Hi everyone
My team of 4 finally managed to get down to Canberra in March 2021 after several years of trying to find a long weekend to get down there. I had met Chris and Jesse, the owners of Riddle Room at PAX in Melbourne in 2019. It was awesome to finally go down and check out their rooms.
We played all 4 of the rooms at Riddle Rooms in a single day. We checked out 3 back to back (with a break for lunch) and then we came back after dinner than night to play the 4th room.
First up we took on Riddle Room’s first room, The Nightmare. Before Riddle Room took on commercial premises, their Nightmare room was constructed in a garage. Things have obviously come a long way since then, given that Riddle Room now has one of the largest commercial premises of any escape room business in the country.
The summary of The Nightmare is as follows:
The DreamWake Corporation is looking for volunteers to enter the mind of a young girl trapped in an endless nightmare. Can you find the cause, save her, and get out in time?
Players: 2 - 6
Recommended Players: 4 - 5
Difficulty: 3.5 / 5
Scare Factor: 1 / 5
The Nightmare was our 4th room in Canberra and our 171st room to date. Here’s what we thought:
· Nightmare is a dark, scary-themed room but it wasn’t uber scary (there are no jump scares or anyone coming after you, for example). That being said, I don’t think the room would be suitable for young children (as there are some aspects that are very dark (ie poorly lit) and some of the creepier elements might not go down so well with little ones);
· as far as room design goes, Nightmare has a really nice flow. There are interesting puzzles, some of which included elements that we had not seen used before (and that’s becoming pretty rare these days);
· there is a lot of well-concealed tech in Nightmare (as there is in all Riddle Rooms for that matter). But one of my favourite puzzles in Nightmare was a simple, low-tech puzzle that relied on following coloured rope. It was really nicely done;
· as far as theming goes, all of the props were of a high quality and both the props and puzzles all made sense in the space. There was also a strong storyline that continued throughout the experience and brought everything together nicely;
· there isn’t a huge amount of hunt and seek fun in Nightmare, but where it is used it is quite effective (I’m thinking here of the end of the experience);
· something that Riddle Room does extremely well is the customer service side of things. We had a dedicated game master watching our every move – she was friendly and helpful and she offered to take us back through all of the puzzles at the end of our experience. Not all rooms in Australia have dedicated game masters (in fact, not all rooms in Canberra have dedicated game masters) and it always makes a huge difference; and
· I am pretty sure Riddle Room uses the Voice of God system in their rooms, although I am not 100% sure as we didn't ask for any hints in Nightmare.
Overall, I would describe Nightmare as a really strong room with nice puzzles and theming. The only puzzle we didn’t love was a puzzle that used black light. There was nothing wrong or unclear about the puzzle – we just don’t like black light puzzles. They have been done to death in escape rooms and they very rarely fit the room theme.
I forgot to write down how long it took us to escape from The Nightmare, but I think it was somewhere around the 40 minute mark. It was a strong room and it proved to be a really good warm up for my team before we took on the rest of the rooms at Riddle Room.
Where: 8 / 160 Lysaght Street, Mitchell ACT
Duration: 60 minutes
Themes: 4 themes (with plenty of space for more rooms)
Price: $40 per person
Overall Thoughts: A fun, well-themed first room from Riddle Room
More details: http://riddleroom.com.au
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