An Immersive Horror Experience with Ten Thirty One Productions

By: Calvin Amin

The other day I was watching a re-run of Shark Tank (which is perhaps not the most relevant show to write about on this blog) when I noticed a very unique idea that was pitched to the “sharks.” This idea was Ten Thirty One Productions, a company that, if it had to be categorized, would likely fall into the genre of haunted house, but it does a good job differentiating itself from any traditional haunted house experience that I have seen. Currently, Ten Thirty One Productions offers several different horror excursions, including haunted hay rides in both Los Angeles and New York, a newly introduced Ghost Ship experience, and the Great Horror Campout.

While I’m sure the hay rides and Ghost Ship are both terrifying, what really got my attention during the Shark Tank episode was the Great Horror Campout. The campout is a 12-hour, overnight, “choose your own adventure,” horror extravaganza. Throughout the night there are many activities that you are allowed to participate in and during all of them you will be tormented by monsters and other horror figures that I imagine are quite frightening. Alternatively, if you are an individual who is very easily scared (I would probably fall into this category), you can elect to enter the “chicken zone” where you can enjoy camping with friends and watching horror movies without the possibility of monsters jumping out and scaring you half to death. Just to provide some perspective on what the campers who elect to participate in the “high octane horror experience” have to put up with, here is a description from the website; “camp creepers may get entombed in a mass grave, be the hunter and hunted in the latest edition of blood tag, outwit the Pishtaco to survive a hallucinatory cannibalistic nightmare, and much … oh so much more.” While I have no idea who or what Pishtaco is, I personally don’t ever want to participate in any sort of “hallucinatory cannibalistic nightmare.”

One of the activities for the campers who aren’t faint of heart is the “Hell Hunt,” where you go around searching for items, called SCAG (shit campers all get), all the while you are pursued by the monsters of the campout. While it is a little unclear on the website how this hunt works, I believe that the idea is to collect all of the “SCAG” so that you can be crowned “Hellmaster.” During the hunt, campers face many different challenges that can leave them “kidnapped, caged, or trunked.” Basically, everything about the Hell Hunt sounds very atypical to the traditional haunted house experience.

Long story short, if you want an insane and ridiculously immersive horror experience I would suggest looking into some of the attractions offered by Ten Thirty One Productions. I have a hard time watching a horror movie without screaming like a 6-year old, so I don’t know if this would be a very fun time for me, but I’m sure some of the readers of this blog would be interested in this type of experience. Also, if you’re still reading and curious, Mark Cuban ended up investing 2 million dollars into the company for twenty-percent equity. So it’s definitely a well-funded company, which means they likely have one of the best, most thrilling horror experiences right now.