Escape From The Runaway Train

Coming from overseas and having played some incredibly cinematic escape room games, SCRAP’s ‘Escape from the Runaway Train’ lands more as a puzzle room with thematic puzzles. Some of those puzzles are fun, to be sure, but the experience is slightly impacted by the business choice to prioritise throughput over player experience. The lack of a heart, like, or dislike rating in this review is intentional—it is a mixed bag and worth unpacking in words. The puzzles are as you’d expect from SCRAP; clever, witty wordplay, lateral thinking and a behemoth meta-puzzle for the final challenge form the core of SCRAP’s experiences, and ‘…Runaway Train’ is no exception. We were stumped by a few and the final room feels as if it was designed to almost certainly ensure players require the additional ¥1000/player for 10 minutes and hints to complete the final room. Most answers are inputted as words into an iPad aside from a couple of combination locks. Aside from a few novel presentations of puzzles, the standout experience was witnessing the game master act the opening moments of ‘…Runaway Train’. More game masters should adopt this approach to inducting players—it is far more compelling than the standard scenario read-out. If you finish a room quickly, you cannot advance to the next one unless the team ahead of you has also moved on. Your timer will pause, but this means that the 50 minute experience could balloon out to 70 minutes due to the time spent waiting for the teams ahead of you to progress or bow out. We certainly benefitted from SCRAP’s new hint book system, as their ‘nine-room’ games only give you a hint every 2 or so minutes via the game tablet, whereas the book can be used immediately without a time penalty. Given that the final room doesn’t have any hints the first time you play, and that the amount of time you have remaining is reduced to a maximum of 10 minutes irrespective of the fact you may have had more time when you entered the room, the book offers a better experience for players. Their other room, ‘Escape from the Witch’s House in the Woods’, sorely needs this hint book system. It’s an interesting experience for international escape room players, particularly given SCRAP’s involvement in pioneering the escape room format. While the international design shift appears to be firmly directed towards immersive, cinematic narratives and player agency in escape experiences, SCRAP continues to carve and refine their puzzle-forward niche.

I disliked immensely that you had to wait such a long time to ask for help in each room. It means if you get stuck right away you just stand around burning time and losing time available for later rooms.

We played it in english without any issues. The GMs are helpful and you play with a tablet in english. I liked the game as a whole, like many others mention, to solve the last wagon you should be prepared to pay 1000 yen for a replay card that gives you 10m and the hints. Either that or you need to be an expert who pays attention to everything. The props were nice and i saw a few unique puzzles that i havent seen before or thought of. In this sense it was a great room and i recommend it for anyone passing by in Tokyo :)

Good Points: Some puzzles are nice and semi-novel and the pace is fast. Bad Points: They employ predatory tactics to make you pay more than the base price. In particular the last room could be an escape room (an easy and fast one ok) in itself. There are at least 3 times the number of puzzles of the other rooms. You have only 10 mins and, the first time, without hints. If you pay extra you can get additional time and retry, with hints, the last room.

This should only be undertaken if you are okay with missing out some of the end. It only has about a 10% completion rate and the final room has a ridiculous number of steps involved.

Can be done in English but we personally found a bit frustrating and would recommend Escape from the Witches House in the woods first.

It’s quite a unique experience where you’re expected to solve puzzles every 3 to 5 minutes, as the tablet will remind you whenever you take longer than average. You would also hear other players approaching your room, so it adds to the urgency you’ll feel. The puzzles were mostly not hard. A few of them were more like intuitive than problem solving though. It’s quite intense overall.

An English friendly escape game in Tokyo Japan. Only for a few members but they do provide hints. You have 50 minutes to escape the train. You put the answer into an iPad that’ll tell you if you can advance into the next room. Meant for small groups-perfect for tourists.

The gameplay is incredibly unique making your way from train car to train car. I have some issues with the policy of buying 10 mins for 1000 yen per person. The room seems designed to encourage people to buy the extra time being only 50 mins and with the sheer number of puzzles. Also, there was something that confused me about the ending that made me think they want you to play (and pay) the game twice to complete it.

Unconventional puzzles. Multiple train car theme rooms is unique. 12% escape rate.