As usual, I'm not of a single opinion on this one.
I don't like the whole shooting thing, but... I think that most dark rides offer very limited re-ride enjoyment for a majority of people. There are certainly people who love dark rides, but I think they're in a bit of a minority.
So unless there's a real "hook" to get people to ride again, they just wont. It needs excitement or something really "great" to get people back onto it.
I loved the book (Smoke and Mirrors) as it's a brilliant insight into the creation of a large scale project and it has some great background into Tussauds at the time. However, my most endearing memory of The Haunted House is "I'm bored of this ride". After years of visiting and going on the ride, I just got less and less out of it. Nostalgia plays a huge part.
Now, I don't like Duel. It's too brash and you miss so many great details shooting, but, it's also boring the 12th time in a day you've been on it not shooting
Unlike something like Haunted Mansion, there isn't a complete narrative, you're not "encapsulated" by a story/world. I think Tomb Blaster does that much better, with everything from the queue to the journey through the tomb being holistic. Duel misses that, and so did the Haunted House. It was a set of disparate scenes only very vaguely linked. In fact, I only realised a lot of the links having read the book - it was simply lost on the rider. I also don't think there are many good effects in Duel/HH. It's always very clear that it's a shed containing animated scenes. The swing arms and the mechanics aren't disguised very well.
Here's a conundrum though... If a ride is quaint and tacky enough, I think that matters much less. Duel/HHs issue lies in the fact it tried to be grandiose but just didn't go far enough. Knoebels' and Blackpool's ghost trains work so much better because they chock full of stuff, but it's all really tacky and awful. It doesn't matter if things are obviously on arms and strings, because it's great fun just to see what they've done. And there's your hook. Tackier rides have a great element of fun. You want to ride them just to really enjoy the efforts gone into making things straddle that line between "scary" and "amusing". I think there are very few that actually get this right.
I'd say Voodoo Mansion failed as it was trying too hard to be scary and wasn't. It just came across as a bit sad. The problem being that it appeared to be too scary for "family entertainment" and it wasn't really appropriate for all ages. So you had a ride that was crap for those who it was appropriate for, and inappropriate for the people it's meant to entertain. Spooky 3D is turd, but at least it's got a wider range of appeal.
I think most Ghost Trains just don't try hard enough. A few plastic skeletons, cobwebs and hooters just aren't up to the job. They don't scare and they don't entertain. They're just pointless.
Brean does it properly. I like Brean's because it's taken the traditional "dark room, loud noise and scary **** " thing and brought it screaming into the video nasty age. It's a constant assault of genuinely horrific scenes with the correct kind of pauses between so it keeps on getting you. It's actually really cheap, because all the stuff is off-the-shelf, but it's great to see them make such an effort for such a small ride. certainly not suitable for the majority of places, but it fits Brean perfectly.
TL;DR:
A ghost train should create an atmosphere before you enter it. You should feel trepidation at the unknown you're going to experience in the ride. You should feel a part of the spooky goings on before you even enter.
Then the ride should entertain. Maybe You should get a feel for a narrative that immerses you in the ride. It could just be really fun and silly and that nervousness at the start is released as good humour. Maybe the ride should actually go the whole hog and be genuinely terrifying - which is no easy feat. Possibly just distract the rider by having them shoot at lights. They all walk a tightrope though between success and failure and I think it's much easier to chuck in flashing lights and guns to "entertain" than to actually do things properly.
