Alton Towers Dungeon - Bringing Staffordshire's darkest history to life!
Alton Towers dungeon is a dark and comedic horror based walk through attraction located in the former Charlie and the Chocolate Factory building.
The attraction breathes life into some of Staffordshire’s darkest history making it both educational and entertaining at the same time.
But what is The Alton Towers Dungeon? Let’s take a look.
What is it?
The Dungeons brand currently boasts a line up of 6 fantastically dark attractions UK wide, and The Alton Towers Dungeon makes up just one of them.
Where as The London Dungeon or York Dungeon are their own purpose built attractions, The Alton Towers Dungeon (like The Castle Dungeon at Warwick Castle) is a subsidiary attraction meaning it’s located within the park itself.
This means that the only way to visit it is to visit the Alton Towers Resort itself, and whilst the Alton Towers Dungeon is an up charge attraction, we can assure you it’s well worth the extra cost.
What Can I Expect?
Expect laughs, chills and a few good jump scares along the way!
The Dungeon follows the traditional set up mixing live actors with physical sets, special effects and a full range of heavily immersive elements such as show specific audio, lighting and so much more.
The experience itself however consists of five actor lead shows and one ride (The Black River boat ride) and lasts a total of 45 minutes from start to finish.
The Alton Towers Dungeon features the usual staple shows you’d expect to find at any typical Dungeon attraction as well as a few location specific ones too.
These include the Judge, the Plague Doctor and the Torturer as well as location specific shows such as Molly Leigh and Dick Turpin.
The attraction is well themed throughout and also features external themeing as well as internal themeing such as flaming torches, skeletons in cages and a few other medieval looking additions.
What does it cost and is it worth it?
Admission is currently priced at £8.00 per person (£5.00 for annual pass holder) and tickets can be purchased either on the day from both the attraction and the resort box office or in advance via the resort’s official website (click here).
Prices do however fluctuate depending on the time of year and admission during events such as Scarefest can be (in some cases) a little more.
Having said that in our opinion we feel it’s well worth the cost.
The Dungeon delivers an experience that is both chilling and downright hilarious at the same time mixing traditional story telling with a good amount of humor and thrills along the way.
Personal highlights for us are the Black River Boatride (an indoor boat ride themed around medieval torture in all it’s grisly glory) and Molly Leigh (a ghost show reminiscent of something straight out of a horror movie)!
Although the attraction itself is recommended for ages 10 and over, the attraction itself is more funny than it is scary.
The Bishop of Stafford and the Plague Doctor are two great examples of where humor is utilised far more than actually scaring the audience.
Any Criticisms?
Yes, two actually.
Although the run throughs we have had have usually been entertaining there have been 3 instances where we have left with a sour taste in our mouth.
This has been down to the approach by actors and actresses to their audience and how they have handled them
Whilst we completely get that the humor is supposed to be dry and at best rude, there have been 3 occasions where we feel the actors have over stepped their mark.
This in our opinion tarnished the whole experience and left us feeling both offended and very under whelmed overall.
The second criticism we have is regarding the amount of ‘blank spaces’ there are within the attraction.
Whilst you feel involved in your experience you can’t help but notice where the use of black painted has been employed as opposed to actual themeing to cover a space.
This can be found both within show sets and corridors throughout the attraction too and as such this does make us wonder how long Alton Towers plan to keep the dungeon.
The only two sets we can think of where this doesn’t feel to be the case are Molly Leigh and Dick Turpin.
Should I visit?
Ultimately, the answer is YES, absolutely!
The Alton Towers Dungeon is a fantastic unique addition to the Alton Towers Resort and delivers an experience worthy of it’s location.
Regardless of the above stated, acting at this location is in all fairness some of the best we have experience at any UK dungeon attraction and for the most part actors are usually very professional and accommodating.
For most however this type of attraction is usually a one time deal and as such most don’t go back for a second round, however we can’t help but visit here nearly every time we go.
Overall, Alton Towers Dungeon is a great little addition to the Alton Towers Resort and is a worthy of the Dungeons brand.
The dungeon is also family friendly too making it a fantastically creepy interlude in any family day out at the park.
If you haven’t already then we highly recommend visiting here on your next visit to Alton Towers Resort.
Go on Traitor, what’s the worst that could happen?
