Farmaggedon takes place at Farmer Teds Adventure Farm in Ormskirk just outside Liverpool. On arrival the processing of visitors was quick and efficient which we were glad of because of the soggy evening. The (slightly grumpy seeming) security staff batched us into groups and directed each group to different mazes. The queue management throughout was good and you never felt you were waiting particularly long for anything even though it was a busy night.
The main hub with the band and bar area wasn’t heavy on theming but it had some simple and effective decor. Having not visited the attraction before we felt that it wasn’t always clear where to find the next scare maze and we overheard a couple of other groups saying they had been having trouble too so bigger and bolder signage would be helpful.
Attractions
Zombie Outlaw
First up was Zombie Outlaw. On the outside of the building they had used big, bold decor, lighting and good sound effects to conjure up the feeling of an apocalyptic emergency. It is here you join the queue where we had our first interaction with the excellent street theatre and a freaky nurse bantered with us, telling us off for being late to our appointment. Whilst in the queue you have the option to buy additional paintballs for £10 a pod or £15 for two. You have the opportunity to buy them during the experience too and whilst not needed, if you are trigger happy a single £10 would probably see you through. Thanks to the efficient batching on entry we weren’t waiting for very long to get started. On to the briefing room. We were given the safety spiel which is a hybrid of a military style briefing from the host and a mock emergency announcement video. This was a really good opportunity for audience interaction with the host trying to ramp up the energy and comradery in the group (HOORAH!). Unfortunately some of our group weren’t overly energetic and didn’t seem up for playing along so it was only a handful of people repeating phrases which was a shame.
We then boarded the trailer and headed out to the zombie zone. The experience was really fun and the sets were effective. The use of UV was funky and made the characters we were shooting at stand out. Some of the actors really took a beating and some were clearly having a lot of fun with it even though they were taking a beating in the rain.
After the experience you are led to the ‘decontamination zone’ where we had a short wait before entering what by day is clearly a family maze. Whilst it’s clear that an existing infrastructure was being utilised to add to the attraction we felt that a more impactful experience could have be achieved with a shorter yet more intense walk through set up. The decontamination theme didn’t really come through and there was a lot of reliance on smoke and sound effects with minimal interaction with the actors. The maze was somewhat creepy but fell flat when it came to jumps or scares.
The Beast of Terror
Next up we headed to Beast of Terror. This attraction has an impressive facade with dancers entertaining the queue line and loud rock music pumping into the barn which got everyone pumped for the attraction.
It is worth noting that unfortunately we felt that this maze lacked the scares of the others. It seemed to rely heavily on animatronics and whilst these aspects were incredible we felt more interaction was needed from actors. The theming was however brilliant, the church scene being a particular standout.
We managed to get through this maze twice and we definately felt our second run was better. We would have liked to have seen a few more jump scares as a lot of actors would lurk eerily rather than produce an impact scare. We appreciate that this is very subjective and for some people an actor following them with a piercing gaze is enough to send them running. Overall an impressive set and theme but more actor interaction would have bumped the experience up.
Contagion
This maze again had a fantastic facade with creative artwork. This time with alternating entertainment including an illusionist which we caught the tail end of and lots of interaction with the wandering scare actors.
The set design was really fun and the use of 3D worked well however there could have been more scene setting to link the overall theme of the maze to the content. The actors utilised the space to get maximum impact and were attentive to the whole of the group. Overall we would probabbly say that this maze fits into the fun category with a good number of actors working on the group from all angles.
The Meat Locker
This maze took you on a journey as a little piggy going to the slaughter. It worked well with quite gory and gruesome scenes throughout and good use of smells.
It had a good number of scenes with some good distraction techniques and the stand out part of this maze was the ending section. When leaving we walked through a wet and dingy area over a wobbly grate which worked really well and gave that feeling of being in a slaughterhouse, particularly with it ending on a classic chainsaw scare. Whilst personally chainsaws aren’t on our list of ‘things we are scared of’ we appreciate that for the majority of people going through the experience this would be perfect.
Street theatre
We felt the street theatre was some of the best we have seen. The interactions were fun and tied in to the different mazes. They would randomly scare visitors and chase the people who were creeped out which was entertaining. The actors were great at improvisation and we particularly enjoyed an interaction when we were making a fuss of a horse in the stables and one of the actors gave us a spiel about how the horse was a man called Rodney who had been reincarnated. A very amusing exchange and those interactions really added to the event.
Overall we felt that whilst it wasn’t the scariest event is was a really enjoyable evening. The atmosphere was electric with the live band and bar in the central hub really adding to the spooky party feeling. The mazes could have had some additional scares but the theming was brilliant and could not be faulted in the slightest.
We highly recommend visiting Farmaggedon if you want an enjoyable night this halloween season.
Farmaggedon takes place on select dates until the Day of the Dead 18+ Grand finale party on the 2nd November.
