Halloween Horror Nights 35 (UOR) - Speculation & Rumors

[Legacy]

From Reddit by way of Facebook, the boilerplate responses from Universal seem to have coalesced into this:

View attachment 29690

The language is very deliberate, treating "Scream Early" and "Stay & Scream" as separate entities. (AP early entry always was classified as a form of "S&S," with an AP being a "day ticket.") These feels more like it was drafted by Legal than a typical tweet. As bad as it seems from a logistics standpoint, this language strongly implies another level of upcharge.

Adds a new wrinkle -- are the Scream Early and S&S houses the same? Last year S&S could in theory line up at any house, even if it wouldn't open for a while. Will the SE houses be off-limits to 5? Also I doubt they offer Express from 2 - 5, although I can't imagine needing it.

As always, until we see it on a website it's subject to change, but at least keeping that option open.

So if true, their attempt at getting extra revenue has officially overcomplicated things.

The GP was already getting confused with the S&S vs HHN vs Day Admission and what was needed for each. I know because I've been stuck behind people arguing with staff over what ticket(s) they thought they were buying.

"So this just lets me get in a line early?"

"Yes. But not that house."

"Why?"

"That's a Scream Early house. It's line doesn't open until 5:00."

"Oh. So I can see that house now?"

"No. You only have Stay and Scream."

*Man walks away angry and confused. Yells at wife*

I actually think the solution is surprisingly simple:

All non-Scream Early queues start allowing people to line up at 5 instead of 4. From Universal’s perspective, that’s how you “force” guests showing up for S&S to do something other than sit for two hours. If you walk in at 4, you can find something to do for that first hour. At 5, the Scream Early houses shut down and all queues open for S&S.

Doing this, Scream Early is explicitly separate from Stay and Scream. The one hour overlap in time is more of an “administrative” overlap rather than an operational overlap.

And before anyone says keeping the S&S queues closed until 5 is removing a “perk,” the perk is being in the park early so you can queue before General Admission. Keeping the queue closed until 5 doesn’t actually eliminate that perk at all.

 

[HHN Maddux]

 

[rageofthegods]

 

[RedRightDan]

The socials (including Vegas) seem to be warming up a bit too.

 

[StaticShock]

Anticipating like…

 

[Pixarfan96]

Me everytime you bring up having KKFOS appear again as a house at HHN Orlando. Or in any capacity.

I Know, I have a problem! Help Me! Lol

 

[Parkscope Joe]

I actually think the solution is surprisingly simple:

All non-Scream Early queues start allowing people to line up at 5 instead of 4. From Universal’s perspective, that’s how you “force” guests showing up for S&S to do something other than sit for two hours. If you walk in at 4, you can find something to do for that first hour. At 5, the Scream Early houses shut down and all queues open for S&S.

Doing this, Scream Early is explicitly separate from Stay and Scream. The one hour overlap in time is more of an “administrative” overlap rather than an operational overlap.

And before anyone says keeping the S&S queues closed until 5 is removing a “perk,” the perk is being in the park early so you can queue before General Admission. Keeping the queue closed until 5 doesn’t actually eliminate that perk at all.

It's still April and more has been done in less time (looking at you Us), but it does feel like this is a big shift and it is a new ticket product. Sorry @Hatetofly on that. I think the problem they have is Scream Early has been a S&S ticket option for non-daytime ticket holders for many years now, they should have debuted a new name but that's water under the bridge now.

I'm honestly kinda shocked they changed this, and when you combine this with the several cuts around the resort I'm more than a little concered about product quality.

 

[tdmarshmallow]

So if true, their attempt at getting extra revenue has officially overcomplicated things.

The GP was already getting confused with the S&S vs HHN vs Day Admission and what was needed for each. I know because I've been stuck behind people arguing with staff over what ticket(s) they thought they were buying.

"So this just lets me get in a line early?"

"Yes. But not that house."

"Why?"

"That's a Scream Early house. It's line doesn't open until 5:00."

"Oh. So I can see that house now?"

"No. You only have Stay and Scream."

*Man walks away angry and confused. Yells at wife*

Never underestimate the ability of the GP to get confused at theme parks.

Perhaps it is just my neurodivergent brain, but the entire thing made sense to me in an instant, I mean it's even in the names of the products.

Stay and Scream meant if you already had a day ticket (or AP) you could STAY in the park for the day and then SCREAM at night with a HHN ticket. You would get priority access to queues prior to those with just HHN tickets.


Scream Early meant that you could start SCREAMing (HHN houses) EARLY by them opening some of the houses early for you.

I'm honestly not trying to make fun of anyone, or cause any division, my AuDHD brain just does not comprehend the confusion. If a neurotypical person would like to privately explain it to me, I would appreciate it.

 

[TheCodeMan95]

Never underestimate the ability of the GP to get confused at theme parks.

Perhaps it is just my neurodivergent brain, but the entire thing made sense to me in an instant, I mean it's even in the names of the products.

Stay and Scream meant if you already had a day ticket (or AP) you could STAY in the park for the day and then SCREAM at night with a HHN ticket. You would get priority access to queues prior to those with just HHN tickets.


Scream Early meant that you could start SCREAMing (HHN houses) EARLY by them opening some of the houses early for you.

I'm honestly not trying to make fun of anyone, or cause any division, my AuDHD brain just does not comprehend the confusion. If a neurotypical person would like to privately explain it to me, I would appreciate it.

Yeah, like I said a page or so ago, I think people are severely overthinking it lol

Scream Early = do HHN early
Stay and Scream = stay in the park and wait for HHN

 

[Jake S]

Listen, we'll see how it all gets rolled out in the end but I think this has a high potential for being confusing for regular guests. You're introducing a new ticket type with a similar name and purpose to an existing ticket type that many people are already familiar with. It doesn't help that, in my opinion, Universal has a pretty poor track record of clearly communicating how their policies are implemented to their guests and (importantly) their employees.

People are going to be confused by this and I'm unconvinced this will do much to improve the guest experience. Obviously, we'll see what it all looks like in September ... but I can certainly appreciate the skepticism surrounding this.

 

[Clive]

Never underestimate the ability of the GP to get confused at theme parks.

Perhaps it is just my neurodivergent brain, but the entire thing made sense to me in an instant, I mean it's even in the names of the products.

Stay and Scream meant if you already had a day ticket (or AP) you could STAY in the park for the day and then SCREAM at night with a HHN ticket. You would get priority access to queues prior to those with just HHN tickets.


Scream Early meant that you could start SCREAMing (HHN houses) EARLY by them opening some of the houses early for you.

I'm honestly not trying to make fun of anyone, or cause any division, my AuDHD brain just does not comprehend the confusion. If a neurotypical person would like to privately explain it to me, I would appreciate it.

The trouble in my book here is I believe (someone correct me if I'm wrong) that "Scream Early" tickets have existed as a discrete ticket product for several (many) years. A quick Google revealed Reddit discussions from a few years back discussing the differences... In fact, I think I bought these tickets myself more than once.

Originally, Scream Early was just the name of the ticket product that allowed you to access Universal Studios Florida (and consequently the Stay and Scream holding areas/benefits) from 3-5 PM.

In other words, they are now changing the fundamental features of an existing ticketing product without changing the name. Simultaneously, Stay and Scream is in essence "losing" a powerful perk (in theory) by not granting the earliest possible access to haunted houses. Furthermore, Stay and Scream has long been associated with getting a head start on everyone else, adding to the confusion.

 

[TheCodeMan95]

I'm going to reserve judgement on how this plays out because I was panicking about how they'd handle the SS houses with the HRRR construction.

And it ended up being not too bad!

 

[Circ]

I'm going to reserve judgement on how this plays out because I was panicking about how they'd handle the SS houses with the HRRR construction.

And it ended up being not too bad!

SS house corridor was SO good last year, I’m hoping they use that layout again. It was perfect for bouncing between houses back there.