All 6 rooms that we played in Bilbao and Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain in 2024

Hi everyone

After playing rooms in Athens and Madrid/Toledo on our trip in November/December 2024, we took a flight over to Bilbao very early one morning. While there, we played 6 rooms in Bilbao and in a little town called Vitoria-Gasteiz. I have put together detailed reviews of those rooms that I really enjoyed (and short comments only for those that weren’t my favourites).

Here is what I thought:

VITORIA-GASTEIZ ROOMS

Tu Tambien Sonaras (Mayto Kingdom) – Room 351

This was a fantastically scary room – seriously one of the scarier rooms that we played on the trip. You can see my more detailed review here.

Una Aventura De Leyenda / A Legendary Adventure (Mayto Kingdom) – Room 352

This was my favourite room of all 68 that we played in our Greece/Spain trip (although La Taberna was right behind it). This room was simply phenomenal. You can read my (very) detailed review here.

The Innkeeper’s Son (Dragonborn Escape) – Room 353

This was one of the most fun rooms that we played in Spain. It was designed by the same designers behind the Mayto Kingdom rooms and the Monkey Island themed room in Toledo. The puzzles in this room were really fun, many of which required interaction with our game master/actor, which we had a lot of fun with. The puzzles ranged from straight forward to pretty challenging (and there were a lot of puzzles to get through). The theming was strong and there were a couple of nice cinematic moments as well.  This room debuted at TERPECA #8 and was sitting at #137 at the time that we played it. Whilst I think it is showing its age a little, it was still a great room that we really enjoyed. If you would like to check out this room, you can do so here.

BILBAO ROOMS

The Lost Kingdom (Petra Escape Room) – Room 354

This was a pretty strong room. The quality of the theming was great, as were the puzzles (and there were a lot of puzzles). This room was TERPECA #88 at the time that we played it (and was formerly #51). The only issue I had with this room is that I found it really dusty and with lots of different smells (which although thematic, wreaked havoc with my hay fever).  I have found the same thing with other rooms that contain sand – I think the layers of dust stack up on top and there’s no real way to clean/remove it. So unfortunately I spent much of the time in this room sneezing. If you would like to check out this room, you can do so here.

The Rebellion Hybrid (Blindhouse Escape Rooms) – Rooms 355 and 356

Teams can play the Vampires room separately from the Werewolves room, or they can be played together as a hybrid room, which is what we did. The theming was really strong in these rooms. We had fun actor engagement where we did our best to make her laugh and break character (which she did more than once, which was fun). The puzzles were all strong, really varied and satisfying to solve. The hybrid version of these rooms is currently TERPECA 66 and debuted in 2022 at TERPECA 22. I think the most memorable aspect of these rooms was the scale and quality of theming. What the rooms lacked though (when compared to current top 10 rooms) is any cinematics or true ‘wow factors’ – and I thought the actor engagement could have been more involved. We did however really enjoy these rooms. If you would like to check them out in more detail, you can do so here.

Final thoughts on Bilbao/Vitoria-Gasteiz rooms

Bilbao and Vitoria-Gasteiz are beautiful spots. We found very limited public transport options though to get from Bilbao to Vitoria-Gasteiz and ubers do not run between the two towns (which is about a 1 hour drive), so we decided to hire a car (which was pretty straight-forward). We only had our NSW drivers licences on us (and not an international driving permit), but we had no issues. We didn’t have much time in Vitoria-Gasteiz, but we spent a morning walking around Bilbao which was beautiful (and we had a late night dinner in a tiny burger place in one of the laneways near our hotel and it was the best burger I have ever eaten). After our escape rooms were done, we hit the Artxandra Lookout in Bilbao on the way to the airport, which provided an awesome sunset view of the whole of Bilbao. This is somewhere I would have never traveled to if it were not for other enthusiasts’ recommendations (which have since been confirmed by TERPECA votes). Vitoria-Gasteiz is a long way from Madrid and Barcelona, but Una Aventura De Leyenda alone made it worth the trip.

Mayto Kingdom – Tu Tambien Sonaras (You’ll Dream Too) Review (Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain)

Hi all

After Madrid, we flew to Bilbao and then took a hire car to a little town named Vitoria-Gasteiz. We had heard amazing things about Mayto Kingdom’s rooms and we included Bilbao and Vitoria-Gasteiz mainly to play their rooms.

The story of Tu Tambien Sonaras is as follows:

As retired paranormal investigators, you're fed up with so many cases involving haunted houses that turn out to be hoaxes. Now, a strange case has caught your attention. The clues have led you to the vicinity of a spooky house. A place that should never be entered under any circumstances.

We had high expectations of Tu Tambien Sonaras, given it debuted at TERPECA Number 1 back in 2021.

Tu Tambien Sonaras was our 351^st room to date and here is what I thought:

• The theming in this room is seriously amazing. They have constructed a multi-level house in the middle of a warehouse. The attention to detail is awesome.

• As for the scare factor, this was a genuinely scary room. I had hoped that by the time we got to Spain, I would have been desensitised to scary rooms having played so many in Athens. I can confirm I was not desensitised (at all). Again, playing as a team of 2 made this room that much scarier, particularly when at several times we were split up. Horror escape room designers love themselves a ‘courage’ test or two, don’t they…

• As for jump scares, there were many of these (but not so many as to be annoying). There were some really nice elements too where lighting (and a complete lack of lighting) were used to move things about and to again, scare us. There were also some nice cinematic moments – sounds/music were used really well (and were not quite as loud as many of the other Greek/Spanish rooms we played).

• This room contained a large number of puzzles (and a large number of spaces). The room used the spaces really well. A common element we found in other well-designed scary rooms is that they use ‘light and shade’ – ie, moments where players can be more confident that they won’t be jump scared, which allows players to concentrate on puzzles properly.

• As for actor interactions, there were many interactions throughout the experience. The actors were all well-behaved – they didn’t grab us and at no point were they rough with us. We felt safe (although petrified) throughout the whole experience.

I thought Tu Tambien Sonaras was a fantastic room. Although it was incredibly scary, particularly as a team of just 2, I appreciated the quality of the theming, the sounds, lighting, use of jump scares, etc. It was all really well-considered.

One thing to note is that we had a little difficulty in finding this room. It is located in an industrial estate with several rows of identical-looking warehouses. Our GPS put us in the wrong row – so if you find yourself unable to find it, keep driving around until you see a wide painted garage roller door and then you will know you have found them.

Where:                 Barratxi Kalea, 37A, Pabellón 20, 01013 Vitoria-Gasteiz

Duration:              120 minutes

TERPECA:           1 in 2021

Themes:               3 themes

Overall Rating:     An incredibly well-designed, shit your pants, escape room

More details:        https://maytokingdom.es/

 

Mayto Kingdom – Una Ventura de Leyenda (A Legendary Adventure) Review (Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain)

Hi all

The second room that we played at Mayto Kingdom in Vitoria-Gasteiz was Una Ventura de Leyenda. This room is VERY hard to get into – they seem to be booked out around one whole year ahead. I contacted the owners and managed to get a morning booking and so we booked the flights and hotels accordingly.

The story of Una Ventura de Leyenda is as follows:

A renowned team of archaeologists has discovered the location of the greatest treasure ever told. Everything indicates it's in Southeast Asia. Unfortunately, it seems they're not the only ones searching for it. You must prevent it from falling into the wrong hands and get ahead of it, or the greatest catastrophe of all will unfold. This time we're going to need the best team. The adventure is going to be exciting!

Before our trip, I reached out to Heiner to ask about any ‘must do’ rooms. He said we needed to play this room, so we made it happen. And it ended up being our favourite game of the trip.

Una Ventura de Leyendas was our 352^nd room to date and here is what I thought:

• This was such an amazing room. It started with pretty a high octane level of adventure, which was sustained for the entire duration of the experience.

• The theming in this room is about the best I have seen in the world. The amount of work (and money!) that must have gone into this room is truly amazing. The sets are straight out of a movie backlot tour. There were some really spectacular (and enormous) spaces that were phenomenal. I was glad that we had time afterwards to walk back through and look at some of the amazing spaces slowly, to properly take them all in.

• Whilst this room borrows a little from the Tombraider world, it doesn’t rely on any knowledge of that franchise. At its heart, this is a room based purely on fun and adventure. As much as I would love to go into the details of the very many elements that we encountered during this experience, I can’t do so without giving spoilers. But trust me when I say that this room brought out the Goonies, Indiana Jones and 90s PC adventure game lover in me!

• The puzzles throughout the experience were great. They used some old-school puzzle elements, some pretty high-tech elements, some hunt and seek fun and some puzzles requiring fun character interactions. And on that front, we enjoyed interacting with the various actors throughout our experience. One cool element that was included in this room were true cut scenes, where we watched actors interacting with each other. I felt like I was at Universal Studios, watching actors from a distance. It was really cool (and certainly unique for an escape room).

Overall thoughts

This room was phenomenal. The scale was ridiculous. The theming and props were amazing. The actor interactions and cut scenes were fun and really unique. The puzzles were plentiful, varied, challenging and really satisfying to solve. This was our favourite room of the entire trip across Athens and all over Spain. It did not surprise me when I learned, after having played this room, that it was later nominated and hit the number 2 TERPECA spot. It is very much deserved.

One thing to note is that we had a little difficulty in finding this room. It is located in an industrial estate with several rows of identical-looking warehouses. Our GPS put us in the wrong row – so if you find yourself unable to find it, keep driving around until you see a wide painted garage roller door and then you will know you have found them.

Where:                  Barratxi Kalea, 37A, Pabellón 20, 01013 Vitoria-Gasteiz

Duration:               120 minutes

TERPECA:            2 in 2024

Themes:                3 themes

Overall Rating:      Our favourite room of 68 on this trip. Unbelievable.

More details:         https://maytokingdom.es/