The Man From BeyondStrange Bird ImmersiveEscape roomIRLI came to love escape rooms through immersive theater. I’ve travelled to London and Portugal just to see immersive theater shows. This room was a highlight of all of my experiences with immersive theater and the best escape room I have ever done. The place making from the moment you walk in, from the signage, the scents, the quirks of the lobby let you know this is something special. Once the experience begins, you feel wholly a part of a world that both feels surreal and believable at the same time. Strange Bird was kind enough to create a custom booking for us on a Monday afternoon and Madam Daphne was a joy to meet. The entire experience felt like a dream, the perfect amount of puzzles that made thematic sense and evoked the magic of Harry Houdini himself. I cannot recommend this room more, the emotion, care, precision and creativity poured into this experience elevated it beyond a perfectly executed escape room and into an immersive experience that I truly felt a part of from start to finish.
A Not So Fairytale EndingLock, Clock, and Peril Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLThe owners here were SO kind and we had an absolutely lovely time. On just a day’s notice, the owners were willing to stay open late to let my wife and I play two of their games and we are so happy we did! This game was nothing but a good time throughout. With varied sets and a pretty big footprint, this puzzle centric game oozed charm and whimsy. You’ll use all your senses, fingers and toes to get through this game and meet lots of new friends on the quest to help the Fairy Godmother. If I had one criticism, the video production in this game, while used sparingly, did not match the homespun charm of the aesthetics of the rest of the game. The voice acting was all done by their staff and was lovely and the video work in Teleporter Trials was kitschy and on brand, the animation here felt like a bit of a mismatch. I cannot recommend this game enough. There were only nine new games in the US nominated as a TERPECA finalist in 2025 and this game absolutely deserves this accolade. Stop by Lock, Clock and Peril whenever you can, if you like hand crafted and lovingly made puzzle focused escape rooms, this is a day trip worth making!
女王と国のために [For Queen & Country]Studio Escape NipponbashiEscape roomIRLWe were fortunate to do this room, along with their newly reopened Madam LeClare’s Seance room during our trip to Osaka. We weren’t sure what to expect but we were blown away by both rooms! This room contained the stronger puzzles and had more of a traditional “escape room” feel than their Seance room but both rooms were incredible and worth going out of your way to do if you’re traveling in Japan. The tactility, creativity and narrative focus in this room was so satisfying and contained plenty of “wow” moments that I have never seen in any other room. We never thought we would be comparing an escape room in Japan to rooms like Man from Beyond and Servants of Sleight but here we are! The humor, physicality and plot of this room elevate it into the top tier of rooms I’ve ever done. The GMs work really hard in this game and the care they take shows. We met one of the designers and they took the time to show us a little bit of how both rooms work and were so kind. We will make it a point to visit their rooms again on our next trip to Japan, whenever that may be!
Teleporter TrialsLock, Clock, and Peril Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLLock, Clock had been on my radar for a bit now and seeing them get a TERPECA nomination and finalist gave us the last push to stop on our road trip up the east coast and boy was it worth it! What a charming, clever and just plain fun company. On one day’s notice, the owners were willing to stay open late for us to play two games and sat and chatted with us for FAR too long, we couldn’t be more happy we stopped. My wife and I couldn’t decide which game we liked more, she preferred this game to the Fairytale game and I can totally see why. This is a puzzle focused game with a stellar and hilarious introduction and conclusion. Puzzles varied in style and complexity but were really innovative and made excellent use of a relatively small footprint. I am so impressed by this came and its worth the detour off 95 if you’re driving through or if you’re doing an escape room trip through the Carolinas!
Curse of the Hidden TemplePuzzleConnect Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLThis is our second room at PuzzleConnect. After finding them on Morty driving from NYC back to Philly, they have become a must visit location for us. This room was densely packed full of puzzles and an absolute blast to play! The thoughtfulness that the designers put into this game from the lighting, the sound design, to set decorating was the real highlight for me. The logic that PuzzleConnect shows in their designs is truly a stand out. Conveying the “why” behind a solution without hand holding or overt written clues is an art, one mastered in the two rooms we have played here. From the onboarding to the conclusion, theme and theatrics radiate from this game. So many moments made us smile, pause, and laugh. The solutions to the puzzles felt gratifying and the room flowed incredibly well. It was very manageable for two experienced players to finish without feeling the crunch of the clock but felt like a very full, rewarding experience. JQ who ran our game was incredibly kind and offered us a hint at an appropriate time and listened to us when we asked to be sparing with unsolicited help. We met one of the owners, Christina, at our first game and met the other owner, Frank at this game and both were so welcoming and wanted to chat about escape rooms and design. If you have kids, their Candy Shoppe room is an absolute must play, but if you’re a group of adults, I think this is a can’t miss room if you’re anywhere near central Jersey!
The Candy ShoppePuzzleConnect Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLThis room was so much fun, a must play for families and anyone new to escape rooms! This room is in wonderful condition and has an emphasis on tech that works flawlessly. The theme and sets were pristine and so much fun to progress through. This room was not particularly difficult but had puzzles of various difficulty for people of all ages and experience levels to keep anyone engaged. The room was very thoughtfully built for kids, with steps to ensure kids can reach all of the puzzles. Christina and Jack were wonderful gamemasters and took the time to speak with us after our game. We cannot wait to come back for their third room when it opens!
Help Not WantedThink Solve EscapeEscape roomIRLAnother excellent build from Think, Solve, Escape. One of my two favorites along with Bubba’s! A unique theme that has some really fun a-ha moments and reveals. I do think the theme should be better conveyed in the room description/marketing, it’s super unique and less generic than I thought it would be! Ideal for smaller groups, a good amount of puzzle density and a few solves we hadn’t seen before! It’s worth a trip from the city to check these guys out!
The ObservatoryThe Gate EscapeEscape roomIRLThis game is a piece of escape room history and an absolute must play if you’re in New England if you love puzzle dense games. It has a “wow” moment that took me back to one of my favorite top ranked TERPECA games in Europe (and this game certainly came first). More than that, it has an individual puzzle so crunchy, layered and methodical that I’ll remember it for a long time to come, maybe the most dense single puzzle I’ve seen in any game. We brought my wife’s family and they had a blast, everyone contributed and had an incredible time. Lucas was our game host and ran an incredible room, giving very gentle hints at the exact right time, understood when to let us suffer through our thought processes and provided an excellent experience for our group of six players of wildly varying skill levels. Come play this game if you love old school escape rooms with a focus on puzzling, charming, home spun sets and ingenious design that keeps giving. I think this game is a snapshot of where escape rooms began and how even a classic game can bring happiness and genuine surprise to the most jaded enthusiast or a dad who’s play three games before.
Fall Harvest13th Hour Escape Room - WhartonEscape roomIRLEasily my favorite and the most refined experience at 13th Hour, out of this, Campground and Oz. Fall Harvest grew in both scale and size from their previous builds but also shows restraint in its difficulty level in a way that Campground would have benefited from without sacrificing puzzle complexity. An excellent use of a very large space that keeps you traversing back and forth for the entirety of the game in a very satisfying way and “a-ha” moments that manifest from both solves and story progression in equal measure. Fall Harvest is a wonderful build with a sophistication and fairness in puzzle design with a satisfying sense of progression throughout its two hour run time. A puzzle could have used some signposting to connect two disparate pieces that did lead to a satisfying solve and we ran into a completely un-clued search fail that our game host quickly intervened and assisted with. Overall, the puzzling relied heavily on verbal communication across a large space and all of the solutions felt logical and earned. This game would play well with two enthusiasts who have played together frequently but can easily accommodate six players of any experience level. I liked Oz, I loved Campground, and I adore Fall Harvest. One of my favorite games on the east coast of the USA and worth a trip out of the city the next time you’re in New York. Watching 13th Hour continue to level up and find a polish and balance to their games over the last few years makes me beyond excited to see what they do next.
Bunker 071EscapopolisEscape roomIRLThis room is really special! We really enjoyed this room and our GM Lauren did an incredible job facilitating our game. This is a pretty challenging room that would be best served with four players who communicate well together. The puzzles were plentiful and had a depth/challenge that exceeded most rooms. The room was immersive, clever and incredibly challenging. There were a few things I would improve, the main being providing a board for note taking, they told us we could use our phone to help with notes and always prefer an in game instrument to help with it instead, especially in this game, there are some puzzles that require a lot of note taking. Overall, the logic of this room made it stand out, it flowed really well and we really enjoyed ourselves. Bring strong players with you and you will make it out! We also suggested making it a 75 minute room, an extra 15 minutes would benefit most teams! We can’t wait to try more games at Escapopolis!
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