Theatre-based pop-up escape room - Art Heist

Hi all

I learned recently from Marise at The Cipher Room that the Jetpack Theatre at Dulwich Hill is running an escape room.  The experience opens on 18 May and will run until 30 July.  

Here is the summary of the experience:

You and your crew plan and carry out a robbery in our purpose-built art gallery.
Distract guards. Avoid cameras. Fool alarms. Dodge lasers. Steal art.
But be quick, time’s already running out…

I understand that there are security guards all over the place (played by various actors) who interact with you throughout the escape.  My first thought was that it sounds a lot like Small Time Criminals, which was an escape room experience run in Melbourne last year that involved a heap of actors playing the roles of security guards that you have to avoid and/or trick. 

I'm pleased to confirm that Jim, the director of the Art Heist tells me that feedback he has received from people who have tried both Small Time Criminals and Art Heist is that the experiences are very different.  

Art Heist goes for 45 minutes, with an intro at the start and a de-brief at the end.  

I have bought my tickets for later this month and I'll report back here with my review.  You can read more about Art Heist on their website here.

Also, if you buy your tickets before 18 May and type in the code word "EARLYBIRD", you will save $30.

Thanks

Scott

Scram Escape Rooms - The Wizard Chambers Review

Hi all

My usual team of 4 managed to check out Scram Escape Rooms at Parramatta over the Easter weekend.  My 6 month old tagged along, so we were officially a team of 5.

It was our 53^rd room in Australia and our 41^st room in Sydney.  Here’s what we liked most about The Wizard Chambers:

·           they have done a great job with the theming of the space, which is Harry Potter inspired.  Their front of house looks great as does a small area beneath the stairs which sets up the first room theme really well.   They have managed to provide a real feeling of a wizarding world. 

·           the puzzles are great.  There is a really good mix of high tech and low tech puzzles throughout the rooms – they are all intuitive and make sense.  It’s always nice to see puzzle elements that we have not seen used before in 50+ rooms.  There were a number of things we saw in The Wizard Chambers that we had not seen anywhere before, which was cool.

·           they have some nice tech in the room, but some of my favourite elements in the room were low tech puzzles and door mechanisms, which were awesome. 

·           they have a simple voice of God hint system, which worked perfectly.

·           the room has a really good flow.  There were a couple of parts that had us scratching our heads, but when we figured it out it was all logical and made sense.

·           they have a dedicated game master watching each players’ every move, which is fantastic.  

·           after our escape, the game masters Walid and Jess stepped us through each puzzle in the room, which was a nice touch (particularly when certain puzzles were solved by my team members before I had even seen them).

·           it’s also really impressive that the owners designed the rooms and all of the puzzles themselves.  This is no easy feat (with more and more escape room companies in Sydney opting to purchase room designs or puzzle elements).  Scram has done a great job on this front.

·           they have a great location – they are close to Westfield and the train station, which is really convenient.

·           I think this room is an intermediate difficulty level.  We escaped in around 44 minutes (which I think was a record for about half a day until it was broken by another team).  None of the puzzles are impossibly hard – they are largely logical with a couple of elements that require you to really pay attention to your surroundings. 

·           this is therefore a great room for teams who are new to escape rooms and it’s really well-suited to family teams.  There are a couple of sections that are a little poorly-lit, but otherwise it’s not scary at all for young kids.

·           their pricing is great – at around $31 per person (for a team of 4), they are considerably below the average price for escape rooms in Sydney.

I’m pleased that there really isn’t much to report on the negative side.  I have given the owners my suggested tips/comments on minor things (some puzzle and theming tweaks mainly).  

This is a great room that I think is particularly suited to family or younger teams as well as beginner to intermediate players.  It's really fun!

Where:                   48/2 O’Connell Street, Parramatta

Duration:               60 minutes

Themes:                 1 currently (and another room planned)

Cost:                       $31 each (4 players) (*we played at the kind invitation of the owners)

Overall Rating:      A family-friendly room of magic and fun!

More details:          http://www.scramescaperooms.com.au/

Cairns gets its first escape room - Cairns Riddle Room

Hi all

A quick note to let you all know that if any of you are heading to Cairns, they now have their own escape room.  Owned and designed by Roland, Cairns Riddle Room is a standalone business.

They have opened up with just the one room so far - the summary of the room is as follows:

The Military Hospital

After years of investigating you and your soldiers have finally discovered the identity of the doctor who had been performing illegal experiments on patients at the military hospital. His descent into madness was obvious by the gruesome bodies he left behind.

You finally enter the hospital, ready to apprehend him, when the doors slam shut. You realize you are now part of his mad game, and need to escape before you become his next victims. ..

I happen to be heading off to Cairns next week for a family holiday, so I'll report back here shortly with my review of The Military Hospital.

Thanks

Scott

New escape room in Newtown - Second Telling Missions

Hi all

I was contacted in January of this year by Patrick, the owner of a new escape room in Newtown called Second Telling Missions (STM). 

STM is a little different to any other escape rooms that I’m aware of in the Sydney (or Australian) market so far – their games are based on historical, factual stories and are led by an actor who will form part of your team while in the room. 

They are opening up with just the one room to start with, but a second room is planned to open very soon (they are currently beta testing the second room).  The room summaries are below:

First Room - Rescue the White Rose

18 February, 1943. Hans and Sophie Scholl, members of the anti-Nazi resistance organisation the White Rose, were arrested a few hours ago. A member of the group who has yet to be arrested asks your team, as clean-skins, to go to their basement to retrieve a full list of White Rose members before the police have a chance to search the basement and find it themselves. The group was careful to put some security in place, so your team will have to find ways around it. The fates of the members of the resistance organisation are at stake. (For 2-7 players)

Second Room – Sabotage the Enigma

February, 1943. One of the White Rose’s leaflets called for Germans to sabotage the doomed war effort so that the war could be brought to a close as soon as possible. Your team has been contacted by a resistance organisation and asked to break into a top-secret army communications centre and sabotage the Enigma key-distribution mechanism. There is only a narrow window of opportunity to do it – one hour – but the mission could change the course of history. (For 2-6 players)

I’m uber intrigued by the thought of having an actor in the room with us and how that would work.  The best hint delivery system I have seen to date has been the “voice of God” system, where players simply speak out loud and a response comes over the loud speaker.  Next Level Escape uses a narration style voice of God, where the voice on the speaker is "narrating" the story of the escape room players working through the room, in a tongue in cheek method, to provide guidance and hints– this is the best system I have seen hands down.

However, having a live actor in the room sounds like a whole different level of immersion.  My very first escape room was years ago in Vegas (before escape rooms were a thing) and they had a live actor with us for the entire 4 hour game (which involved traveling by minivan to 4 different sites).  It was awesome – the live actor allows the game master (ie the actor) to see exactly what players are doing, what puzzles they are stuck on, etc.  The only risk with this system I think is that because the game master is there in the room with you, players might bombard the game master with hint requests rather than figure things out by themselves.  Game masters have such a huge impact on players' experience in an escape room, but a game master who is in the room with you would absolutely make or break the experience I think. 

I’m hoping to check out STM’s first room in the next couple of weeks and as always, I’ll report back here with my review.  You can check out their website here.

Thanks

Scott

New Escape Room in Parramatta - Scram Escape Rooms

Hi all

In February, a new escape room outfit opened its doors in Parramatta.  They are called Scram Escape Rooms.

The owners, Jess, Daniel and Walid, have told me that they are a standalone business and have done all of the design work themselves (ie none of the puzzles or room themes have been purchased from third party designers).  The owners noticed that there were a lack of things to do in Parramatta, and decided to change that by opening up their own rooms.

They have opened just the one room so far, but are currently constructing their second room which is coming soon.  Here are the very brief summaries of the room themes, taken from their website:

The Wizard Chambers

Your rival house team has hidden your wand and locked you in the dorms.  Can you solve their tricks to escape?  (3-6 players)

The Doll House

Will you escape?  Or will you be the puppet on strings?   

Their first room is The Wizard Chambers, which has a definite Harry Potter sound to it.  Jess tells me that the aim with this room was to create an immersive room that delved into childhood dreams.  

They are located in the Parramatta CBD, in a fantastic location only a short distance from Westfield.  

You can check out their website here.

My team will check out their room shortly and as always, I'll post my review on here.  As always, if you have tried their room, post a comment below and let us all know what you thought.

Thanks

Scott

Escape Rooms Central Coast - Review of Espionage

Hi all

I first learned about Escape Rooms Central Coast via another escape room blog last year.  Since then, I have been following the progress of the room build and I got in contact with the owners, Geoff and Wendy towards the end of last year.  They run an enormous laser tag operation in the same complex (something like 600m2 of dedicated laser tag space, which is awesome) and have recently added the escape room side to their business. 

They invited me to come and check out their room, entitled Espionage, a while back but it has been was challenging to find time to head up to the Central Coast.  They are near Toukley/Gorokan, around 1 hour and 20 mins’ drive from Sydney. 

I was up at the Hunter Valley at a work conference a couple of weeks ago and I managed to convince some of my work colleagues to stop on the way back to Sydney and try our hand at Espionage.  So, unlike my usual team of 4 very experienced players, this time we were a team of 5 players - 2 experienced players and 3 newbs.  When we arrived (on a Friday afternoon), there were a heap of school kids there who were playing laser tag for school sport.  I was immediately jealous of them all because laser tag was never on offer at my high school…

We were greeted by Geoff, the owner who took us upstairs to where the escape rooms are (they are on the second level and are quite separate from the laser tag and other gaming areas). 

This was my 52^nd room in Australia and my 40th room in Sydney (or surrounds). 

First off, here’s what I liked most about Espionage:

·        the puzzles all worked well and we didn’t have any technical issues or hiccups of any kind;

·        the puzzles are also pretty challenging – we were a mixed team of newbs and more experienced players, but we only escaped with about 9 minutes left on the clock (by memory), which shows that it is a pretty challenging room;

·        Espionage is a “non-linear” room, which means that the various puzzles do not need to be solved in a particular order (ie first a, then b, then c).  The biggest benefit of a non-linear room is that players can break off and solve puzzles separately, whereas linear rooms typically require players to all move together as a team through the puzzles (picture a team of 5 year olds playing soccer and following the ball).  The puzzle flow is done really well at Espionage, where the non-linear aspects converge at one point for the ending;

·        much of the theming in Espionage is done really well – there are some aspects that are really immersive and where the props and set decoration perfectly meet the storyline;

·        there is a nice mix of low and high tech puzzles in Espionage, as well as some fun hunt and seek fun;

·        the owners are passionate about their business.  We were lucky enough to have Geoff as our game master.  He was an excellent game master – he had very good intuition as to when (and more importantly, how) to give subtle hints throughout the game.  They operate the “voice of God” hint system, where players simply speak and the game master responds over a loud speaker – this is the best system for providing hints that I have come across;

·        Geoff also walked through the room with my team after we escaped, explaining each puzzle and the room flow.  This is always nice (as it gives players who might have missed some of the puzzles an opportunity to see how they are solved).  It’s also the sign of a business that cares enough to take the time out to make sure players can ask any questions that they might be sitting on.  We were also emailed a team photo after the escape, which was nice;

·        there was a high tech puzzle at the end of Espionage that I have not seen in over 50 escape rooms, which was awesome; 

·        Geoff and Wendy have included some hidden “easter eggs” within the room and puzzle design, which is always cool;

·        their pricing, which is $35 per head (for teams of 4 or larger) is great value.  Most rooms in Sydney are heading towards the $40 per head mark; and

·        Espionage is a really family-friendly room – it’s not scary. 

Espionage is a strong room and there isn’t much on the negative side to report.  The kinds of constructive feedback I have given to the owners are more along the lines of tweaks or minor improvements – things like:

·        strengthening the back story and tying it together with all of the props and theming throughout the experience, to add to the immersion;

·        consider having some different lock types or mechanisms (to add some more variety); and

·        consider adding some additional elements (such as sound) to further add to the immersion.

And that’s about it.  My team really enjoyed Espionage.  As always, the biggest deciding factor in my room reviews is the fun factor.  I’m happy to report that we all had heaps of fun.  The newer players in my group all loved the high tech aspects of the room the most (which are pretty visually spectacular) – they all want to try more escape rooms now, so clearly they have been bitten by the bug! 

Where:                   Unit 6, 132 Chelmsford Road, Charmhaven  NSW

Duration:               60 minutes

Themes:                 1 theme so far (but several more planned) 

Cost:                       $35 each (4 players) (We played at the invitation of ERCC)

Overall Rating:      A fun, family-friendly room with a nice mix of puzzles and tech

More details:         http://escaperoomscentralcoast.com.au/

Mission Sydney - Review of Lost Mine

Hi all

The second room that my team ever did in Australia was Vampire Castle at Mission Sydney, which we tried back in November 2014.  I enjoyed Vampire Castle, which was my first experience of a high tech escape room.  I also really enjoyed Dr M at Mission Sydney, which we did a little while later.

Now some 50 escape rooms later, my team went back to try one of Mission Sydney’s newest rooms, The Lost Mine.  This was a gift that I received from my wife for my birthday – she knew I really enjoyed their Dr M room when we had tried it about a year before.

We went into Lost Mine with high expectations, based on our previous experiences there.  I remember really enjoying Vampire Castle too, but 2 years later, I think I now have a greater appreciation for things like immersion and theming.  Looking back, Vampire Castle’s theming was better than average but some aspects don’t make a great deal of sense (like lasers or swipe cards) given the vampire theme.  It was still a great deal of fun though.

We were our usual 4 team of players again.  It was our 51^st room in Australia and our 39^th room in Sydney.  Here’s what we liked most about Lost Mine:

·        the puzzles all worked well and we didn’t have any technical issues or hiccups of any kind; 

·        the puzzles are also pretty challenging – there was a lot of variety of puzzle types in the room, which was cool; 

·        there was one puzzle in particular which had us stumped for about 5 minutes.  When we got a clue, the solution was obvious – I love a good forehead slapping moment; 

·        some of the spaces are really well-themed – clearly a lot of thinking has gone into the puzzle and room design;

·        there were some “wow factor” moments – some of the puzzles and different areas were unlike anything we had seen before, which was really cool;

·        if you’re a fan of high tech puzzles, then Mission Sydney’s rooms are for you.  There were heaps of high tech puzzles in Lost Mine – more I think than any other room we have tried before; and

·        we had a really lovely game master who answered all of our questions and spent some time with us after the escape to explain the back story further, which was a nice touch.

Ok, now for what I didn’t like so much:

·        whilst some of the high tech puzzles are cool, many of them just don’t fit the theme.  Some of the high tech is well concealed, so as to have the appearance of being "magic", which is great.  But laser puzzles in a lost mine didn’t really fit the theme for me;

·        this is the lawyer in me, but even though some of the mechanisms in the rooms are really cool, there are some aspects where I can see people hurting themselves.  Overall the room is reasonably safe, but for small kids or a drunk buck’s night, there are definitely aspects where players could hurt themselves;

·        there’s one puzzle that requires players to weigh items – I can’t really go into much detail on this one without giving spoilers, but needless to say we really didn’t like this particular puzzle – the solution was annoying;

·        my absolute favourite puzzles that I look back on now over the past 50+ rooms have typically been the low-tech, brilliantly-designed puzzles where everyday items that you would expect to see in the room are re-purposed as part of a puzzle.  Some of the high tech puzzles I have done are certainly memorable, but the low tech puzzles are the ones that stick with me years later.  Sometimes I feel that Mission Sydney do high tech for the sake of high tech – a bit more of a mix of simple hunt and seek fun and some low-tech puzzles would really add to the experience I think;

·        the back story is a little too complicated.  We had a lovely game master, but it took some time for us to understand the back story fully after the escape when she explained it to us.  I think the storyline is unnecessarily complicated; and

·        the room was expensive.  It cost us $210 for our team of 4, which equates to $52.50 per head.  In my humble opinion, this is too expensive.  I appreciate that it is a 90 minute room with lots of high tech, but when the average price for rooms in Sydney is closer to $35 per head, you really need to be an amazing room to justify the price difference.  Whilst Lost Mine is a really fun high tech room, I think the pricing is more suited to about the $45 per head mark.  Others will (and have) disagreed on this, but that’s my honest opinion.

Mission Sydney effectively owns the “high tech escape room” market in Sydney, as they have for some time.  It has proven a very popular market too, given that they are voted number 1 on TripAdvisor.  There are no traditional locks in Mission Sydney at all, which is their point of difference.

If you are the type of player who likes wow factors and high tech puzzles, then you should definitely head to Mission Sydney and check out their rooms.  For mine, I really enjoyed Lost Mine, but personally I have come to prefer a more rounded experience with a nice mix of high and low tech and some truly immersive, intricately themed spaces.  I don’t think Mission quite hit the mark on that front for me, but Lost Mine is still a great room.  

As always, the true test of a great room for me is whether or not we had fun.  We absolutely had fun in this room, so it was a success on that front.

Where:                   Suite 301-303 Pitt Street, Sydney

Duration:               90 minutes

Themes:                 4 themes

Cost:                       $52.50 each (4 players)

Overall Rating:      The highest tech room we have tried – great fun but could be more thematic

More details:          http://www.missionsydney.com