Monthly Archives: August 2023

Mysterious Package Company – Body of Evidence

Image

Reply

Body of Evidence Review | From the devious minds at the Mysterious Package Company comes a new type of game: Body of Evidence. Dissect the clues in this grisly web of deception and intrigue. Body of Evidence will test your skills of observation, pattern recognition, and will push players to the cutting edge of a detective investigation. A murder mystery experience, with a twist!

Date Played: August 2023
Time Taken: ~2 Hours
Difficulty: Easy
Number of Players: 2

Please Note: We received a complimentary, pre-launch copy of Body of Evidence with the expectation of a review. This does not affect the content of our review.

The Mysterious Package Company, a company based over in Canada and best known for the Curious Correspondence Club series, among other spookier experiences, recently gifted us an exclusive sneak peek of their new game ‘Body of Evidence’ which will soon be launching on Kickstarter! Although there are still a few production elements to finalise (such as the construction materials and some of the writing) this was a great insight to what we can expect from the finished product.

 

Body of Evidence Mysterious Package Company Review

Photo provided by Mysterious Package Company

 

Unlike a traditional ‘murder mystery’, the premise of Body of Evidence is that it’s a murder mystery, but one you will primarily be solving via an autopsy of the victim. As well as your standard murder mystery evidence, such witness interviews, the victim’s belongings, maps of the location, and details about the crime scene – you benefit from being able to get your hands on and explore the physical body of the victim as well. As well as of course, your own knowledge.

 

 

To guide you through your autopsy of the victim, you have on hand a handy “Coroner’s Handbook” which helps you understand what you’re looking for and what this could mean. This Coroner’s Handbook is the meat of the puzzle part of the experience, as these guiding steps are smaller, bite-sized puzzles. I really enjoyed this aspect, and found it very unique and different to other games on the market in both the “murder mystery” and “tabletop puzzle game” genres. I felt very immersed, all the way noting down my observations and reading the information to understand the implications.

At various points your start to open up the body, and I was so impressed by the depth of detail they included, and the way this happens! But since this is the real ‘centrepiece’ of the experience, we’ll not put spoilers here and instead let you experience that part for yourselves.

Alongside the autopsy there are various other pieces of information to read through, including witness statements, call logs and sometimes seemingly irrelevant papers. These all did a fantastic job of painting a full story of the city of Thornhill, the restaurant where the murder itself takes place, and the various suspects that could be found in the case. Once I’d completed the game I looked at these again and noticed lots of small hints and features that made so much more sense once the killer was uncovered. But equally, as a lot of murder mysteries do quite well, were a lot of realistic red herrings and plot twists that didn’t contribute to the killer’s narrative. It all added together to make this a very layered experience.

My favourite ‘puzzle moment’ was creating a timeline from all the witness statements, trying to figure out who was lying and who was just misremembering. Again, the way the witness were fuzzy/vague on the timings felt very realistic and this was so much fun for me to sit down and puzzle through.

 

 

The case is solved at each stage via ‘Evidence cards’. Each folder contains two questions that you answer by drawing the correct cards from a deck – if the ‘red threads’ on the front of the cards match, your answer is correct. If not, you’ll have to go back and take a closer look at your deductions.

Eventually, you create a full timeline using these threads, which leads you directly to the killer. I thought this was a really fun and thematically suited mechanic, as well as providing a very clear signpost each time for what I was meant to be solving. As the case fell into place, my red threads connected throughout like building a gigantic murder board.

 

 

The overall experience took me around 2hrs, and I found it very enjoyable and unique. I only got stuck at one point, but I was able to move pass this without too much frustration and complete the game. A departure from the traditional murder mystery – Body of Evidence gives you a hands on experience as you explore the autopsy. The narrative pulls you in with red herrings and interesting plot twists that make this an amazingly layered experience. I really recommend backing this one!

Body of Evidence can be backed on Kickstarter in September 2023. If you’re reading this review later than then, head to Mysterious Package Company’s website to purchase.

Please Note: We received a complimentary copy of Body of Evidence with the expectation of a review. This does not affect the content of our review.

Bowness Escape Room: Down to the Wire | Review

Image

Reply

Down to the Wire Review | Being in Russia undercover for the government isn’t easy at the best of times. Especially during the Cold War. Even more especially when someone has tipped off Russian intelligence about you….and they aren’t very happy. Wanting to destroy your work; and everything attached to it. You have one hour to save yourselves, and all your secret findings. The Countdown is on. Tick tock.

Date Played: 24th August 2023
Time Taken: 40 minutes
Number of Players: 2
Difficulty: Medium

 

 

Whenever I go on holiday, wherever it is in the world, I look and see if there are any local escape rooms. For a sunny week in August my family had booked a trip up from London to the Lake District, and being just an hour away in Edinburgh I thought I’d come along to escape the Edinburgh Fringe. There’s something so lovely about taking a week away to work in little cottage in the middle of absolutely nowhere, miles from the nearest tiny town. So what I wasn’t expecting to find was… An escape room!

I’ll be super honest. I almost didn’t book the room. The bus to get there would take an hour from where we were staying, and it only ran 5 times a day (so if we missed it we’d be screwed). To make matters worse, whichever bus we took we’d be arriving into Bowness 5 minutes after our room was meant to start. On top of that I made the mistake (or enthusiast judgement) of looking up other enthusiast reviews before. Other enthusiast reviews were… Not great. One reviewer said it was one of their least favourite rooms in the UK. Sheesh. That bad? So I chewed up whether I’d book it or not over the whole week. Until, on the very last day of the trip, I thought “What the heck, when else will I ever be in Bowness?! Lets just do it.” Besides, I only ever book good rooms, and I kinda wanted to see what a not-good room might be.

But on that front, I was disappointed. You know why? The room (or the company) wasn’t bad at all. Not in the slightest! It was lovely. Welcoming, super accommodating, and the room was the perfect example of making a fun, light-hearted experience on a small local budget. If asked, I’d probably even recommend it. But let’s get into all the specifics.

What to Expect at Bowness Escape Rooms

Bowness Escape Rooms is located in the heart of Bowness, just a short walk from most of the town’s bus stations. If you’re in town for a walking holiday, plenty of bus routes go through Bowness, so it’s a fairly conveniently location for the Lake District. On the other hand, if you live in the area then – oh my god you’re so lucky it’s so pretty – you may already know all about Bowness Escape Room and how to get there. Either way, despite my earlier bus complaint, it’s a convenient location.

The entrance is located on Lake Road (not Quarry Rigg, as Google Maps indicates), and is a part of a little stretch of cute shops and cafes. At this site, they run two rooms:

  • Cutting Room
  • Down to the Wire

We only had time for one, so we picked the less scary Down to the Wire, though it is worth noting that Cutting Room can be made less spooky if you want.

In our case we were running late, but the team were super responsive via Facebook and gave our GM a heads up that we’d be running a little late. It seems like they have bookings comfortably spaced apart and so despite showing up a whole 15 minutes late, we didn’t feel at all rushed.

Our Games Master was the enthusiastic Raphael (or Raffi for short) – please excuse spelling! Raffi greeted us at the door and had us wait in the waiting room with a couple of ingenious puzzles to play around with. Then came the usual briefing (no force, nothing high up, don’t poke the plug sockets, and so on), before we were transported back into the Cold War and off to a flying start.

 

 

Down to the Wire

Down to the Wire begins with you, the players, contained in a separate space from the main room. It’s a classic ‘escape into the room’ beginning, where everything you’ll need to use is tantalisingly just out of reach, and you need to figure out how to break into the main game area. Here, we were greeted with a few linear puzzles. Solve one, gain access to the second, and so on. Now, I’m a complete sucker for something slightly gimmicky that tests your skill level rather than puzzle solving level – but I know these aren’t always the most popular. There’s something that happens in this first room which we found brilliantly fun, but we definitely were lucky with our skill.

After only a little bit of faffing, we finally escaped ‘into’ the main room, and from there the game was truly afoot. With the theme being the Cold War, our central goal was to deactivate a bomb that stood in one corner ticking away in the background. There were a number of things we needed to do before we could get to the bomb. A number of locked boxes, some padlocks, and a tantalising class case in one corner with plenty of puzzles inside it.

We managed to ‘beat’ the bomb in around 40 minutes. There were a few notable places we could have shaved some time off, but besides trying to make up for showing up 15 minutes late, we weren’t especially in a hurry.

Overall, the puzzles felt fun. The entire room is linear, meaning it’s less practical for a larger team, especially where a few puzzles can really only be solved by one or two people at the time. There were also one or two where the solution was in fact something much more obvious than we thought, where we’d spend a while trying to ‘solve’ a puzzle when the solution was staring us in the face. Similarly, a few maths puzzles where the real answer wasn’t the complicated thing we were trying to do. But overall, they clicked with us. I can see how some groups – especially enthusiasts – might be frustrated with some elements of the room, and so maybe I wouldn’t recommend it to a super, super enthusiast, but for our little two player team it clicked well.

In terms of decor, this room is painted a sleek Cold-War military green and white. It looks mostly like a scientist’s office, with books on the table and test tubes and microscopes dotted around. Similarly, there’s a little Cold War bleakness. It’s furnished fairly sparsely and most of the puzzles or locked boxes you need are on display around you. That’s not to say there weren’t a few surprise reveals – there were, such as a keycard being swiped in just the right place to trigger a secret door… But generally speaking we knew where each ‘secret door’ was hiding from a carefully concealed wire behind tape, or a slightly fraying design that had definitely been handled a lot. All that to say, not a bad thing, just a thing. It felt on the low budget side, but what it lacked in fancy decor it made up for in enthusiasm and love.

 

 

The Verdict

We enjoyed Down to the Wire! It was an unexpected bonus onto a non-escape room holiday. It wasn’t a perfect room, but for a little hidden treasure found deep into the countryside, we were greeted cheerily and enthusiastically, and found in the room a lot of love and a few clever puzzles along the way. It’s not going to wow enthusiasts, and it’s best not to go in with super high expectations, but for us it was the perfect way to spend a morning. I’d recommend it for anyone in the area who wants a fun challenge!

 

Down to the Wire is one of two escape rooms that can be played at Bowness Escape rooms in the Lake District. You can book it here.

Escape Key: Plague | Review

Image

Reply

Back in 1636, half of Newcastle’s population had succumbed to the Black Death. ​ Enter our plague escape room, which overlooks a real plague pit. Can you outwit the crazed plague doctor and escape before the horror of the Black Death gets you?

Date Played: August 2023
Number of Players: 4
Time Taken: 23 minutes
Difficulty: Medium

Since moving up North, I’ve realised the UK is more than just London… I kid, I kid. But in all honesty, fun escape room destinations like Newcastle are so much closer now. Which is why on a sunny Sunday morning we took a trip down to Newcastle to celebrate a friend’s birthday. The best way to celebrate a birthday? 4 escape rooms, of course. First up, Escape Key’s well-recommended “Plague” room.

 

 

Escape Key is one of Newcastle’s most loved escape rooms, and it’s located just a 10-15 minute walk from the station past a few cute coffee shops and overlooks a rather spooky looking graveyard. The graveyard would only feel spookier and spookier as, when we watched the briefing video, we realised the very escape room we were about to enter into was based on the rather large plague pit located just a stone’s throw away out the window. We all glanced at each other as we wondered- wait a minute, is this a horror room? Well, yes it is. But also no it’s not. It strikes a comfortable balance between “spookiness” and “this is real history so we’ll be respectful”, and I liked that a lot.

The story of “Plague” takes players back to the 17th century when plague was rife in the city of Newcastle. We had to get in, find a mysterious urn of ashes, and get out before the plague doctor returned. I’ll be honest, there was definitely more to the story than that, but it being our first room of the day had us in fits of excitement, eager to get into the experience. So, I’ll admit, we didn’t pay quite as much attention as we should have done – but thankfully, the story wasn’t too central to the puzzle solving. So long as you understood it was “find an urn and get out in under 60 minutes”, then you’d be fine in this room.

 

 

A really nice touch about Plague was the incense burner in the corner. Partially marking the time it takes us to complete the room, and partially just adding some historically specific ambiance to the room, it was a pretty cool touch. After so many rooms, it’s nice to be able to say “I’ve never had incense in the room with me before”. Besides the incense, the room was also very well decorated, just as a plague doctor’s creepy house should be. Complete with a jail cell, locked doors, and one or two jump scares. In a rarity for an escape room, the owners have uploaded a 360 degree ‘view’ of the room on Google Maps which you can go and explore here. Super useful for remembering all the little details, and of course for grabbing a photo or two for this review!

As well as the décor, for me the room really shined with it’s puzzles too. Okay I could be biased because we managed to escape with an all-time leader board score, but either way: The puzzles just really, really clicked for us. Maybe it was that it was so early in the day (believe me, the later rooms we did we didn’t escape quite as quickly), or maybe it was just that the style worked particularly well for our team, but we were off to a flying start. The room has a mix of locks and more outside-the-box thinking and some manual puzzles mixed in. Nothing overly challenging, but just enough to really get the braincells working. The room as a whole was also non-linear, meaning dividing and conquering was key. Most puzzles could be solved by one person, and a few perfect for a smaller ‘solving team’ of two.

Last but by no means least, I have to offer a shout out to our GM – Luna. Luna was absolutely excellent in every way!

 

The Verdict

We really enjoyed Plague. It was the most fun of the rooms we played during our trip to Newcastle, and at Escape Key, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to anyone. For folks afraid of jumps scares – there are a few small ones, but it isn’t by any means a ‘scary room’, just more on the side of eerie. In terms of difficulty, despite the website saying it’s hard, we found it a comfortable ‘medium’. If you’re in Newcastle and only have time to play one room, this should be very high up on your list!

 

When I play with this specific group, we call ourselves Chicken Nuggets. A spin off team from the Chicken Nugget Choir, who you may occasionally see on leader boards around the world.

 

Plague can be booked by heading to Escape Key’s website here.

Scarlet Envelope: Holiday Greeting Cards | Review

Image

Reply

Scarlet Envelope Holiday Greeting Cards Review | Decipher Santa’s wish, solve multi-layered puzzles with Rudolf, THINK, and HAVE FUN!

Date Played: August 2023
Number of Players: 1
Time Taken: 20–30 minutes per card
Difficulty: Medium

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… 🎶

Okay, so here in the UK, it’s pretty warm right now… Something, something heatwave this, that and the other. But that won’t stop me from being excited about the coming festive season! And so, in true festive style, Scarlet Envelope have kicked off the season early with their launch of a new Kickstarter experience: Holiday Greeting Cards! For me, Christmas really is all about solving puzzles together. So it’s no understatement to say I was really excited to get my hands on these and get stuck in!

So, Christmas Cards and puzzles? What is this all about and how does it work?

Well, Scarlet Envelope’s new Kickstarter is for a suite of festive greeting cards. The cards are your traditional, beautifully illustrated festive scenes complete with wreaths, snow, and Santa Claus iconography (yes, I really did just say “Santa Claus Iconography”, haha). But, hidden inside each illustration, if you look really closely, are the puzzles! To guide you, inside each card is a poem. Most Christmas cards say something kitschy like “wishing you festive tidings for the year” and most people don’t even read them… But this poem instead provides subtly hinted clues as to where to start and what type of thing you’re looking for – whether that be a reindeer name, a secret message from a cat, or a sweet festive message. So pay close attention!

As puzzle games, they’re great! But as Christmas cards, they’re also gorgeous. So a pretty perfect gift for puzzle people and puzzle muggles alike! But how did we get on with them? Let’s get into it…

 

Santa’s Wish

Your goal is to decipher Santa’s New Year’s wish hidden in a cheerful Christmas poem (the four words right before “And Happy New Year!”.)

Santa’s Wish is Scarlet Envelope’s first ‘Holiday Puzzle Card’, which is probably why you may already recognise the design. They launched this puzzle game a few years ago, and it’s enjoyed some success since then.

On the front of this card is a festive scene of ‘the night before Christmas’, with a roaring fireplace and stack of presents beneath the tree. Inside the card is a lovely poem about Christmas. But again, look closely and it holds the clue to solving the puzzles within. At it’s core then, there are four ‘puzzles’ and each one is looking for a single word output in order to complete the final line of a rather festive and puzzle-y poem. The puzzles are ‘hidden’ across the front, the back, and inside the card itself. The puzzles ranged from quick wins, to “okay I need a hint“, but overall this game fell on the more straightforward side – at least compared to some very outside the box thinking on the later cards in the series.

It’s a cute one, and a good introduction to the ‘series’. A few trickier moments pushed me into the hints section – but mostly to figure out if I was on the right track, or get a small nudge in the right direction.

 

 

Rookie Reindeer

Ho ho ho, welcome to your puzzle card adventure! To start, notice how the poem inside the card tells you that Junior Reindeer is about to begin his new job in Santa’s team. Six reindeer coworkers made a team-building puzzle game for him, with the answer being his new cool stage name. You can see the empty name tag with six letters waiting for you to fill them in!

In the second of the three puzzle cards, we turn to Santa’s workshop! Here, the senior reindeer have decided to take the day off. They’ve had enough! They’re on strike! *gasp* Thankfully there’s another reindeer who is able to fill in on the big night, but all he needs to start his job is a cool name. Taking a letter from each reindeer’s name gives him his new name – but which names, and which order?

In this puzzle card, there were a few additional steps more than in Santa’s Wish. Essentially, more puzzles to find and solve – one for each letter. But overall, these puzzles felt shorter and snappier than those in Santa’s Wish, meaning both cards took more or less the same time to solve. Most were traditional puzzles, but some took a more “outside the box” approach to figuring out the solution.

Funnily enough, I fell onto one puzzle first, which I later saw in the hints was the ‘most difficult’. This worked well for me to get the ‘hardest puzzle’ over with before diving into slightly easier ones.

For me, this one had the illustration I liked the most. I can’t tell you exactly why, it was just so bright and colourful and fun to spot the well-hidden details. Of which there were many! Or perhaps it’s just that I love big moons (and I cannot lie). Either way, out of the three, this will be the one I’ll place at the front of my festive mantlepiece when December comes round.

 

 

Clawy Christmas

Alert, naughty kitty on the loose! This Christmas, Santa’s furry friend has decided to “redecorate” – lighting up the tree (literally), creating unique wall art with her claws, and snacking on tinsel like in an all-you-can-eat buffet. But why is this usually purr-fect kitty behaving so claw-fully? Can you figure out what will turn her back into the angelic furball she usually is? Dive into this hilariously cute adventure, and let the festive feline fun begin!

Last, but by no means least, is Scarlet Envelope’s most recent card named Clawy Christmas. This card features a rather mischievous cat! Imagine a beautiful home all ready for the holidays… Completely destroyed by the claws of a pesky kitty. Yeah. There’s a reason I’m more of a dog person. *shakes fist at fictional cat*. But paired with the scene of festive destruction is one of the cutest opening lines,

“Have all the holiday fun you can get away with”

Now, full disclaimer, I played this card just before the final artwork was finalised. So whilst I did have a tiny struggle – I realise that these minor qualms had already been addressed in the final art pass – which looks absolutely gorgeous I might say!

But that aside, these puzzles are certainly the most entry-level of the three. They’re well sign-posted,  quick and easy solves, and involve fun interactions with the physicality of the shape of the card. There’s a playful narrative about the cat woven throughout the puzzles that culminates in a festive twist too. In all, I’d probably recommend this one more for an audience including kids and families – perhaps one for non-puzzle people to dip their toes into before jumping into the other two in the series.

Out of the three, this one was also my favourite, if that helps sway your opinions! 😉

 

 

The Verdict

One of my favourite things about all three cards – apart from the puzzles of course, was how lovingly illustrated they are. Although I played in August, each one felt fuzzy and warm and cosy as heck. I cannot stress enough how cute these are – even for non puzzle people. If these cards had zero puzzles inside them, I’d still love to buy some for friends and family because of how lovely they look on the mantlepiece. It really helps having a mix of fun puzzles, backed up by lovely illustrations. A round of applause for these!

But back to the puzzles… In some ways, having a little date stamp on the back reminding mewhich one was designed in 2020, which in 2022, and which now in 2023 was like a time capsule into Scarlet Envelope’s history. I am a really big fan of Scarlet Envelope. Not just as incredibly lovely and generous people, but also as talented puzzle designers and game creators. They’ve made one of my favourite games ever, and over the years they’ve made better and better games and puzzles. The way I played all three cards (in chronological order) reminded me of this, and it was like tracking a designer’s skill increasing over time.

So the verdict is, we love them! I would recommend these puzzle cards for just about anyone. They lean towards an easier puzzling-level, with a few real head-scratchers. They’d probably be appropriate for a particularly smart child, but as with all things Christmas, you’ll probably get the most out of them if you sit around with family and solve them together.

At the moment the Scarlet Envelope team is Kickstarting the three cards, so now is an excellent time to go ahead and back them if you want to see these (and I hope more in the future) come to life and made available to the general public.

 

 

If you want to purchase your own Puzzle Christmas Cards, you can back these directly on Kickstarter here. If you’re reading this after the Kickstarter has concluded, you should be able to find them directly on Scarlet Envelope’s website here.

Please Note: We were sent a complimentary preview copy of the Puzzle Christmas Cards. This does not affect the contents of our review.
Photos in this review are taken by us at The Escape Roomer. Please don’t use without permission! 🙂

Escape Room Cottage Tewkesbury | Review

Image

1

Escape Room Cottage Tewkesbury | A holiday cottage cross escape room – Can you solve the puzzles, unravel the story, and gain the prize… all in one long weekend? The house is filled with puzzles and clues, all woven together into a story for you to discover. 

Date played: July 2023
Time taken: Played over a long weekend (Fri-Sun) with approx 10-12 hours of puzzling
Number of players: 4
Difficulty: Moderate-Hard (different puzzle levels available)

 

A Weekend of Puzzles

Playing escape room games is a bit like (I imagine) being addicted to drugs.  That first game you play gives you a massive, excited, cerebral high, sending you back out into the world buzzing.  It feels so good that you’re soon back, searching for a repeat of that high and, for a while, each new game also gives you the sought after buzz.  But it’s not long before one game at a time isn’t enough.  The comedown after a single game sends you scurrying to book a second straight away and pretty soon you’re booking escape room days of five or six games in a row.  By this point you are a fully fledged ER addict.  So when an opportunity to actually live in an escape room, where you can eat, drink, shower and sleep surrounded by puzzles, comes along, it doesn’t take much persuasion to hand over your cash for a full weekend of ER highs.

And at the Escape Cottage in Tewkesbury a weekend of highs is exactly what you get.

 

Escape Cottage?  What Is That?

The Escape Cottage in Tewkesbury is an AirBnB property run by the lovely (and very responsive) Caroline and Rich.  And honestly, the cottage itself and Tewkesbury would be more than worth the price of the weekend.  The cottage is really a three floor house right in the centre of medieval Tewkesbury.  It is a little jewel box of a property, filled with eclectic, quirky and lovely artwork, sculptures and books, that can accommodate up to 5 guests across three bedrooms (a double, twin and single) and with three separate bathrooms.  It is beautifully decorated, luxuriously comfortable and spacious and has everything you need for a weekend break, including a fully equipped kitchen. It sits in the heart of the lovely town of Tewkesbury, which is rammed with characterful, wonky, beamed medieval and Tudor buildings, as well as narrow, atmospheric lanes and alleys and a stunning Medieval abbey.  Tewkesbury was the site of a key battle in the War of the Roses, commemorated throughout the town with colourful banners representing the many warring families, and there are plenty of self-guided walks around the key historic sites available.  And even if history is not your thing, Tewkesbury’s location as a point where the River Avon and the River Severn meet, creating the Severn Ham nature reserve, means there are wonderful riverside and country walks also on the cottage’s doorstep.  Also just outside the cottage door are a great variety of independent cafes, restaurants, pubs and shops.  There’s no private parking at the cottage (though a cheap long stay car park is a few mins walk away) but, honestly, once you’ve arrived everything you could possibly need for a weekend is all within walking distance.

 

Yes, Yes, Sounds Lovely, But What About The Escape Room?

 

 

TBH I wasn’t sure what to expect of the escape room element when I booked the cottage.  I thought that perhaps, in order to appeal to the widest audience possible, the puzzles might be too simplistic for my team of experienced ER nerds, or that it would simply consist of nothing but padlocked boxes dumped in a room.  Oh how wrong could I be?  The puzzling element of the cottage blew our minds and vastly exceeded every expectation we had by miles and miles and miles.

The puzzling starts even before you’ve arrived, as in your welcome email your host sets up the story behind your weekend adventures and gives you the first puzzle that will give you the code for the property’s keybox.  OK, this puzzle IS fairly simple but then you don’t want your guests to spend hours sitting outside your property wondering how on earth to get inside!  But once inside, the puzzle world expands and the house becomes a treasure trove of clues, secret messages, mysterious locked boxes and intriguing artifacts.  While areas of the house that are definitely NOT part of the puzzle world are clearly marked (by locked doors and stickers), and you are told before arrival that most clues will be straightforward to find so “you won’t need to pull everything off the walls and disembowel the furniture” there is an element of ‘searching’ needed to get puzzling properly.  And inspiration and clues can strike at any time – even an innocent mid-puzzle trip to the loo can suddenly reveal a detail hidden up until then.

 

 

There is a clear narrative thread to the puzzles, and hints and clues are found in letters and postcards discovered as you move through the property.  My advice is to read them carefully because at the end of the puzzles you will have to make a decision based on all you’ve read beforehand.  While that narrative winds its way throughout the game play, once you’ve reached a certain point (I won’t say what as it’d ruin the excitement of the discovery for future players), the order in which you tackle the various puzzles no longer matters.  Through some very clever tech, you can choose which puzzles you want to focus on, or jump around between the different ones if something stumps you and you need to think about something else instead.  From that ‘certain point’ mentioned above hints are easily available if needed, but hosts Caroline and Rich are also accessible via phone or AirBnB messages if you really get stuck.

The variety of puzzles is impressive – there are some purely physical ones, as well as ones for the mathematician in your group, or the music-loving team member or the crossword obsessed player, the logic puzzle solver or that player who just enjoys a good jigsaw.  There are some lovely little moments of puzzling and discovery magic that delighted my entire team and had us squealing with excitement, racing up and down the stairs, or just saying “wow” repeatedly.  As a team we’ve pretty much seen and played it all before, but there were some elements here that had us genuinely surprised and excited.  And to stop the puzzle-hardened obsessives from simply locking themselves inside for an entire weekend, also built into the experience is an outdoor puzzle/treasure hunt that takes you through much of medieval Tewkesbury, giving you puzzling pleasure, a tour of the town and a dose of fresh air all rolled into one.  My team failed to find a part of the initial set up for this treasure hunt but still had a lovely time wandering the streets of the town and managed to find all the answers we needed.

 

 

And there are differing levels of involvement and commitment to the weekend too.  You can choose to take things at a leisurely pace, solving just a handful of puzzles that get you to a certain narrative point, or you can keep going and solve more, or, as we did, commit to the completionist experience and make sure you’ve solved every single thing in the house including the few ‘bonus’ puzzles.  Overall I think our team of four puzzled hard for around 10-12 hours in the cottage (but we also squeezed in 11 other escape rooms in Cheltenham and Worcester, on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday) so you can take your time, enjoy the luxurious cottage space and the beautiful town it’s in, and still play through most of puzzles on offer.

In other words, this escape room cottage experience can be enjoyed by anyone who likes to puzzle.  There’s enough to keep a diehard ER enthusiast busy and satisfied, while a relative newbie or a family group could also play and have an absolute blast of a weekend.  In short, this escape room cottage surpassed my expectations by a (beautiful) country mile and is amazing value for money, given the loveliness of the house and town and the sheer quantity of puzzles squeezed in.  Would 100% highly recommend to pretty much anyone and everyone.

 

 

A Note on Accessibility

The listing on AirBnB makes it clear that this is an old house split over 3 floors with only stairs for access, so unfortunately it may not suit those with mobility issues, especially as the puzzle-solving requires quite a lot of going up and down across all three floors.  Some of the puzzles use colours or sound so may be harder for those with restricted vision, colour blindness or hearing loss.

 

Full details of the cottage and how to book are here.

 

Photos in this review are either (c) Cottage Owners (from AirBnB), or Karen Myers, Jake Andrews, Jane Blackwell.