes.

Club Blood for me was never really a vampy maze although this last year it did improve a HELL of a lot. I for one won't miss it, even though it does mean this year will be the first year in a long time there will not be a vampire maze at Haunt.

Black Widow Cavern I did enjoy, of course. But as I said a few years back, there's only so much you can do with spiders. I'll miss it a bit. A moment of silence for that, please.

And Labyrinth. Huh. ~sighs~ Oh, it was pretty and the talent divine. But mazes are supposed to be scary, and sadly this missed the mark. So no real sadness for this one either.

But on to my predictions for this year.

Does anyone but me notice an odd theme here? Apocalypse and such? Hmmm, says I.

Because correct me if I'm wrong and I might be, the 3 new ones seem to be slight variations of each other.

Delirium: This could be a grand throwback to the Asylum theme, which I course loved. But they still have Lockdown AND Fallout Shelter, both of which feed on claustrophobia and darkness. Not that I'm complaining, but it will interesting to see just how they make this work.

Invasion Beneath: (Mine Train) Ah now, this could be rather interesting. Although the mention of weaponry makes me wonder if it'll be a re-imagined version of The Underground. Which was a fantastic maze, but on the Mine Train? Hmmm, that may be a tad reaching. The reason Underground worked was you were trapped in this industrial holocaustic aftermath that you stumbled through. Being in a mine car will definitely need some real good scares.

Endgames: Oh boy. I just...wow. To me, this sounds like a cross between Mad Max and The Running Man. It'll be a fun maze. Yeah. Fun. Not scary. Guys dressed up in scraps of metal and carrying various items of destruction are great for me to laugh at, not scream. But who knows?

So there we are. I am excited for the other returning mazes. My only requests are that Cornstalkers gets back to its former glory of spookiness, that Lockdown has more creeps in it, The Doll Factory gets their dollies in tip top scare mode, and that Slaughterhouse brings back the gore it knew so well in the first year.

Everything else was damn incredible.

I cannot wait for October. How about you?

Until next time....