Upside Down

At the time of writing this, Upside Down is Breakout’s toughest room. Themed around the hugely popular Netflix series, Stranger Things, you can expect a fusion of science and the supernatural as you work together to rescue a missing young boy named Will. No knowledge of the series is required to play, and those who have watched won’t really feel any big benefit/advantage. The theming was generally good, but I feel like the choice/order of rooms didn’t always make complete sense. The rooms themselves definitely felt on-brand, but as it’s not an official room there are no pictures of actual cast members used. Teams are split up for the first few puzzles, before coming together to face the rest of the challenges. Gameplay is linear throughout, with a mix of puzzles that included physical activities, observation tasks, some code breaking etc I can’t say I’m a big fan of the Breakout hint system, which they basically recommend you use as a prompt for where to go next. It feels a bit sloppy and as if you are cheating, even though they encourage you to use it along the way. The hints are in the form of ‘riddles’ and extra help is available if you press the ‘call’ button that connects you directly to the GM. We escaped with 6 minutes to spare, which isn’t too bad given that we were told most teams don’t get out (even when using hints). Overall it was enjoyable but not particularly impressive, with some missed opportunities with the gameplay.

A good escape room with a stranger things theme- not official but it might as well be (it explicitly mentions, but does not spoil, events and characters in the show). A really nice compartmentalised room with interesting pre- built room furniture. Not as intense or scary as the Exorcism- one of the gimmick puzzles is a bit “finicky” to use however, you’ll know which one I mean when you see it. The rest was fairly logical but I will say that if you didn’t pay attention in school, you’ll need one of the puzzles to be solved for you. Really high quality props and theming, not scary or violent at any time. The staff said this was their hardest escape room and I thought that all the puzzles were solvable and not too obscure. As with the Exorcism room, the hint system was really good but you only get one hint per puzzle and not a rotation of two or three. Our 5 person team got out with about a minute and a half to go.