A Jacksonville
At Orange convention, Sally Corp. seeks home for attraction
company wants to find a home to bring to life its “Walking Dead” dark ride.
Fans of “The Walking Dead” may come face to decomposing face with creatures from the televised zombie drama in an amusementpark ride being developed by a Florida company.
Jacksonville-based Sally Corp. is showing off elements of its “4-D” dark ride called The Walking Dead: Battle for Survival at this week’s gathering of the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions — aka IAAPA — at the Orange County Convention Center.
“This will be a six-passenger kind of anchor attraction, motion-based vehicles, virtual and practical sets and scenery,” said Rich Hill, creative director. Not to mention dozens of animatronic “walkers,” the TV show’s term for zombies.
The planned attraction is done in conjunction with AMC, the network that produces “The Walking Dead,” one of the most popular shows in the nation and especially with the 18- to 45-year-old demographic in Orlando. In fact, the deal between AMC and Sally was born here a year ago on the floor of the IAAPA expo, Hill said.
Last year, Sally had a generic zombie attraction in the works that caught the eye of network executives, he said.
“I literally pitched this ride to them on the floor of IAAPA last year,” Hill said. “We’ve been working all year — wrote the script, designing the building. The entire concept was developed this whole year.”
It all required the approval of “The Walking Dead” executive producer Greg Nicotero.
“You are a survivor of the zombie apocalypse, and you are trying to gain entrance
into a camp,” Hill said of the ride’s story line.
“You’re trying to be introduced to the camp. Your requirement is to go out into a mission and find supplies for that camp,” Hill said. “So you‘ve got to go out on the streets and visit a lot of the locations from ‘The Walking Dead’ series and collect supplies and defend yourself against walkers in the process.”
A switch on the vehicle’s dashboard allows passengers to toggle between weapons used in the such, such as a crossbow, shotgun, water hose and kata, he said.
Settings from the series — including Woodbury, Hershel’s farm, the prison and the streets of Atlanta — are incorporated.
“We actually see when the barn opens and the walkers come out at you and you’re stuck in the mud trying to get away,” Hill said.
Don’t score high enough? Well, um, nice knowing you.
“If you don’t collect enough supplies, you get eaten by walkers,” Hill said.
The ride doesn’t yet have a buyer, although Hill said there has been a lot of interest at IAAPA.
“It’s going somewhere,” he said. It could operate in multiple locations.
Universal Orlando might seem logical to some fans because “The Walking Dead” has been at the theme park’s Halloween Horror Nights event for four consecutive years. But dealing with licensed properties can be tricky.
“Unfortunately, unless Universal contacted us directly, we cannot sell to Universal or anybody in a [certain] mileage radius,” Hill said. He would not specify that distance.
“I love Horror Nights,” he said. “I think it’s awesome, but this is a completely different thing.”