[icarian]

I agree, there should be a vendor developed product that SIMULATES a gunshot. picture triggering an animatronic maniacle hick that cocks his 12 guage and perfectly synched with his pulling the trigger theres an air cannon blast and super-bright LED lights out the barrel of the gun... it would be amazing and i would totally use it in my haunt designs.

point of the thread being that using a real firearm loaded with actual explosives (with or without a projectile) is still idiotic. It would be just as idiotic to cut the showmanship corners by using an actual automobile to drive through your haunt wall at people rather than the multiple simulation options available for the same effect.

Didn't the haunted hoochie have a shotgun suicide SIMULATION scene either last year or the year before? granted, not in the best taste IMO, but a good example of how haunts COULD use the CONCEPT of a firearm in their haunt, in a completely controlled and safe manner.

no one should ever use a gun in their haunt, ever. now a piece of plastic or rigid foam that looks like a gun, thats a completely different story (if done right with the appropriate safety measures in place)

[Jim Warfield]

Of guns and grew up watching lame TV shows where guns go "Bang!" and bullets only hit the bad guy and everyone else lives happilly ever after, saved by a gun...bullets only kill quickly and quietly, no muss, no fuss..beter start getting "Real".
Bodies ripped apart-forever, irreversable damage, crippled, maimed forever, much pain and suffering..all from a split-second act.
For those who all ready realise these things, pretending to aim or shoot them with a phoney gun might be way too much for them to ever forgive you for.
How many customers can you afford to perminently scare away?
A very good patron of mine was perminently scared away by one employee I had who took it upon himself to point a realistic plastic gun at her head from 2foot away and say "BANG!" real loudly!
She fell on the floor, on her butt. That was it for her.
I feel such a scare crosses the line for many people. "People" spelled k-u-s-s-t-o-m-b-e-r-z.

Maybe a muzzle loader with a hillbilly swearing and struggling to get the gun loaded but never quite getting it done could be played for a laugh?
That might be fun.

[hsmag]

I experienced something similar this year. Went to a haunted house and they had a real gun with blanks that they fired in the air. I didn't find out until after I exited that the gun was, in fact, real. This made me uneasy.

I disagree with part of Robo's statement though. Having a real gun is not the same as having a real chainsaw. They are not equally as dangerous in my opinion. I was thinking about this very topic a week or so ago. Weapons safety is something ALL haunts need to address.

Do I have a problem with haunts using real weapons in haunts? Not really, as long as the proper safety measures are taken to ensure that things are done safely. Any metal blades should be ground down to ensure they can no longer cut and any sharp points that could pierce skin should be rounded off. In addition, the weapons should ONLY be given to actors who are responsible and understand how to use it safely, which is why I think any haunt that uses a weapon should train those actors in how to safely handle a weapon.

I'm against real guns in any fashion because, as this post shows, even a gun loaded with blanks can injure someone. Even if you're not pointing it at the guests, the sound inside of a small room is amplified and could possibly damage someone's hearing.

Now Larry, I will disagree with you that only 10% of haunts are good. Yes, there are some haunted houses out there whose only goal is to make money and they don't care about the quality of their show but I wouldn't go so far as to say 90% of them are that way. Not every haunt has the budget that some of the "great" haunts have. Some haunts have to make their own props, paint their own scenes and get by with what they know how to do. Just because a haunt is low budget doesn't make it bad. If a haunted house is able to entertain and scare guests, then in my opinion, it's a good one. The haunted house I worked for this year was low budget but that doesn't make it a bad haunt that sucked. In fact, we had a bunch of people coming out of the haunt telling us we were better than the big-production haunted house in the area. This other place spends tons of money on sets, animatronics, props and advertising, yet people were saying our small, low-budget place was better. I've also went to one of the haunts that's on one of the "nation's best" lists (I won't say which one) but I was incredibly let down with it and thought a competing haunt put on a much better show, even though they aren't on any list. So on that, I disagree with you.

To end this post, I would like to see videos, seminars or hell, even articles that are dedicated to weapons safety in a haunted house. Any actor using a weapon needs to have respect for the item in their hands as well as respect for the guests and their safety and maybe if this issue was addressed more strongly, like the way other safety issues have been addressed in the past, we'd have less incidents like this.

Just my two cents.

[mindtumor]

He means 90% of new haunts, trust me.

[Gman035t]

Originally Posted by drfrightner

ONLY AN IDIOT WOULD USE A GUN TO TRY TO SCARE PEOPLE...

Idk a Pneumatic shotgun that shoots a blast of air would be safe and scare the crap out of guests... but is it in good taste?

Kind of irrelevant to the thread though