We’ve all endured some version of the tiresome “What do you want for dinner?” – “I don’t know, what do you want?” – “How about pizza?” – “No, anything but pizza” – “Steakhouse, then” – “Nah, not steak either” conversation. A buffet offering a bit of something for everyone might be the best option.
The same can happen for haunts. In the mood for a haunted house? Or does a trail sound better? More of a hayride person? Fancy a stroll through the cornstalks? Hey, why not all of them!
Fear Forest gives you the Haunted Hayride, Insane-a-tarium, Psycho Path, and Forbidden Cornfield all in one go. And they’re sequenced in that order, so you don’t even need to choose which to go through first. A true godsend for indecisive couples or groups!
Besides being an all-in-one-stop shop (you say you want zombie paintball too? Get outta here, now you just seem greedy), this place offers a lengthy, nearly hour-long experience. The fine folks of Fear Forest also are dedicated to changing things up and installing new chilling content every year.
Total overall scores for each attraction –
Haunted Hayride: 7.93
Insane-a-tarium: 8.44
Psycho Path: 8.17
Forbidden Cornfield: 8.09
Fear Forest had good cast coverage during our visit. A sizable number of bodies – live, dead, or undead – came out to meet us and were evenly split between the four attractions, relative to their respective lengths.
We observed energetic, demonstrative performances and reasonable levels of interactiveness throughout, save a few exceptions on the hayride. We heard some pedestrian dialogue of the Get out/What are you doing here/Fresh meat variety, but this was balanced out by choicer bits of wacky or unusual commentary.
Hayride: There were a couple actors who seemed a bit reluctant to engage, and in general we thought there were fewer wagon invaders than normal. But the super-manic clowns ran around like their green hair was on fire, and a swaggering trio of burlap sack-wearing hee-haws made themselves at home among the riders.
The proprietor of the Bonesaw Cafe surveyed us and declared, “Y’all smell like a good meal, ever had a barbecue like that?” Another cannibalistic creep told us they intended to take our ears, and a barbaric butcher whacked off the leg of a buzzsaw victim and threw it into a furnace or smoker. These hayride inhabitants sure seemed hungry for humans.
A caged victim screamed at us to stay away, and a Camp Crystal Lake counselor ran around the office yelling at us to watch out for him to come, but of course it was far too late for escape. Jason and Michael took turns doing slow slasher strides around the wagon and waving their weapons at riders.
Insane-a-tarium: Loud music and noises filled the house, limiting the opportunities for dialogue. Most creatures made their presence known with sudden aggressive movements, either silently or screamily. Most amusingly, a half-torso suspended on the wall cried out: “Give me my life back, don’t just leave me hanging here!”
Psycho Path: Quick-hit scenarios dominated here as marauders popped out for a fast scare, yell, or comment. A nut job invited us to join the collection of corpses in their trailer. Someone dragging around a body bag told us it was Earl; like the song says, Earl had to die. High on the funny meter, a skulker sheepishly admitted (in character) that they let us walk by because they’d expected people behind us that they intended to scare and vowed to do better next time.
Forbidden Cornfield: A dark figure taunted us for jumping at its reveal, the big meanie. An actor with a rather Tourette’s-ian presentation kept yelling out things in a compulsive manner. One that we caught was “Gonorhhea!” A scarecrow told us, “We shall take your eyeballs to make soup.” It’s nice to hear when someone has an actual plan for whatever body part of yours, they’re intent on grabbing. Otherwise, it seems like they might throw it away or something, and that’s just wasteful.
Aficionados of masked actors, rejoice! Ghoulish and bloody-faced makeup jobs appeared in places, but Fear Forest most prominently boasted a voluminous and varied mask collection. Skin masks, split faces, broken faces, metal-pierced faces, faces with Predator-like tusk/teeth coming out of the mouth, clown masks, sack-head masks, hockey masks, The Shape masks, all of them came out to play.
The arsenal of weaponry was one other area in which the costuming excelled. Bats, axes, daggers, cleavers, machetes, hammers, saws – it seemed like everyone had one and they all looked different.
Most costumes presented in complete and suitably distressed, if not especially detailed, fashion. Some of the best looks included: the bee sting victim with hives-infested face; the big-headed alien; the garish clowns, one of whom had a distinctly Joker-ish feel; a hairy werewolf in overalls; and the head-to-toe awesomeness of the axe-wielding cornfield scarecrow.
Fear Forest is in Warren, Ohio (or Lordstown, depending on your navigational system, but either way, it’ll get you to the same location, which is close to Youngstown). We found it easily via GPS.
A large, illuminated sign greeted us above the driveway entrance. The haunt provided ample parking in a large asphalt lot with good lighting. Ticketing is adjacent to the parking lot, on the way inside the main building.
Some port-a-potties reside out by the ticket booth and in between attractions. However, Fear Forest also provides the salvation of permanent restrooms in the main building. Let’s hear it for indoor plumbing!
Fear Forest runs a solid website with good and complete information, and a Facebook page to which they are very responsive.
The hayride kept us secure for all its one-mile length, with comfortably cushioned seating and a reasonable step-up/down. The house did not present many obstacles besides a small stretch of downward slanting floor and the usual negotiating of dark or foggy rooms. The trail surface seemed problem-free, and the mulch-smothered cornfield path felt remarkably smooth and soft.
The lead-up to the first attraction felt slightly lacking. After purchasing tickets outside, patrons go through an extremely bright white interior to get to the hayride line. A couple photo op props graced this large area, but there wasn’t much else besides the merch room in one corner.
The hayride queue was at least much darker, and after that the entrances got much better. Insane-a-tarium was housed inside a spookily lit corrugated metal facade with a leering prop overlooking from a balcony. Psycho Path started under a tall wooden fence, the approach lined with skulls. Forbidden Cornfield featured a sinister jack-o’-lantern-headed scarecrow with glowing face holes.
Hayride: The excellent soundtrack, sound effects, and sets were positive; a couple dead spots and a few actors who seemed a little timid in their approach were the negatives.
Insane-a-tarium: Fast scene turnover with tight sequencing, physically challenging actors, and fog-filled rooms with a pulse-quickening maelstrom of a soundtrack made this the most immersive attraction. Some visible equipment and unmatching ceilings were the major detriments.
Psycho Path and Forbidden Cornfield: The natural surroundings of the woods and cornstalks, coupled with well-made, realistic structures and actual vehicles in Psycho Path, and the effective prop-or-actor? tactics in Forbidden Cornfield, made for good immersion. Sound bleed from neighboring attractions sometimes took us out of the proper headspace for full enjoyment.
Fear Forest is a huge treat for those who like good ‘n’ gory props, mannequins, and animatronics. Ooohh, the animatronics here. They could fill a museum. These things shake, rattle, roll, scream, squonk, gyrate, vibrate, and sometimes shoot out on accordion extender arms, seemingly set up in every corner or bit of spare space available. We loved it!
Probably the biggest FX news is, Fear Forest has a theme song now! We heard it in the hayride line and toward the end of the cornfield. It has attraction-specific lyrics, and it rocks, dude. We hope they will start playing it on the website.
Hayride: The wagon, a tram vehicle with forward-facing, bus-style seating, began our journey under an arch with a colorful Fear Forest neon sign bookended by floatey ghosties. We saw an area swarming with hives and bees, a campground invaded by UFOs and alien figures, and a butchery section featuring a dummy being lowered into a meat grinder, a table saw complete with victim, and hanging meat slabs, all of it bathed in bloody red lighting.
Another red-lit set occurred at the Bonesaw Cafe, a rustic trailer with game hanging on hooks, a grill and smoker set-up, picnic tables, and a cage with the next meal inside. The cemetery came illuminated in frosty blue shades, starting off with an iron arch and gate and followed by animatronics shooting out of caskets, skeletons, statuary, and the sobbing sounds of a mourning widow.
The clown house and Camp Crystal Lake section topped out the fantastic sets. The crazy clown house slapped with a fanged head springing out of a jack-in-the-box animatronic, fog, a scorched cotton candy smell, and manic sounds including Pop Goes the Weasel and a recording of Pennywise saying “Time to float.” Camp Crystal Lake featured a cabin housing the candle-ringed head of Jason’s mom and a bait shop with a full pier over part of the lake.
A semi came at us with smoke fuming out of its exhaust stacks and a hearty bray of its horn. We went inside a drive-through vortex tunnel with swirling kaleidoscopic colors and spacey music. Someone yelled out: “Am I on mushrooms or acid, man?” Good question! The surreal feelings continued with things getting Meta when we passed a mocked-up Fear Forest ticket window.
Besides the sounds already mentioned, we also heard several horns, air cannons, wacko animatronic noises, and banjo twanging, in addition to a creepy soundtrack going in and out across scenes (the wagons have a speaker attached for supplying audio) – all in all, a very solid sound game.
Insane-a-tarium: More great sounds here, as we became sonically assaulted by loud music, screams, drumming, and cracklers. The sounds melded with fog, lighting, and darkness for maximally disorientating stimuli. Scenes of medical maliciousness and menace played out before us, including bloody operations, amputations, and disembowelments, accented with mauled mannequins and a slew more of their trademark animatronics. Without doubt, the labor and nursery sets received top marks. A live birth and a mutant baby in a bassinet both sprang forth with force and one of them came accompanied by a messy fluid effect – about as shocking, surprising, and affecting as these things get!
Psycho Path: The path brought us past some simple but well-built structures and a few vehicles that had seen better days. We passed by a dingy trailer stocked with dead bodies, a shovel-toting sexton standing over a body, and a food (?) truck that probably did not pass the health inspection. Two different zombie animatronics, one with the Zs trying to bust down a cage and the other where they dragged their rotting carcasses out of the ground, continued the crazy awesome animatronics game at Fear Forest.
Forbidden Cornfield: No surprise, greater animatronics and grotesque mannequins featured heavily in the stalks. Some of them shot out of their placements, many had lighting effects, one of them held a neat moving chainsaw, and most of them emitted cool noises. Props included a grouping of jack-o’-lanterns and dummy figures like a couple of melonheads.
21. How scary was it? (35% of score): 7.85
22. How well did they provide scares to everyone in the group? (15% of score): 8.58
23. How predictable were the scares? (25% of score): 8.43
24. How well did they provide a wide variety (types) of scares? (10% of score): 7.68
25. How strong was the ending / finale? (15% of score): 7.43
Hayride: The least scary attraction. It was more of a fun romp through great sets than a scare-fest, but it still delivered a couple good jolts to the system. The clown house provided the biggest frights, fueled by a riot of noise, sickening props, wild animatronics, and crazed actors cavorting about the wagon. Air cannons, horns, more animatronics, and near-misses from other vehicles delivered a shot of adrenaline as well.
Insane-a-tarium: The very loud audio, areas of shadow and darkness, tight corners, foggy rooms, and dynamic actors attacking out of hiding spots, all combined to make this the scariest attraction. It was surely the most intense we’ve seen during any of our visits.
Psycho Path: Positioning and placement played a major role here in making the most of scare scenarios, as actors took their place in natural dark hiding spots of the woods and the blind spots of structures. With the scare snare set, a precisely timed pounce, yell, or shake of a noisemaker was enough to do the deed. Well-placed animatronics also got us a couple of times.
Forbidden Cornfield: By far the most effective technique here was actors posing as props. They managed to spook us most of the time. One of the best scares of the night happened when two figures slowly walked toward us out of a clear part of the field, one of them with a skull face and the other with pasty white face and hands that shone beautifully in the moonlight. Also, we got faked out a little by two actors at the end, when we thought the first one was the actual final scare …turned out we were wrong!
We found our way through Fear Forest in a total of 50 minutes, broken down by attraction:
Haunted Hayride: 26 / Insane-a-tarium: 9 / Psycho Path: 7 / Forbidden Cornfield: 8
Compared to the ‘quad combo’ ticket that packages all four attractions for $30, the MPD (minutes per dollar) ratio came out to 1.67. Anything at or over 1.5 is usually good, and we always enjoy our visit to Fear Forest.
Considering the pleasing level of entertainment – especially the borderline gonzo display of effects, animatronics in particular – sustained over almost an hour, we consider this a great value.
The speed pass version of the quad combo is $40. You can also go for the hayride only for $14 ($20 speed). None of these prices have changed in at least four years. That’s fantastic!
So, the next time you get stuck trying to decide where to go, find Fear Forest for a fearsome foursome of frightful and fun attractions.
6780 Tod Ave SW, Warren, Ohio 44481