The Crypt

Super Fun!

The gameplay was very intuitively understandable, in that it was often immediately obvious what puzzle we were meant to solve. The only wrench in that flow was the sheer number of locks in the room! I don’t know if anything was especially novel in the gameplay — I didn’t have a moment where I was like “Wow, I’ve never seen this before.” But I will say that despite the lack of novelty (or perhaps because of it), this felt like an ode to the art of escape rooms, with well crafted puzzles and simple but enjoyable rooms.

The storyline of a cursed movie set had a lot of potential, but the rooms were somewhat barebones. The later ‘crypt’ room tried to do more with decorations and was the most successful. I didn’t really find the idea of the set being a movie set believable for the first few minutes of the game, and the storyline was quickly forgotten once I was immersed in the lovely gameplay. I think that the major aspect that made it hard for me to believe in room as a movie set (atmospherically) is that there were no movie props lying around. Almost everything tied directly to a puzzle. Real movie sets backstage are chaotic and brimming with random items. While that might be hard to mimic in an escape room, some inspiration from that would help.

We did a venue rental and the GM was great. He was super helpful in figuring out which rooms to play and starting the games.

Nothing different or out of the norm, but what was there was done well.

I think the story was the weakest element of this room. That’s not to say it wasn’t an engaging concept, but I think the ending didn’t have the payoff that the story wanted. I also think it was a bit confusing what the curse even was — more lore is always nice.

Not too bad! There were a couple moments where you had to think outside the box, but overall the progression and pacing was really good. Spatial and visual thinkers would both be required to do this room faster — many puzzles that used one or the other (or both) in a tricky way!

A lot of mechanical locks and keys! Some fancy moments but fairly limited, overall.

We played with 5, but people were standing around at times. Could easily be solved by 2 or 3.

One memorable jumpscare moment and an overall spooky ambience due to the ‘curse’ storyline.

It could be a bit frightening for kids that are too young, but tweens/teens would enjoy the spookiness as it never gets truly scary (just enough to be thrilling!) Some puzzles do require someone tall enough to reach them, but overall most puzzles are solvable by kids, nothing too complicated.

Small rooms! Not a lot of moving around needed.

To access the venue you must walk down stairs, meaning it isn’t very mobility friendly. I believe that the venue would make accommodations for people with other disabilities. There is a colour-dependent puzzle and vision-dependent puzzles.

Busy street, very limited parking. Might have to park elsewhere and walk.

Honestly it is a mix but more locks than the other rooms.

Linear room

You need someone on the team who can climb into a box

One person needs to be able to climb a little. Same person should not be claustrophobic

Metered parking