“You’re a real target,” my husband chuckles after someone dressed like a character from The Purge franchise lunges at me, stopping just inches from my face. This is about the twentieth time a character has purposely tried to scare me since we entered Universal Orlando Resort’s Halloween Horror Nights event, and though I should expect it, I can’t help but jump and let out a little shriek. Every. Single. Time. What can I say? I’m a good audience.

As we make our way through the hordes of people gathered on a hot evening in Universal Orlando Resort theme park in Florida, I feel giddy as a kid on Halloween, sprinting from one jack-o-lantern-lit house to another. Halloween Horror Nights, an annual event held at Universal Studios select evenings from mid-September to November 4, is like Halloween on a frantic sugar-high — a scare event on a dizzying scale that could only be pulled off by one of the best theme parks in the world.

For more than 20 years Universal Orlando Resort has scared the pants off guests, transforming itself each fall into what it calls the premier Halloween event in the United States. Actors don spine-chilling costumes and lunge at patrons, movie-quality haunted houses draw huge crowds and streets are transformed into the settings of popular horror films.

I spot one of the first creepy characters of the evening: an actor dressed as the Bride in Black from the Insidious franchise. The bride, costumed in a black wedding dress with a veil obscuring its demonic-looking face, is roaming one of the event’s Scare Zones (which is exactly what it sounds like) and momentarily pauses its eerie parade to swipe at guests — and pose for the occasional selfie. I see other costumed actors terrorizing guests all around me. The whole place is buzzing with shrieks and giggles, camera flashes and the odd patron running for their lives. I can’t wait to explore.