I miss haunted houses of the past

It seems to me that when I was younger, haunted houses were better than they are now. Not that I don't still like them, but I remember them being a lot different. There were people in them with really great makeup, and the house itself was really something to look at. The outside of the house might be a spooky graveyard with interesting tombstones for people to read while they waited in line.

Now it seems like they are all about people chasing you with chainsaws. Gone are the perfectly decorated rooms with mood lighting. The hallways that were once carefully painted to look like bricks or cracked walls are now mostly covered with that splatter type paint that is used to hide graffiti.

And why spend hours on someone's makeup and set decoration, if it is going to be too dark for anyone to see it? I used to be able to see such things by the lights of fake candelabras and lamps with colored lightbulbs, but now the rooms are just barely lit enough for you to see the exit, and many of the hallways have no light at all. I don't like literally stumbling around in the dark. Once or twice might be okay, but after that it really gets annoying.

Maybe it's all my imagination. Maybe the reason I remember the better lighting when I was younger was because we went to some special early show for kids when they turned on more lights. Maybe we went to a preview show, and the people were making more of an effort with their makeup and such, and later in the season they're just too tired to bother with it anymore.

But I don't remember running through the whole thing just trying to get out. I remember stoping to watch people. I remember going through rooms with black lights and laughing at people whose white bras and underwear became visible beneath their dark colored clothes.

Not that I dislike everything new. I like the bridge that goes through the vortex. Okay, it isn't as impressive now as the first couple of times that I saw one, but I still like it. And I like some of the animatronic things, but not all of them. (I especially do not care for the one that has spasms on the toilet. And why are we supposed to be scared of a guy playing with himself anyway?)

Maybe it's just me, but it seems like for the most part we're paying more and more money for less quality entertainment.