Exit 13: Taking the wrong turn
Exit 13 wants you to know what you are in for is not a normal haunted house. As you join the line, a cacophony of screams, sirens, chainsaws, and air horns fill the air. Music drives a steady beat cutting through the rest of the noise, while minimal red lighting lets you barely make out what is going on around you. Soon you enter the door and get informed of the rules. You step through a curtain and an air horn goes off signaling your arrivals to the psychos waiting within. What follows is a trip through Hell, in a house that pushes the limits in disturbing, but amazing ways.
Be prepared for this one, it is not your typical stroll through a haunted attraction. Sure, actors will use jump scares to good effect, but it is how tiring this house is that sets it apart. It is physically and mentally draining. One section finds you crawling through a small hole that seems to go on forever, knees pounding on the cold cement. Actors will push you around, props such as chainsaws and axes will be slammed into you. Actors will stop you and have incredibly creepy conversations and actions with you. Fingers will go through your hair, you will be told to smell things, and you will be instructed to separate from the rest of your group. I personally did 60% of the house on my own, which is a terrifying and thrilling situation. Having all of the actors focused on you can get the heart pumping hard. It is also commendable despite multiple groups being split up throughout the house, I never ran into another group the entire run. Coordination on that level is incredible. The acting in this house is a huge part of the overall success of the house.
Theming is another thing well done at this house. Sets draw you in and include enough little details to convince the brain that locations entered are the real deal. Whether it be creepy house located in the middle of dark woods, or a demented general store with quite interesting workers, Exit 13 does a great job making them feel legitimate. Areas are made in such ways to create discomfort and confusion. Small areas are designed for actors to pull victims out from their group and hide them away for awhile. Rooms are also designed to send you in circles for what feels like forever, until the actors patrolling the area decide it's time to let you free. Tension is kept up throughout the house with situations like this. However, the only knock on this house will be that some of the rooms do feel like they are not being used to their full potential. For instance a room featuring a ton of water jugs strung up is just a room with a strobe light and nothing else. Another room is a circus-style room filled with upright coffins on both sides of the hall. This room stretches on a good distance, but not a single actor was inside it. Both of these issues may have just been a prop not working properly or under-staffing was an issue for the night. Overall though, these areas were very few and far between and did little to affect how great this house is.
Exit 13 is a thrill ride. It is a pure adrenaline rush designed to truly make you feel like a victim in a horror movie. Actors are physical, terrifying, and clearly love what they are doing. The house is a confusing mess, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. This is a truly scary house, that gets the job done in ways that houses normally do not. By being so physical and great at tense, taunting conversations, the actors get in your mind from start to finish. There is a second attraction on site, Total Blackout, but due to time constraints we unfortunately did not have time to do it.
4.5/ 5
