Decided to brave a Saturday night to see how it was.
Park was very crowded, parking was going to the overflow lot by 6pm. But mazes themselves? Not too bad. Willoughby's, Sewer, and Trick 'r Treat all had no waits at all as of around 9pm, and were still fully staffed (though Trick 'r Treat feels like it could use a few more scareactors). Short waits on Aftermath, Vault 666, and Truth or Dare. The longest lines were for Conjuring, Saw, and Stranger Things... but even those were maybe only using about 1/3 of their available queue space. Conjuring line moved really, really slow. Army of the Dead was closed when we stopped by, so never got around to that one.
Saw had some minor improvements, a few set design additions--notably schematics of torture devices posted on the walls. Perfect amount of fog. and sound for the queue was working (and Conjuring had sound in their queue as well). And big surprise, an interactive element! Well, it amounts to a button in the second room prominently displayed on a desk by a TV. When we pressed it, lights flashed. It wasn't much, but is was a nice surprise!
Honestly, in terms of wait times for mazes, it wasn't too different than it was in previous years. So while maybe the price hikes didn't add more guests, it didn't seem to scare that many people away, either. And the park was definitely very crowded. Tatsu had a full queue and was heading out past the gate, and most all food and shopping places were mobbed... so I suspect the park is still going to be making money on this. The only serious issue to me is that I feel the scare zones are not as full of actors as before... but again, with so much going on around the park, it's not a surprise short staffing has to appear somewhere.
Side note, Oktoberfest was still going until 9pm! So you could get there for FF and still enjoy that a bit. I feel that's a change from last year, where I thought it closed with the daytime park ops. Plus, they moved it over the Metro Park (that bar area across from Goldrusher), whis is actually a great place for it, as it's a bit self-contained and has plenty of seating.