Wales’ new scare attraction, the Silver Mountain Experience, opens officially
The Silver Mountain Experience, the newest permenant scare attraction, has opened officially and is ready and waiting to welcome visitors on their UK holiday. Based between Aberystwyth and Llangurig in Wales, it is a multi-element visitor attraction featuring The Black Chasm, an underground scare attraction hewn out of the mountain itself.
The attraction is the first official member of the newly formed professional scare entertainment operator collective – The Scare Network. The Black Chasm is the latest in a changeable line-up of permanent UK scare attractions and joins Wales’ other two current haunts Bunker 3Zero in Pembrokeshire to the south and Terror Tombs in Rhyl to the north. Located high in the Cambrian Mountains on the A44, it is expected to attract more than 30,000 guests a year.
Daytime operations are led by a hoard of hungry Orcs who accompany batched groups through the chasm where they encounter a variety of special effects, including localised sounds, strobe lighting, audiovisual effects and static tableaux. When combined together, the 50-minute experience delivers a mixture of light hearted fun and scarier moments, and is not recommended for those under the age of 12.
Of particular note is the moment when an explosion disturbs a creature named simply ‘It’. Although it is never seen, the panic caused by the stereophonic sound of the creature ‘approaching’ causes panic among the group as they clamber through a tunnel to escape – the sounds and screams getting louder as they hurry into the darkness beyond.
The clever combination of immersive storytelling and newly constructed scare attraction environments ensures that the experience delivers something for everyone, making guests scream and laugh in equal measure.
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A good dose of humour and interactivity are thrown in the mix and the content can be tailored by the scareactor host, dependent on whether the guest group is primarily adults or children, or a family day out.
A more extreme adult only experience is being planned by the team at The Black Chasm to run over the coming months. ‘Fright Nights’ will offer a similar experience to the daytime operation, but with more live scareactors, a different script and increased scares. With this in mind, the construction of the set allows for a more intense experience when the scareactors will be up close and personal at night.