Lost Locks – Cottage Capers (Gold Coast)

Hi everyone

In October of 2024, on our weekend away to the Gold Coast, we checked out a total of 7 escape rooms. Our fourth room was Cottage Capers at Lost Locks. 

This was our 315^th room to date. Here is what I thought:

• the room very much felt like a generation 1 room. The quality of theming was pretty poor by current standards;
• the puzzles were all ok, but not memorable. We did have a few mechanisms throughout the experience that did not work (some were finnicky and worked on the third or fourth attempt, others were poorly designed so that we solved them before we should have solved them);
• my girls enjoyed the Christmas theme, but that was probably the best part of the room. The actual execution of the theming, with props and quality of floor/wall/ceiling dressings, was below average; and
• I thought this room should have been retired some time ago and was surprised that the price charged was more than what we paid at other, much better escape rooms on the Gold Coast. Prices here are $55 per adult, which I think is far more than this room deserves to charge. We were out in less than half the time, with a pretty unsatisfying, anticlimactic ending.

I would give this one a miss. Our family of 4 paid $210 for less than 30 minutes for an average, generation 1 room. For less money, go and check out Padlockd or better yet, Eclipse Escape Rooms (which are the cheapest and best rooms we played on the Gold Coast).

Where:                 3240 Surfers Paradise Blvd, Surfers Paradise

Duration:            60 minutes

Themes:              7 themes

Price:                    $55 per person (over 15yo)

Overall Rating:     Give this room a miss – should have been retired long ago

More details:        https://lostlocks.com.au/

Padlockd – The Carnival (Gold Coast)

 

Hi everyone

In October of 2024, on our weekend away to the Gold Coast, we checked out a total of 7 escape rooms. Our third room was The Carnival at Padlockd. 

After having just played their School of Magic room, which was a near duplicate of a room we had played in Sydney, we were hoping for a better experience with The Carnival. Thankfully, it delivered.

The Carnival was our 314^th room to date. Here is what I thought:

• we played The Carnival with our 2 daughters and we all had a great time. The story behind the room is that players find themselves in an abandoned carnival where they have to make their way through the carnival to hit the big red button to escape;
• The Carnival is not a scary room. There are poorly-lit areas, but no jump scares and nothing scary (our timid girls were fine);
• there is a nice room flow and scale to The Carnival, which was much bigger than I had anticipated. There was a really fun mix of puzzles as well;
• the most memorable aspect of The Carnival was that we all got to do something we have never done before (or since) in an escape room, which was pretty cool;
• there were some fun puzzles that had us all running all over the place; and
• one cool thing that Padlockd does is that all players walk away with a free, high quality, coloured pin. We walked away with both a Carnival and School of Magic pin, which were really nice (not many ER businesses provide keepsakes, but I wish more did).

The Carnival was a really fun, family-friendly room. The puzzles were all fun and we all really enjoyed ourselves. The only issue we had was that one puzzle had not been reset correctly and a spare key had been left in the room, which we found and then skipped a puzzle. That was a shame, but it didn’t ruin the experience.

Where:                 3177 Surfers Paradise Blvd, Surfers Paradise

Duration:            60 minutes

Themes:              14 themes

Price:                    $54 per person (over 15yo)

Overall Rating:     A really fun, family-friendly room

More details:        https://padlockd.com.au/

Padlockd – School of Magic Review (Gold Coast)

 

Hi everyone

In October of 2024, on our weekend away to the Gold Coast, we checked out a total of 7 escape rooms. Our second room was School of Magic at Padlockd. 

I had written to Padlocked ahead of playing this room to confirm that it was a unique room (given the number of ‘magic’ themed rooms that we have now played both in Australia and overseas). Padlockd confirmed that the room was an Indestroom room, but that the only other place that the room had been constructed was in Brisbane (and even then, there were just elements from the room that were shared in that Brisbane room).

Unfortunately for us, that didn’t turn out to be correct. Within about 10 seconds of entering the room, I knew we had played it before. Whilst there were some subtle puzzle differences, I can confirm that School of Magic at Padlockd is almost identical to Wizardry at Paniq Room at The Rocks in Sydney. We played on (but didn’t enjoy the experience, given we had played Wizardry in Sydney only maybe 6 months before). We zoomed through and escaped in about half the time.

To their credit, Padlockd refunded our money after I sent them an email (the GM on the day didn’t seem to appreciate that we were disappointed, but Emily, their COO, did when I emailed her).

School of Magic was my 313^th room. I won’t bother reviewing the room here – instead, you might as well read my review of Wizardry here (given the rooms are near identical).

I do want to make a comment though about Indestroom rooms. For those of you who don’t know, Indestroom is a company (based in Europe I think) that designs and sells fully-constructed rooms. The concept, as I understand it, is that ER businesses can purchase a room and it is then sent across (presumably in a shipping container) with instructions on how to build and combine all of the pieces together.

I am not a huge fan of this model (and I suspect most enthusiasts aren’t). What this type of product is good for is to allow ER businesses to get a new room up and running very quickly and to therefore start bringing in revenue. And I have heard directly from Sydney ER owners that have had a successful partnership with Indestroom (albeit subject to exclusive contractual obligations to purchase spare parts from Indestroom for life, and an inability to change the room designs in any real way). However, I have yet to be amazed by the quality of any Indestroom rooms (and none to my knowledge sit on the top 300 TERPECA rooms list). They are typically reasonable rooms with high quality props and theming, but without any wow factor, large scale or any kind of well, soul.

The biggest issue with Indestroom rooms is that the same rooms are now appearing all over the place and ER owners are not, in my view, adequately flagging this fact on their websites. For example, I am aware that there are Indestroom puzzle elements from that same School of Magic Gold Coast room now at SCRAM in Parramatta and obviously at Paniq Room at The Rocks. So that is 3 magic-themed rooms in Australia (that I know of) with some identical puzzles/props (and in the case of School of Magic and Wizardry, almost completely identical rooms). That’s a problem.  

If Indestroom is going to sell its pre-made rooms, surely it should only be selling those rooms/puzzles in different geographic locations (and surely ER owners would want to ensure that is the case in their contracts as well)? But this does not seem to be the case. I also think any ER owners that purchase Indestroom rooms or puzzle elements should make that clear on their websites.

Where:                 3177 Surfers Paradise Blvd, Surfers Paradise

Duration:            60 minutes

Themes:              14 themes

Price:                    $54 per person (over 15yo)

Overall Rating:     A reasonable room, an identical copy of which we had already played elsewhere

More details:        https://padlockd.com.au/

[Add family photo]

Fox in a Box Gold Coast - Wild West Saloon Review (Gold Coast)

Hi everyone

In October of 2024, my wife had a work conference on the Gold Coast, so we decided to take our girls up for a few days. Whilst there, we managed to check out a total of 7 escape rooms. The first room was Wild West Saloon at Fox in a Box.  I had previously played some rooms at Fox in a Box in Brisbane, so I had a pretty good idea of what to expect (as far as room/puzzle quality was concerned).

This time, we were a team of 6. I had been telling my Dad for years about escape rooms and I finally managed to bring he and his wife along to see what it was all about (together with my wife and girls). 

Wild West Saloon was my 312^th escape room to date. Here is what I thought:

• I would describe Wild West Saloon as a pretty simple, family-friendly room (no dark areas and no jump scares of any kind);
• the puzzles were all straight forward (with the exception of one, which was a little illogical for my taste), but overall they were reasonably good;
• there was some nice, albeit simple, theming in the room. There was no amazing floor or ceiling treatments, but the props made sense in the space; and
• the puzzles were all fun to solve.  We divided and conquered, with my girls solving several puzzles by themselves. There was also a good mix of hunt and seek fun, together with some low and higher-tech puzzles.

Wild West Saloon was a straight-forward, family-friendly room. There were no wow moments, but the puzzles were all largely good and the theming was also reasonably good. My family had played an amazing wild west themed- room in Paris together earlier in the year, and that room easily outshone this Fox in a Box room. I would also describe Wild West Saloon as being on the easier side (we escaped with plenty of time to spare, even though we weren’t rushing). Of the 7 rooms we played on the Gold Coast, this was about middle of the pack.

Where:                 Level 1, 3173 Surfers Paradise Blvd, Surfers Paradise

Duration:            60 minutes

Themes:              8 themes

Price:                    $42 per person (team of 6)

Overall Rating:     A reasonably good family-friendly room

More details:        https://www.foxinaboxgoldcoast.com/