NYC’s latest Halloween pop-up: the Nightmare Machine

With roughly two weeks until trick-or-treaters scurry about the city, there’s ample time to cross off everything on your Halloween to-do list – and for Halloween lovers, one of those items might just be entering the Nightmare Machine.

Embracing the Halloween aesthetic, Nightmare Machine is an immersive nine-room experience geared to the social media savvy looking for a good fright. Each room features aspects that may frequent your nightmares, such as frightening clowns, aliens… or, if you’re a New Yorker, a room swarming with cockroaches(!).

Walking through the Nightmare Machine takes between 30 to 45 minutes – depending on how many photos you plan on snapping within each room. Though certain rooms of the Nightmare Machine are designed to resemble a haunted house (one room contains a bunch of “bodies” clad in garbage bags, another is completely blood splattered), Nightmare Machine isn’t a haunted house, nor is it particularly scary. Perhaps the scariest part of the entire experience was an epitaph crested with “L Train”, which beckoned a chuckle from visitors most likely not relying on the L.

Those familiar with Williamsburg might recognize this to be the same location as the stomping grounds for Dream Machine – which is taking a temporary hiatus in lieu of the Nightmare Machine. Open between 5 pm to 10 pm, Nightmare Machine stretches out until Halloween, and will then revert back to the Dream Machine. But stay tuned, as it appears that the pop-up is going mobile according to their website.

The $38 experience is somewhat charming, but if you’re not an aspiring Instagram influencer or keen on social media, then this might be worth swapping out for some Hocus Pocus-themed trivia instead.

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