Insane Asylum

Just challenging enough for three relative newbies to escape rooms. We solved three out of four parts of the final room-exiting puzzle and got the last one by brute force just in time. There were several red herrings that had us going down the wrong path. The staff was very helpful and the few clues we got were nudges not answers. Parking is on the street and very easy.

Super easy and kind of weird vibes from the staff. I wouldn’t recommend - there are much better ones in LA

Fun! Lots of puzzles, and they were all brain games, not just scouting for endless 4-digit codes. Everyone was doing something different at the same time. Felt a bit short, we blew through it in 40 minutes, but the atmosphere was incredible and the GMs were a blast. I’d say DEFINITELY do the “dark mode.” It makes it dim but not a blackout, they give you flashlights but you can see pretty alright without them. It really adds to the ambience.

So much for the group to do! Very good production value. Feels like you are in a real Asylum

This location is so well designed. We really enjoyed area 51 and the Wizard trials is the best. Today we played the asylum and hero origin. Benjamin, Kevin, Henry, Benjamin, Kevin, Henry and Jack were all terrific hosts.

Full transparency, I’ve done this one before, just not at this location. I think the PanIQ in Long Beach was more challenging only because we had 2 people and I didn’t know what the puzzles. I had more people in my group this time around, I stayed out of helping with most puzzles so they could enjoy them. There were no glaring differences between the rooms and the puzzles were still clever. This theme remains one of my favorite at PanIQ, I just wish I waited longer to forget the solutions a little more.

It was … fine. The room was nicely themed. A few puzzles did not seem to be working as intended, were finicky, which got us stuck a few times. The plot of the escape room did not really make any sense and the puzzles were not like… really related to the theme of an insane asylum. But some of them were fun! Lots of more physical “move this around puzzles and basically no mental puzzle solving here. Everything was relatively straightforward and was just about finding objects around the rooms.

Gave a lot of unprompted hints

Fun! Nothing particularly novel, but I will say what I like about these rooms is you just start. Theres no real guidance on what to do. They just throw you in, which adds a level of difficulty to the room. With that said it wasn’t challenging, but we had a very fun time playing it. Spooky. Not scary. For escape room experts I would say this is a medium difficulty. I’m very happy we played it. Everyone who was working there was incredibly nice. We didn’t ask for hints, so can’t speak on that level of interaction with the GM. But if they see you struggling they will poke you in the right direction. Also, if you do a room they will offer 30% off to book another room. It’s a cool space to hang out in. Definitely would be a good place to have a big gathering or party. Other note is you have the choice to play a public room or private. Private rooms are at a higher ticket cost. But just be aware when you are booking.