Haunted Houses are a time honored Halloween tradition in which kids and adults alike pay an absurd amount of money for a five-minute scare session.

Most people I know have been to one of these haunted houses, and nearly all of them scoffed when I told them I’d never been. This year, I decided was the year I would finally subject myself to the scares and thrills of a haunted house.

Along with Benjamin Vaskov ‘24, I made a late night visit to the Haunted Asylum attraction in the parking lot of Meadows Mall. When we arrived around 11 p.m., the lines were still long, a testament to the popularity of these haunted houses. We paid the insane $40 entrance fee.

It took us about 20 minutes of waiting in line before it was our turn to be spooked. When we first entered the “house,” the lights shut off immediately and we were swallowed by darkness. Then suddenly, the lights flicked back on and there was a man in front of us, eerily inviting us to continue. The rest of the haunted house was full of similar tricks, closets, and cupboards rigged to start shaking or open and close on their own when visitors walked past.

There were a few good scares, as the actors working the attraction had good vantage points to pop out at us from. Most of the scares were a bit predictable, and I would say I was only genuinely spooked only once or twice.

At the end of the visit, when we left the house, I remember thinking to myself, “That’s it?” Ben later explained to me that he has been to much scarier haunted houses. The most popular Halloween attraction for teens, the Freakling Bros Haunted House, usually found in the parking lot of Ikea, had unfortunately been canceled this year.

Overall, the experience was a good one. Ben and I had a fun time, even if we weren’t as scared as we had hoped. The scariest part of the whole experience was the price of the tickets.