City Reserve

2nd time visiting City Limits (CL) and another fun experience. We played City Reserve, and this was definitely a larger and more challenging game than The Armory (which we played as a duo). We brought 6 people and it was probably 2 too many people, as we were a little tight in some rooms as we progressed through the game. City Reserve had a very cool set and vibe, similar to The Armory’s dystopian type of setting where you really do feel immersed due to the set, but this room had more space and the game flowed better. Again, some cool use of tech in the room, with some laser reflections, and the final puzzle required a lot of communication, but was fun to accomplish. If anyone remembers the toy/game Simon, there was a memory puzzle which sucked up a little time very similar to this concept…very doable, but does take some focus. Another standard jigsaw puzzle was a little worn out which added to the difficulty of it. Tina did a great job as GM and was really friendly to talk with before/after. Definitely check out CL if you are in the area…you’ll have fun!

This was my least favourite of the four at City Limits - this is mainly due to very low lighting and heavy searching. But overall, it was a nice experience.

What a fantastic end to this series of four games! We finished with six seconds on the clock and it felt very satisfying. I enjoyed the variety of puzzles in this room, even the one I have seen called a "time suck." The decor is such a fun mix of old timey and cyberpunk, I really appreciate the aesthetics of it. A few things tripped us up and some time was wasted because we had a LOT of information from the jump and some of that information wasn't necessarily used until later...but we were still trying to use it. As a group of two, we usually stick together to solve as a duo, we did some of that, but more divide and conquer strategy was deployed in order to accomplish everything. Our host was absolutely stellar. Sam was just a joy and really picked up on our play style and what we would need to get successful. I think with some time and finessing this story portion of these games could really be something special. It would be very fun to be told "While you were in the Diner, STEAM took over the City Reserve and locked down our diamonds, we need your help! " Or something like that... Anyway, I'm tickled to bits that these games were saved and brought to Illinois, they deserve to be played!

Fun room with fun puzzles! One puzzle that was deliberately made to suck time, but the rest were interesting and fun. My favorite of City 13’s rooms.

Second favorite room from city 13 despite it being their easiest! Very fun theme thrown in to with a variety of puzzles for both lock and key enjoyers as well as room interaction puzzles! The puzzles mostly function out of the lack of light in the room which I won’t hold as a criticism but something that adds to the ambience and is used effectively. Our game guide was also incredibly nice in this experience, nicer than my guide playing the room the first time in save the city. I’ve found better experiences from the individual rooms rather than save the city, the 4+ hours of puzzles is probably equally draining to game guide as to the people playing the room. Would always recommend this room to people, especially those newer to escape rooms!

Another great room by City 13! Their scenery is really top notch in every room we've done! What's funny is that we have been going from their most challenging room to their least challenging, and our finish times have been reflecting that accurately. No matter what, though, it's been incredible! Another reviewer described this one as a bank themed type of room, and I agree with that! The staff was funny and friendly as usual!

City Reserve was my 2nd favorite of the 4 rooms of the Save the City marathon. It’s essentially a bank-themed escape room. Very solid puzzles and a final puzzle that I really enjoyed! A strange thing that stuck out was how one input device was used several times, but once the GM revealed that, it was easier to comprehend how to solve a series of puzzles. Felt surprisingly heisty for something that’s part of a superhero-themed adventure.

This is such a cool facility with a great overall theme that frequently gets recommended to me… but so far none of the rooms I’ve done have really impressive. The City Reserve is no different. There’s definitely overlap in the puzzle logic/design with their other rooms but there were still some great puzzles but also some confusing ones. Some of the mechanics were a bit fiddly and required a bit of additional physical manipulation to get things to open. I still give this room a thumbs up because the facility itself is amazing and the staff is great and despite not fully enjoying their rooms I still want to complete them all because it’s just such a cool concept.

This was a really cool experience. I’m sure the individual pieces are fine, but it was definitely worth doing the whole thing in one go. And the staff was excellent.