Project 5150Hypnotic Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLHypnotic’s rooms keep wowing me. They’re fun and well designed. And the people there are themselves real Escape Room fans who are eager to share their rooms with new people. 5150 had a great mixture of creepy atmosphere and tricky puzzles without relying on non-sequitors or cheap jump scares for effect.
Escape LAHypnotic Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLAs an L.A. native who loves this city, I was iffy about trying to “Escape L.A.” but this room was delightful. Much lighter in tone than the other two rooms here, this still had the fun, tricky puzzles that make Hypnotic’s rooms among my favorites.
Magic KingdomMaze Rooms - VermontEscape roomIRLThis may have been a good room when it first opened, but everything has gotten old and needs refurbishing. The basic set-up is okay, with lots of imagination put into it, but when spoken audio clues within the game play only once, and at a barely audible level, it feels more like an idea of a room then a well executed one. There was one place where the prop was so used, that the instructions written on it had become illegible. And there is no sensible flow leading through the room. We managed to escape even though we completely skipped two puzzles, and solved a third by mistake. I admire the creativity and design that goes into Maze Rooms, but they tend to lack in both storytelling and basic maintenance.
Atlantis: The Forgotten CityHypnotic Escape RoomsEscape roomIRLA vast and wonderful design is the setting for a series of well thought out puzzles
Scooby-Doo™ and the Spooky Castle AdventureEscapology - Universal CityEscape roomIRLSolid branded experience. It’s a mill that churns people through, but this one has good cogs. The puzzles and design were enjoyably themed.
Outdoor Murder Mystery [Outdoor] - CLOSEDEnchanted Escape Room - NorthridgeEscape roomIRLOut in Northridge, in a Faux Tudor building, up two flights of stairs, is a land of magic where a murder has occurred. When we parked and walked up to the building, we were nervous. It was dark out, we didn’t know the neighborhood, and there was a smelly air conditioning unit dripping next to the door. As we walked up the two narrow flights of stairs to reach the third floor, we were prepared for disappointment. Instead, our game master, Francesco, gave us a delightful puzzle-solving, murder-mystery experience. Originally designed during the height of the Coronavirus, as a way for people to do an escape room without actually being in a closed space for an hour breathing other people’s germs, this mystery/escape room has the feel of people trying to entertain each other. It’s low-budget, and low-tech. And 100% personality and quirky individuality. In an era of mass chain franchise escape rooms, which crank people through and reproduce designs created by someone else to be easily duplicated, this Outdoor Murder Mystery was a breath of fresh air. If you need high tech puzzles, or you really just like immersive sets, skip this one. But if you enjoy solving puzzles and mysteries, if you enjoy storytelling and world-building, set a Monday night aside for this one
The Clock TowerEscape The Room - GlendaleEscape roomIRLWe enjoyed this room. The design was fun, and immersive. And the puzzles a great mix of high tech and physical. This room isn’t a strictly linear one, which we should have gone in expecting, given that it’s about time travel. We lost some time thinking that we had to solve every puzzle as soon as we encountered it, which was our bad. I love that parking is free for the Galleria, but that was seriously offset by having to pay extra for a “private” room. Had we not done so, we might have had to do the room with complete strangers. I know that used to be the norm, back before the pandemic, but this was the first place in years I’d seen that makes you pay for private. The fact that Morty had it listed as all private, and the extra fee doubled the cost of the room was extremely annoying.
Who Stole Mona?Escapology - Universal CityEscape roomIRLI think this might be the last escape room in a national franchise that I go to. There are so many great escape rooms in Los Angeles which are works of passion and show it. The city doesn’t need some franchise out of Florida moving in with licensed themes and a cookie-cutter franchise feel. I had high hopes that the rooms would have impressive production values and truly immersive design. Instead we found a basic series of puzzles. This one is literally a room with white walls. There was no character or personality to the experience. We checked in with one person, were walked to the room by another person, shown into the room by a third person and then had two different GMs watching and giving clues during the actual game. It was clear from the way we were handed off from one staff member to another that we weren’t getting any individual attention. I can’t blame the individuals working there, because that seems to be the intended design of the experience. The kid we did this with enjoyed some of the elements, but all-in-all I felt as though I had just been pushed through the gears of their franchise.
ClueBreakout Games - AtlantaEscape roomIRLStep into the board game and figure out a murder. Wholesome fun - very enjoyable and clever Would be a great introduction to Escape Rooms for younger players, or anyone else. The puzzles aren’t mind-bendingly complex, but it’s still an enjoyable and clever room.
Island EscapeBreakout Games - AtlantaEscape roomIRLSure, CLUE is great room. Why not try another at the same location? Because of this room. That’s why not! Walking in to the room, you’d think you entered a school project instead of a professional Escape Room. There are a few neat technical surprises, but you’re mostly going to be opening combination locks and pretending the paper-mache grade school volcano doesn’t look ridiculous. This room gets negative points for Immersion, and the puzzles are middling.
Something's Out There!Maze Rooms - West LAEscape roomIRLHonestly scary It may help to keep in mind it’s an escape room We got too caught up in the scary story to try things that would make no sense in real life but are natural in escape-room-logic
Escobar: Part 1 (The Betrayal)The Escape RevolutionEscape roomIRLWe had high hopes but went home frustrated First off, as many others have said, they start the 1 hour the second they open the door to the room. They then spend about five minutes talking before you can begin. Longer if they’re feeling chatty. Next, there are puzzles which seem intentionally poorly designed. The writing is sometimes difficult to read, there is a picture so bad as to be misleading, and there is way too much junk everywhere that just gets in your way. Finally, our GM gave us a spectacularly bad hint early on which sent us down the wrong path. We ended up not completing the room. (This is only the second time that’s happened to us and we’ve done around 50 rooms by now.) It seems with minor tweaks, the room could be top rate, but given the number of other reviewers who have made complaints exactly like mine, I don’t think this place had any desire to improve.
The Mush Room - CLOSEDEscape Room 66 - Los AngelesEscape roomIRLA simple fairy tale premised room assembled with wit and love. A delight
Steampunk AliceMaze Rooms - LAXEscape roomIRLI love this location’s rooms. The design of the site is top rate from the moment you walk in. This room did not disappoint. The puzzles were tricky and the design was incredible.
Sky OdysseyMaze Rooms - VermontEscape roomIRLI was looking forward to this and I think I would have loved it. But… My group was too big, too loud, and didn’t share information enough. We needed a leader to maintain order. I repeatedly would come across something and be told that someone else had already solved that. And only half of the time, they were right. We ended up solving two or three of the more interesting puzzles through dumb luck. (I mean like, Shaggy leaning against a bookshelf and accidentally opening a secret passage kind of dumb luck.) I ended up having a pretty annoying time, but I blame the group dynamic more than the room. There were many elements which I was able to experience which pointed to the room as a whole being a great experience.
Inksidious - CLOSEDEscape Room 66 - Los AngelesEscape roomIRLWalking into the lobby felt like entering a different world. The gamemaster, Tuesday, was friendly and welcoming. From the beginning it was clear that she wanted us to enjoy the experience. The story is creepy and the design of everything aids the darkly humorous feeling of the what’s going on. Clues, when asked for, were gentle nudges, allowing us to solve puzzles but not get stuck going down dead ends. This is a mechanical room, but the way the everything was presented made it feel magical. Like being a kid at Disneyland for the first time. Note that if combination locks aren’t your thing and you only enjoy high tech rooms, you might be quickly frustrated. There are no light sensor/magnet triggered/animatronics/tech based flash here. Just good storytelling, great design, and clever puzzles. Easily one of my favorites ever.
![Outdoor Murder Mystery [Outdoor]](https://images.morty.app/mortyapp/image/upload/c_limit,w_260/f_auto/v1/store/s/c55b5927-4622-4400-bea5-c52465211626.jpeg)
