It was almost 1 AM.

I sat in my bed, clutching my phone to my chest, waiting for the next instructions to come. Suddenly, my phone rings.

“im going to kill youre family” the text reads.

I stared at the message, and did the only logical thing I could do…

I corrected their message to contain the correct usage of ‘your’.

A few weeks ago, I spent the weekend doing ‘the stalker experience,’ a simulated, in-home immersive event that you can do literally anywhere in the world. A friend had heard of it, and before signing up, she wanted me to check it out and see what it was all about.

I did a little research, and found that it was fairly new, and not very established. I reached out to the owner, Ryan, and told him I wanted to ask him a few questions about it before trying it out for myself.

He called me a few hours later, and when I didn’t answer, proceeded to call me again. And again. And again. Was the experience starting already? Or was he just eager to chat?

It turns out it was the latter. When we finally connected, we talked for a bit, and I was…quite surprised at some of his answers.

Ryan went through Blackout’s 21, and felt that it didn’t have enough messages. As an avid lover of horror movies that featured creepy phone calls, like Scream, he felt that there was nothing out there like that. So, he decided to create ‘the stalker experience’ to try it for himself.

Experiences last for 48 hours, and the stalker can contact you at any time. There are now two different versions of the experience: the free one, which is the original version he created three months ago, and the extreme one, which has more messages and more interaction. The extreme version also has more tasks, but people need to actively partake in order get most out of it.

Oh yeah, did I mention that Ryan is only 15?

I was very surprised when I learned this fact, and was impressed by his ambition. At 15, I was too busy watching Saturday morning cartoons than worrying about trying to scare people for an entire weekend. He gets major kudos for pulling this all together at a young age. His parents, who are supportive of his endeavor, help him out by placing Facebook ads to bring in more people.

However, after going through the weekend-long experience, I had some apprehensions that I shared with him that I will also share with you.

One of the biggest issues I had with the experience was how very much like Blackout’s 21 it was. He DID mention doing 21 to me. However, ‘the stalker experience’ sometimes blatantly stole out right from 21, from the tasks they ask you to do, how they interact with you, and even their trailer. It’s often said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but borrowing so heavily from Blackout won’t do them any favors in the long run.

Another concern I had were the stalkers themselves; they are all people that have gone through the experience that Ryan pulls from Facebook. All of them are volunteers. Unfortunately, there is no vetting process for them. While I understand he is young, and probably didn’t think about the potential implications of setting a stranger loose on someone else, it could turn out to be a bad situation. I suggested he find some service to do background checks, just so he doesn’t accidentally hire a REAL stalker, and give them someone’s personal information. The people he is employing have no previous experience in doing this (they are all volunteers, as I mentioned), so they could use some vetting and a bit of training as well to really hone the experience more.

Before I started, I was told the completion rate was only 10%. However, I did not find it particularly scary. Maybe it is my veteran haunt brain, but there wasn’t much to it to make it scary. For newcomers, I can see how some of the tasks would be frightening, but I did suggest re-vamping some of their tricks to keep it fresh and exciting for participants…and not so much like Blackout’s 21.

The price point that was mentioned, $30 for a weekend, was a bit too high for me. I get that it is one-on-one interaction for a whole weekend, but if all of his stalkers are volunteers, then there is no need for a high price point.

I do want to give kudos to my assumed “stalker” for giving it his all. He did a good job with what he was given, and I applaud his efforts. He’s actually a really nice guy, and loves immersive theater as much as the rest of us!

While I felt the experience wasn’t for me, and could use a major re-haul, I do admire Ryan’s ambition in this. He is an enterprising kid, and I think he is definitely someone to watch within the haunt industry in the next few years. With some tweaks and re-vamps, I think ‘the stalker experience’ can really be something good and scary. In its current form, however, I cannot recommend it. But in the future, I think it’s definitely something to look out for.

Ryan has something planned for October called 14, and while the details are scant, he does say it will blow ‘the stalker experience’ away.

For more on ‘the stalker experience’ check out there website at http://thestalkerexperience.weebly.com/

Or check them out on Facebook.