Haunted Attraction Reviewed: Demon House
Website: www.demonhouse.com
Location of Attraction: Monongahela PA
Date of Review: Saturday September 7th 2019
Total Number of Attractions Available: ONE
Overall Haunted Attraction Rating: 6/10
Entertainment and Food Rating: 5/10
Atmosphere Rating: 6/10
Overall Costume and Make Up Rating: 7/10
Overall Cast and Crew Rating: 7/10
Overall Props, Animatronics and Set Design Rating: 6/10
Overall Scare/Thrill Factor Rating: 5/10
Overall Feedback: It’s the first Saturday in September, mid 70’s and a perfect evening to kick off our 2019 campaign. Our squad elected to begin the 2019 season in a grand way by road tripping to Pittsburgh PA; a solid 4-6 hour trip one way for our members. To fill the evening up our squad elected to visit TWO haunted attractions: Demon House in Monongahela PA and Hundred Acres Manor in Bethel Park PA. To kick off our evening we paid a visit to Demon House, our first time visiting this haunt. The location of Demon House is an interesting one; one with a lot of history, around 150 years worth of history. The haunt itself takes place inside the “McCue Family Estate” which is actually known to have recorded paranormal activity. We encourage you to read up on the locations history and even watch the Travel Channels “Portals to Hell” episode on Demon House prior to visiting. It was about 7pm as we pulled into the parking lot, which is actually not at the haunt site itself. Guests take a brief shuttle ride from a nearby parking lot on a bloody terrific bus (blood splatter running down the sides of the bus)! The shuttle parks at the bottom of a driveway and guests are then free to walk up to the haunt. The brief walk up the driveway immediately sets the mood for the guests. Eerie sounds echoing from nearby speakers as you take in the simplistic but elegant scenery. Off in the near distance guests can begin to take in the elegance that is Demon House! It’s rather difficult to explain in words how aesthetically pleasing and eerie Demon House is. Our entire squad just gazed at the McCue Family Estate/Demon House in pure awe. As we reached the top of the driveway guests are funneled through the ticketing booth. Ticket prices at Demon House run $20 for general admission and $30 for fast pass. Those who visit on Sunday’s can receive general admission tickets at a discounted rate of $15. Demon House prides themselves on ensuring guests aren’t pushed through the haunt in a kongo line fashion. They admit groups of no more than 6 at a time. As you purchase tickets you are given a group number. This number is essentially your place in line. Numbers are called out on a loudspeaker every few minutes, ensuring there is at least a 2-3 minute gap between groups. Our squad of eight for the evening was split into two groups. We had about 10-15 minutes to scope out the entertainment area before our numbers were called. Several photo stations, light refreshments, outdoor movie theater, merchandise shop and several fire pits highlight the entertainment area. With it being opening weekend and rather early in the evening, about 7:45pm at this point, the haunt had a quiet but eerie atmosphere. To begin your experience at Demon House guests are invited into a fortune teller booth. Guests take a seat as the fortune teller genie entertained us, providing comical palm readings while also reviewing the rules of the haunt. After a few minutes the genie’s crystal ball gave us the all clear to proceed forward into Demon House. We rounded the corner and walked up the sidewalk on the front side of the house, as we approached the doorstep one of our favorite scare actors of the evening welcomed us inside Demon House. As we gathered around said actors cauldron she plucked a hair from one of our members but unfortunately this offering wasn’t accepted by the spirits of Demon House. It was at that point where we were sent forth on our journey. What guests should know is that Demon House was truly an actual home converted into a haunt. So our squad was very curious to see how they’d snake us through the haunt. Inside Demon House itself we encountered a wide variety of sets, all featuring hand-made props. Demon House is certainly not a prop shop so don’t expect tons of animatronics. Our squad thoroughly enjoyed the creativity that the sets possessed. Some of our favorite scenes were easily the asylum and clown sections; the scare actors in these areas were relentless and continually taunted our group providing a frightastic experience. Because of the snake like paths guests do cross paths with other guests once or twice, but this wasn’t an issue for us. In some areas, the snake like paths confused our members, making us feel like we got twisted around somehow. We recall at least one or two scenes with false doors and hidden pathways. One of the haunts strengths was certainly their scare actors. Their entire cast was extremely passionate and dedicated to their role. Only downfall was an obvious shortage of actors, which left several areas of significant dead space. As you exit Demon House you enter a pallet maze with chainsaw wielding scare actors. The outdoor section of the haunt was extremely lacking in scare actors which really put a damper on the experience. The final scene was an electrifying one as we were nearly fried by the executioner himself. All in all Demon House provided a simple but well executed haunt experience lasting around 15-20 minutes. We would definitely consider Demon House an old school style haunt as it features handmade scenes and relies heavily on its scare actors to provide the guests with a spooky fun time! At the completion of our experience we were able to briefly meet up with the owner to chat about our experience. He specifically mentioned they had about a dozen scare actor call offs that night which was easily noticed by our team. Despite the dead space the Demon House scare actors did their best to provide a spooky fun time for our group. Although we wouldn’t necessarily recommend Demon House to an out of state patron we’d definitely suggest the locals to pay them a visit. They are a great family friendly haunt ready to provide their guests with a screamtastic time! If you pay them a visit, let them know Fright Review Squad sent you!