Whatton House of Horror Presents Purgatory
Whatton House of Horror is the home of Purgatory an event billed as an immersive horror experience rather than scare maze, we would definitely agree with the former.
The event starts in a courtyard with multiple food and drink options. There is a really good atmosphere here with people chatting and having a good time while they wait for their entry slot. We were in the 8:30 group and were a bit disappointed to learn that at 8:30 you enter a queue that took about half an hour to get through. For next year it might be worth revisiting the time slots. Maybe changing to smaller time slots to keep the queue short.
Once we had got to the end we were given a lantern and given the usual blurb about what to expect and what we should and shouldn’t do. The lantern was a nice idea as it let the actors see us coming plus we could see if we had caught up with another group so we could slow down and avoid bunching up. It was great to see this as part of the introductory blurb too so everyone knew what to do.
Now on to the experience. The event lasts around 40 minutes and is about a mile long. You encounter a number of set scenes where actors will deliver scripted pieces or be a little more silent to creep the group out.
Overall the majority of the scripted sections were really good, progressing the story and offering a few jump scares and humour along the way. The silent characters often took a more eerie approach but definitely managed to creep the group out.
We had started to catch up with a slower group in front so, as we were told, we held back and let them progress to the next scene. We then entered the penultimate scene where the not catching up rule was broken and ruined the impact of a scene that could have been great. This was down to the actor insisting that two groups should join together in a scene that was far too small. The scare in here was good only for two of the group of thirteen. This was an interesting set and something more could definitely be done here. This would make a reasonable finale but the actual ending fizzled out with the group ending back in the courtyard a little confused.
Throughout the experience there are a few long sections where groups end up chatting so maybe breaking that up with a few more scenes or a louder soundtrack could help keep everyone immersed throughout as we feel this slightly breaks the immersion.
Overall we think this is great attempt at a slightly different form of scare event. The scripted sections work well and in general help keep people reasonably paced. The moments of comic relief work so well between the scares and eerie sections. With a few tweaks this event has a lot of potential to be a solid offering in future years.
