Issue date: 10/13/06 Section: A & E

Nightmares become reality at the Nightmares X-treme Scream Park located inside the Philadelphia Wachovia Spectrum. From now until Oct. 29, Cabrini is offering flex passes to the park for $10 to students. For those who enjoy the adrenaline rush from not knowing what is behind every corner, Nightmares X-treme is just the place.

The park is known for being one of the top in haunted entertainment throughout the world. Created and directed by Lynton V. Harris, Chairman and CEO of The Sudden Impact! Entertainment Company in New York City, the park resonates with themes that the majority fears the most.

Included in the Spectrum are eight attractions. Those waiting in line begin the adventure walking through the pitch-black halls of the spectrum decorated in all black. Random monsters come dangerously close to the spectators and screams fill the building. Edgar Allan Poe recites his gothic poetry as gravediggers come out beneath the black veils and frighten on-lookers. Finally the crowd gets let into the park.

The park is located overtop the Spectrum's hockey rink. The entrance into the park is temporarily interrupted and transformed into the Horrorwood Theatre showing of one of Harris' strangely disturbing short films about two trick-or-treaters that are lead into a freak show. Harris' film sets the eerie mood for the following events.

The audience is separated into groups of about seven and told to hold onto each other's shoulders. The first maze, Snakes in a Tomb, incorporate live snakes and mummy-clad actors. With each turn of the maze there is a monster ready to pounce on the next terrified guest.

Next, fog-blinded and shaking in their boots, guests enter into yet three more walkthroughs: FEAR Park, Flyers Fright and Tattoo 3-D. Aliens, zombies, masqueraders and even dead hockey players chase petrified visitors, and monster claws grab at passerbys. At one point, the guests are handed 3-D glasses to make the scary images on the walls and on the actors pop out even more.

When it seems like the end is in reaching distance, there is one last walkthrough. Prison Break Live!, based off of Fox's TV Drama "Prison Break," displays the traumatic miseries of jail-life and gives the abusive insulting inmates a chance to attack the fresh meat.

Nightmares X-treme is comprised of professional actors, the latest special effects and technologies of haunted entertainment. Open Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, the Park offers entertainment for those seeking blood-curdling thrills.

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