Real-Life ‘The Last of Us’ Haunted House May Force Me Not To Be a Big Baby

Horror and I don’t mix. There are several horror movies I’ve enjoyed, but my enjoyment has come in spite of the horror elements, not because of them. Unlike many horror fans who enjoy how the adrenaline rush of horror experiences make them feel, I really don’t. I don’t like being scared.

So, tell me why I’m considering willingly putting myself in a room full of clickers.

I’ll have a chance when The Last of Us joins Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights this Fall.

The original Last of Us game just celebrated its 10 year anniversary. (It seems like only yesterday …) Considering that and the popularity of the TV adaptation, it makes sense that Naughty Dog is going hard with its presence this year.

The Escapist reports that Universal Halloween Horror Nights “will arrive later this year on select nights from September through October.” While the above announcement video doesn’t show us much in the way of what the TLOU Horror Night experience will look like, it sure as hell does a great job of giving us a feel for it.

I already don’t like it, and I’m anticipating several nights of lost sleep this fall if I go to this thing.

Years ago, I went to my first and only haunted house experience in New York, called Nightmare: Face Your Fear produced by a team called Psycho Clan, which created annual Nightmare experiences for 14 seasons and continues to create immersive horror experiences.

For Face Your Fear, Psycho Clan polled 3,500 New Yorkers on their top phobias, then built an experience where each room was devoted to one of the top 13 fears experienced by New Yorkers, and visitors would go through the rooms in descending order from least popular fears to most common fears.

By the time I got to musophobia, the fear of mice and rats (#6), I was shaking. There were several times when I was legit looking for an exit to GTFO, but then decided to do what the experience said and face my fears.

Once my friend and I were through it, she was beaming, having had a great time. I was crying and angry and wanted to go home—except I didn’t want to go home, because then I’d just be alone at home in the dark. I had trouble sleeping for the next couple of days. Now, for some reason, I’m considering putting myself in a situation where I’ll be in a room with some of the most terrifying creatures created for video games.

The Last of Us’s infected aren’t just “zombies.” Zombies I can handle. It’s the clicker noises and the fact that their presence requires silence when all I’ll want to do is scream. It’s the fact that there are different types of infected that have different movement speeds and physical abilities that are unpredictable. It’s the fact that infected are armored by fungus, so killing them is harder, and I’m assuming we WON’T HAVE GUNS, KNIVES, BOWS AND ARROWS, OR PIPE BOMBS in this experience.

I must really love The Last of Us if I’m considering putting myself through this. Maybe I’ll even record my visit and share it with you. Someone should enjoy my experience.

(featured image: HBO)