Author Archives: Mairi

About Mairi

Mairi is the editor-in-chief of The Escape Roomer and covers escape room news and reviews across the UK's South.

PostCurious: The Emerald Flame | Review

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The Emerald Flame Review | The Emerald Flame is a narrative tabletop puzzle game told in three parts. Commissioned by an organization shrouded in mystery, players take the role of a historical expert embarking on a quest to piece together the recipe for a fabled elixir by investigating maps, drawings, alchemical diagrams, and mysterious artifacts. Combining history, hand-drawn illustration, vibrant characters, and original puzzles, The Emerald Flame will challenge and engage players of all experience levels and has been called “a captivating adventure from beginning to end.”

Number of Players: 2
Time Taken: 6 Hours
Date Played: June – September 2023
Difficulty: Tricky

 


Wait, what? This game took you nearly four months to play? Yes… Yes it did haha. Between my co-writer Rebecca and I, we split it into three sessions. But you know what, from the first session until the very last, I thought about this game a lot. Like, all the damn time. If it weren’t for various life events (work trips and holiday trips), and the Edinburgh Fringe taking over our city for a month, we’d probably have binged this game in just the one setting. But like a really delicious three course meal, a game like this is best savoured. So I’m not even mad at myself that this took 1/3 of a year to play.

So what is The Emerald Flame? The Emerald Flame is one of the most popular Kickstarter games of all time. It’s a labour of love from PostCurious, who are best known for creating the Tale of Ord, among other award-winning and cult hit puzzle board games. It takes somewhere around 6 hours to solve – maybe a little more if you work solo – and the whole thing is just fantastic puzzle after fantastic puzzle, linked together with a compelling and detailed narrative.

I think it is probably the very best example of a tabletop puzzle experience in this entire genre. Yep, there, I said it. It’s creative and delightful, challenging but immensely rewarding. The materials are impressive and unmatched by any other company.

 

 

Introducing the Koschei Historical Society

PostCurious games, unlike a lot of other at-home experiences, pay particular attention to their worldbuilding and storytelling. The story of The Emerald Flame begins with the mysterious Koschei Historical Society and an ancient alchemical elixir. Told over three chapters, taking between 1 and 3 hours each, you the player go in search of that elixir and it’s magical properties. You’re guided through on your journey by a series of old papers and documents. Each document felt as realistic as the last – all aged and yellowing, with hand illustrated watercolours. In each chapter too, is a series of correspondences between Marketa and Hannah, our main characters, whose own lives are unfolding as that of your own adventure progresses.

There’s multiple layers of narrative, but never did the game feel too convoluted. Even after returning months later, we were able to pick up the threads of the story fairly easily. The micro, the macro, and our peculiar hunt through history on the trail of an elixir that may or may not even exist.

At the very end of the game, without wanting to spoil anything – the player gets to make a choice. In our playthrough, we didn’t realise it was a choice, and charged into it a little blindly. After reading out the ‘finale’, we realised that very choice was, how to say, quite important. But by then, our fates were sealed. So no spoilers, except to say – keep an eye out for that one.

 

 

The ‘Puzzle’ Part of Narrative Puzzle Adventure

In terms of puzzles, for me at least, this is where all PostCurious games really shine. There’s a real mix of delightfully unique and original puzzles in here that use their materials to the maximum. Most of the puzzles we encountered were multi-steps, and leaned heavily on logic (which is excellent for me, because I love logic puzzles), meaning that whilst each individual step may not have been too tricky, continuing the thread from start to finish within each one was.

To tackle this experience, Rebecca and I mostly divided and conquered. Meaning, after reading each chapter’s narrative introduction, we leafed through each puzzle trying to figure out where to get started. In most cases, the puzzles were non-linear meaning that they could be done in any order to get to the end of the chapter. On the one hand, most of the puzzles felt very single-player – in that whilst one of us was solving, the other didn’t have much to do with the puzzle. But on the other hand, this suited us really well, as we shine in a two-player team left to our own devices.

After solving each one, we typically swapped notes to make sure we were on the page – before continuing on to our confirmation mechanism. Speaking of, the confirmation mechanism is an online portal. Well, it’s essentially a chatbot, but a very clever one that makes you feel as if you’re talking to a real person! Log in, go to the relevant part, and input your answer to proceed.

We used a few hints throughout our experience – and mostly just to keep us on the right track, or more likely get started on a puzzle.

 

 

Curious Paper Ephemera

The last thing I’d love to mention about The Emerald Flame is the quality of the materials. You, the player, are scouring through papers that are hundreds of years old on the tail of an alchemist. Every single object in this game looked, and felt impressive. From the tea-stained papers, to the fabrics, to the curious ephemera tucked inside little bags and glass cases. I’m a big fan of the illustrative, watercolour style, and I really enjoyed the tactile mix of materials. In particular, there are two instances of using a necklace, and they were both some of the most delightful interactions in a tabletop puzzle game I can remember! It’s clear the designer has really thought outside the box.

There’s also… Like… So much in this game as well? Which, since the experience is broken up into three parts, I didn’t quite realise until I needed to spill everything out onto the table in order to take some pretty photographs and videos. The paper ephemera just… Kept… Coming. For a relatively normal sized board game box, it’s like a TARDIS in there.

Last, but not least, for the price, really reasonable. The only reason I didn’t back it originally was that it launched in 2020 and 2020 was my “year of being absolutely broke”. Whilst I couldn’t justify £60 on it then, today the game retails for £75 (converted from $90 USD), and having seen the wealth, breadth and creativity of the materials in the box – I’m surprised it’s not even more expensive.

 

 

The Verdict

If it weren’t obvious from this review, we really, really enjoyed The Emerald Flame. I’m repeating myself, but it may well be one of the very best in our genre. For this reason (and a million others), I’m awarding this tabletop game The Escape Roomer “Badge of Honour“.

BADGE OF HONOUR The highest award of them all! The Badge of Honour is the best badge The Escape Roomer team can bestow upon a game. These games were incredible!!

I’d recommend The Emerald Flame for enthusiasts, and folks who are interested in a bit more of a challenge than your average game. It’s on the pricier side, but well worth the investment. I’m glad I played it, and my only regret is not backing it on Kickstarter or playing it sooner. I won’t make that mistake again on PostCurious’s next game, that’s for sure.

 

The Emerald Flame can be purchased by heading to PostCurious’ website here.

All photos in this review were taken by me, the author, Mairi Nolan.

 

Lost Sock Studio: Escape from Mystwood Mansion | Review

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Escape from Mystwood Mansion| In this first-person puzzle escape room game, you are trapped in the mysterious Mystwood mansion. Explore the mansion and find hidden compartments while solving puzzles and deciphering codes to find a way out. Will you escape or linger to uncover the mansion’s final secret?

Developer: Lost Sock Studio
Date Played: September 2023
Console: Steam
Number of Players: 1
Time Taken: 100 minutes

I don’t know why but I get really excited when I see a new name or new game studio pop up in our little ‘escape room’ niche corner of the internet. So when I started hearing about Escape from Mystwood Mansion from the brand new studio “Lost Sock”, I was more than intrigued! Lost Sock are about as indie as it’s possible to get – they’re a game developer duo from Sweden and this is their first release. And, well, for a first release, I was super impressed! Tt’s polished, the puzzles satisfying, and it’s comfortable to play. It’s also very marketable. I mean, that spooky old mansion and launching right before Halloween, it’s *chefs kiss*.

But enough about the marketability of a game like Escape from Mystwood Mansion, and let’s get into the nitty gritty of why I enjoyed this game!

 

Deliver a Package to the Library or Face the Consequence

Escape from Mystwood Mansion opens with you, the protagonist, stepping out of your delivery truck with a package. You knock on the door, the door swings open, and very quickly you find yourself trapped. You are Test Subject Number 83, and it’s clear from the narrative of the game you’re not the first to be locked in by the house – nor will you be the last!

What follows is a classic escape room adventure as you move from room to room, solving puzzles, finding keys, cracking codes, and uncovering secret doors. Sometimes you’re breaking things too. I love breaking things.

 

 

At the very beginning, you’re given the instruction to “deliver the package to the library”. I actually never got to deliver the package to the library – I think I lost the package somewhere along the way, although I did (for a while) try to keep it with me. Whether this means I ‘won’ or not, I’m not sure, but I certainly escaped and so I’m calling my 110 minutes in the game a resounding success. I escaped from the library itself, as well as a lovely conservatory room, several secret (and slightly creepy) hidden passages, and the foyer.

Now, on my successful exit from Mystwood Mansion, I discovered a secret door that hinted that there were a few tiny details I had missed. At the time of writing, I’ve unlocked two out of the three secret locks to the secret room, and I’m thoroughly looking forward to going back and figuring out what is behind the mysterious final door. But for the meantime, the game is complete.

It’s very hard not to compare this game to Escape Simulator. Thematically, it’s quite similar to the Escape Simulator levels set in a spooky old mansion. The controls feel the same, the movement feels the same, and even a few puzzles are very similar. The game gives me the feeling of playing an Escape Simulator level, for example one from the vast wealth of community workshop escape rooms available on it’s platform. One of the most memorable puzzles in Escape Simulator was a ‘butterfly sequence’ puzzle in which you could move the butterflies around in order to complete the sequence. Now, sequence puzzles are common, but sequence puzzles specifically involving butterflies… Less so!

 

The View from the Butterfly Room

 

But for each ‘this is similar’ puzzle, there were countless others which were wholly original – so there’s a balance for sure. It also differs from Escape Simulator in a few marked ways. The levels are enormous, and each room rolls onto the other to build up a big picture of a large house. There’s an underlying story, and touches of light humour I really appreciated. Fans of Escape Simulator will love this.

 

Puzzling Through Mystwood Mansion

In terms of puzzles, I really enjoyed these. In fact, the puzzles were some of my favourite things in the whole experience. They really felt like escape room puzzles in the classic sense of the word. A few I recognised right away – there’s some pretty common ciphers in there, including Morse Code, Pigpen, as well as a few dashes of anamorphic text and negative space puzzles. But even then, there were plenty other puzzles I didn’t recognise at all and gave my brain a run for it’s money! Over the course of the game, I used very few hints – just a few to confirm what I already knew if something wasn’t working quite the way I expected.

Escape from Mystwood Mansion probably errs on the side of a little short for a game in the genre. For a seasoned escapist who wants to complete everything in the game, you’re looking at around 120 minutes. I took 110, with plenty of breaks, and didn’t quite complete everything. So let’s add on 30 minutes for “going back in and looking for hidden clues I missed”. To get 100% achievements, you’re probably looking at 3 hours. Each ‘room’ itself takes around half an hour to solve, so you’ve travelling through the game quite quickly.

I had almost no technical issues with the game. I say almost, because I did tweak the settings in order to make my playthrough slightly more comfortable (I like my mouse sensitivity as low as possible!), and secondly because I’m convinced that after searching a room top to bottom that a key item was missing – and needed to reset the level in order to find it in it’s place. Personally, I think the extra item disappeared into the ether. Knowing me I probably picked it up and moved it, but after a good 15 minutes of searching, I had no choice but to reset the room.

 

 

The Verdict

I’m giving Escape from Mystwood Mansion a solid 4.4/5. Yeah! That’s quite high, but I stand by it. I genuinely had fun playing the game. There’s been a big “escape room game” shaped hole in my life right now that nothing on Steam was quite scratching, and this game came along at the perfect time. It felt spooky, and cosy and exciting in all the right ways, and I felt the designers attention to detail was second to none. I’m also genuinely in awe that it’s the company’s first game. It had a really professional level of polish and I’m absolutely certain this game will be a success.

Is it perfect? No, of course not. But is it good? Yeah! It really is.

I’d recommend this game for just about anyone, but if you’re a big fan of physical escape rooms, this one is fantastic.

 

Please Note: We were offered a free Steam key in exchanged for an honest review. This does not affect the content of our review.

Escape from Mystwood Mansion can be downloaded from Steam.

Meet the Creators of ‘The Key of Dreams’, a brand new immersive experience in the UK

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For fans of the weird, the wonderful, and the utterly immersive… Something exciting is coming in 2024. From the creators of The Locksmith’s Dream comes an announcement of a new experience: The Key of Dreams.

We sat down with the two creators, Ivan and Laura, a super-team of designers and creators to find out just what The Key of Dreams is, and what can players expect.

So, what is The Key of Dreams?

Laura: The Key of Dreams is a bit tricky to categorise – maybe we need to coin a new phrase for it. It shares some DNA with escape rooms, immersive dining experiences, Secret Cinema, Punchdrunk immersive theatre and experiences like Phantom Peak, but yet isn’t directly comparable with any of these. In the most basic form it is an overnight immersive and interactive experience with an unrivalled attention to detail and a feeling of consequence.

Ivan: As part of that, guests explore a 17th Century manor house in Wales, discovering secrets that are both real history of the place and parts of the stories we weave there. There are a range of puzzles to solve, from simple trails following paths of clues to unlock boxes, narrative told in snatches of letters, journals, artworks and objects to discovering the stories of the characters of the house through interacting with the actors. The actor to guest ratio is four to one, this combined with the length of the experience means that people develop strong opinions about the characters, their trustworthiness and motives.

There are a range of puzzles to solve, from simple trails following paths of clues to unlock boxes, narrative told in snatches of letters, journals, artworks and objects to discovering the stories of the characters of the house through interacting with the actors.

Laura: Hospitality is also a huge part of the experience for us. The twenty fours hours that the experience lasts comes with all the meals you’d expect – and more. There’s an arrival lunch, an afternoon tea, a banquet dinner with stories and mysteries woven through the dishes and after dinner nibbles served in the bar where you can relax with a cocktail to celebrate your excellent sleuthing. The following day, a hearty breakfast sets you up for the final investigations.

 

You’ve compared it to other immersive experiences – but what else sets The Key of Dreams apart?

Ivan: At its heart, the Key of Dreams is about connection.

These can be human connections with other guests, the actors or characters in the stories. Moments of realisation provide another spark of connection, whether it happens when a puzzle clicks satisfyingly into place; when a piece of music suddenly makes everything come together and make sense; when you realise who a character is and how they were involved with one of the stories you have followed; and the friendships made along the way with other guests.

Laura: We are huge fans of weird fiction and of role playing games like Call of Cthulhu. We love the depth of description and attention to detail that helps to make the deductions, and to help us feel truly immersed in the world. While we consider the word immersive to be overused, it really is what we are trying to create here. That for the twenty four hours you exist in the house, you are part of the strange, timeless place; the outside world seems distant and less real while you are there and you happily give yourself over to the dream-like quality of the experience.

Just sitting in an ancient house, in front of a roaring fire surrounded by the ghosts of history, is an experience that cannot be translated into another medium. When you weave ‘imagined’ history through that experience, the ghosts of the real people with the imagined, factual events with the phantasmagorical, then it becomes truly extraordinary.

Meet The Collector

What was the design process like for creating an experience like this?

Laura: Much of our design process revolves around the concept of ‘apophenia’ which it turns out is a much more recent and less commonly used word than anyone who knows us might expect! Apophenia is “the human tendency to see connections and patterns that are not really there”. But in our world of course they often are!
Ivan: We take all of the details we have, historical facts, characters, places in and near the house, objects, sounds, colours, flavours and smells and then create links between them. Attention to detail is a big deal. When attending our events, we want the suspension of disbelief to happen naturally, to slowly creep over you, like the dawning realisation that comes over a character in a Lovecraft story. You won’t find any bits of paper with roleplay effects, you won’t be told how you are feeling, and you won’t be expected to believe anything is something other than it appears to be. But if we’ve done our job right, you’ll find yourself muttering over scraps of paper in a corner lit by lantern-light, pointing at some feature of the craved wall, or telling a character your deepest fear (even though you strongly suspect that by doing so you may be imperilling your mortal soul).
Laura: When we write, we become pretty deeply immersed in everything ourselves and I’m not sure how good it is for our own sanity! But apophenia works! We recently had a guest message us to say that he was convinced that we’d hidden a secret message in our website and he’d been scouring it for hours to try and work it out! And of course – he may be right…

Ivan: There’s actually a quote I love from the Sherlock Holmes reimagining Elementary that sums it up this part of the design and the experience perfectly:

“It has its cost, learning to see the puzzle in everything. They’re everywhere. Once you start looking, it’s impossible to stop. It just so happens that people, with all the deceits and illusions that inform everything they do, tend to be the most fascinating puzzles of all.”

The staircases inside the Key of Dreams

Connections between people (and things) is at the centre of this experience, could you talk more about how The Key of Dreams brings people together?

Laura: We say that our events have no ‘right way’ to experience them and it really is true. For previous events we have run, we’ve had people turn up in character and hold their role all weekend in how they interacted with the actors and other guests. We had people come along with their partner or family members who knew nothing about the experience that they were coming to, we had escape room folks who came and sped off around the house following clues, interrogating the characters and  solving puzzles, and everyone loved it.
Laura: Creating an experience like this can be a bit overwhelming, by design there is far more than people can experience in one sitting. We make sure there is plenty of story to follow and we try very hard to ensure that there isn’t just one way to solve each problem. For instance, when writing trail clues, we usually have three ways to solve them: there is the ‘I’m a fan of the stories’ who has the knowledge, the ‘I’ll put in the legwork’ who can go and discover the answer from a specific place in the house and the ‘I’m a researcher’ who can find the answer in the commonplace book that they are given on entry in to the house.
Ivan: In a roleplaying game, whether of the tabletop or live action variety, if someone isn’t in character when they should be they break the social contract which makes the game less enjoyable for the other participants. We want to *invite* our guests to play a role when interacting with the actors, to believe in the stories and events, but on their own terms and at their own pace. As they get deeper into the stories and the experience it becomes easier, and all the more delightful to unexpectedly find yourself trading dark secrets with a denizen of the house, or making a connection that makes complete sense within the dream-like logic of the house.
Laura: As someone who suffers with anxiety and can easily become overwhelmed, the experience is designed to include the opportunity to be in a quiet space while still being near the flow of the action. We have puzzles in the bar and in the quiet sitting room, which develop the story, but also help people just to take some time to reset. Additionally, building in some structured activities like a house tour, or dance class with the actors, is a great way for people to learn more about the lore without feeling awkward about approaching people.

The Key of Dreams is set in the past, how does technology factor into the experience?

Ivan: While we don’t force people to have to accept that they are experiencing time travel, the house is itself out of step with the real world, even more so at night. Because of the 1920s vibe that the place has, we aim for the experience to be as diegetic as possible, from music to objects and the technology/science elements. We don’t want people to be wondering how they should be reacting to something, a speaker behind a picture might be able to play atmospheric music, but from the context it isn’t clear how you should respond to it, pretend it isn’t there, or consider who and why it was placed there.
Ivan: Our aim is for the technology to always be in service to the experience and the story, so that they contribute to that little moment of delight that the guest will remember and tell their friends about. We have some utterly delightful embedded technology planned for the Key of Dreams, which should really give a sense of magic. We aren’t ready to reveal our secrets at this time, But we have been dabbling with psychometry and spirit photography!

One of the rooms in The Key of Dreams

Finally, what do you hope people will take away from their experience at The Key of Dreams?

Ivan: A sense of magic and wonder. To be drawn into a world both familiar and unfamiliar in an extraordinary place. To have stories to tell about the little moment of delight. There are physical mementoes of course as well, from the ‘Commonplace book’ crammed with clues, and diversions that each guest will get, to other ephemera that they will get to take away.
Laura: The world we live in can be a hard one; it can be relentless and unforgiving. There is a joy to be found in letting go of that for a day, exploring a strange and mystical place, even if you’re interacting with some sinister beings and unravelling some unpleasant stories. There is a special quality to a shared experience, whether that is dining with fellow investigators, exploring a house, uncovering secrets, and plotting with (or against). There is a Lovecraft quote which captures our hopes that our guests will,

“clothe life in embroidered robes of myth and look through the ivory gates into that world of wonder which was ours before we were wise and unhappy.”

Laura: We love our growing community of cultists, investigators and enthusiasts!  Your readers should have a peek at The Key of Dreams website, and if it appeals can sign-up for our newsletter and follow us on Facebook or Instagram. We also have a blog on our site, which is where I get to talk about my passion for literature and we’ll talk more about the design or inspirations as they arise.

Laura: Our website has information about what you can expect and about the house and how to book. There is also a section on ‘Investigations’ that is currently rather heavily redacted which will fill up over time with teasers and snippets of lore about the world (prize for the reader that creates the best red string diagram!). Over the next few months there will be more information about the characters, societies of interest and objects of curiosity appearing – so do check back. The best way to keep up to date with everything is to come and join our mailing list. That is where the date announcements, competitions and early access to new details will be in the newsletters.

How to book The Key of Dreams?

The first two events have been announced, and will be on the 27th and 30th of April 2024.
Discount for The Escape Roomer readers! As a special treat for The Escape Roomer fans you can get a 10% Discount for all April tickets until the end of October. Just use the code APOPHENIA when you check out.
You can also book a deposit for a future 2024 event and get a 10% discount early-bird discount as well.
Find out more at The Key of Dreams” and you can book here.

The Key of Dreams Poster

The Escape Room Enthusiast’s Guide to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival

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The Edinburgh Fringe Festival is the biggest and (in my totally un-biased opinion) the best Fringe Festivals in the world. It takes place every year in August, lasts the whole month, and showcases somewhere in the region of 3,800 acts consisting of 50,000 performers.

Assuming every act lasts around an hour, it’d take you 159 days to see them all. And that’s if you didn’t sleep or take a single break…

Wait, what?! But there’s only 30 days in the Fringe!!

Exactly. So if you’re visiting for a day, a week, or the whole month, you’ll want to maximise your time at the Fringe. Especially if you’re an escape room enthusiast, because I won’t let you visit Edinburgh without trying out some of our escape rooms whilst you’re here too. I’m serious.

Since moving to Edinburgh I’ve lived through 2 Fringe Festivals, and before that I’d visited a few times for a show or two. The festival does change every year, but there are a few things that happen in Edinburgh all year round you may wish to take advantage of whilst you’re visiting. In this article, I’ll mention a few shows which I’ve seen return year on year, and a few things which are permanent features of Edinburgh. I’ll also mention a few to avoid (and why), so that hopefully (as an escape room enthusiast) you can make the most of your time here.

 

The Best Escape Rooms in Edinburgh

There are three Do Not Miss companies in Edinburgh:

Case Closed

In number one position is “Case Closed” which is easily one of the best in the whole UK. But what makes it so special? It’s a 90 minute room in the heart of Edinburgh. So far, fairly normal. There’s no “escape”, and your currency is information: instead of unlocking doors and running away, you succeed by filling out reports to your superintendent, and if your information is correct you may proceed. It’s about as realistic as it gets to solving a real case – think blood spatter analysis, forensics, and guns. Furthermore, there are no leader boards or ‘escape times’, no, you’re supposed to take your time and enjoy it rather than worry about beating a score. It has a spectacular ending which I’m still buzzing about days later. It’s also designed and created by an enthusiast. You can tell the difference between an escape room for profit, and escape room born out of absolute passion and love. Case Closed is the latter.

The Anatomist

In second place, and located in the very heart of the Edinburgh Fringe is The Anatomist by Escape the Past.

Escape The Past have created an incredible game combining Edinburgh’s dark history with an exhilarating escape room. Our team of five were completely immersed in our surroundings, and I wasn’t surprised to learn that the room was designed by Chris Wood, an Edinburgh University History graduate and Zahra Chaudhri, a doctor. The attention to detail is seriously impressive and offers a full sensory experience, which is a rare find.

 

Locked In

And in third place, for us, is the company “Locked In“. Which room? Honestly, any of them available for booking, but I’m partial to “The Secret Lab”, pictured below. It’s a challenging room for up to 10 players featuring lots and lots of cells. According to the website:

“The lab known as the Kensie Research Lab or the ‘Secret Lab’ was a marvel of the 70’s with technology that no one could ever imagine. It contained the very best equipment money could buy and a group of scientists whose work would go down in history. The genius in charge of the lab was Dr. Lyall Kensie, a brilliant bio-chemist, specialising in virus’ and disease. His experiments were groundbreaking, his ideas were radical but not everything played out how he had hoped.”

 

 

The Best Outdoor Scavenger Hunts in Edinburgh

But before you go and book all the escape rooms… I should drop a little reminder that the Edinburgh Fringe takes place in August. The one month of the year where it’s least likely to rain. So why not get your puzzle fix and make the most of the beautiful Edinburgh outdoors at the same time?

Edinburgh Treasure Hunts

In first place position is Edinburgh Treasure Hunts.

One of the most, if not THE most loved treasure hunt company in Edinburgh is the aptly named “Edinburgh Treasure Hunts“. A solo-run and operated business by your incredibly awesome host Sabi who, as a part-time tour guide, is an expert in all things Edinburgh. The company is also one of the first to start running games of this kind with many of their trails being well over 5 years old and host to thousands and thousands of players over the years. Not only cool credentials, but their experiences are just really, really, really good. My favourite is the Pirates Quest.

 

Mystery Guides

Mystery Guides is a company based out of Portsmouth. They’ve got that small, independent feel, and you can tell the creator really loves what he does. Fast forward a few years from their foundation and now Mystery Trails has setup popular trails in many, if not most major cities around the UK. Luckily for us, one of those trails is in Edinburgh.

The format of a Mystery Guide is fairly straightforward. With your order you’ll receive a physical, printed clue book. These books are lovingly illustrated and come packed with puzzles that guide you around the city. With each new puzzle section, there’s a snippet of map showing you where to go next, the actual clue to be solved, and then a snippet of story. In our case, this was in the form of diary entries. Many clues also had local information about the history of the area, or useful tidbits about local businesses / street names / and fun facts.

 

Edinburgh Fringe Exclusives to Look Out For

Now, these may or may not be running on whatever year you’re planning an Edinburgh Fringe visit – so take these with a pinch of salt. But, if you’re overwhelmed by the 3,800 shows on offer, here are some things you might wish to start with.

Darkfield (Hit)

Every year, company called Darkfield sets up a collection of shipping containers where a performance takes place entirely in the dark. Now, I’ve never booked it. Honestly? I’m too scared. But everyone who ever has says they love it. And by “everyone” I mean all my escape room enthuasiast friends. So it’s probably well worth checking out.

Welcome to DARKFIELD. We hope you enjoy your stay. Eulogy is a surreal, otherworldly journey through a dreamlike, labyrinthine hotel that exists entirely in your mind. Performed in complete darkness over 35 minutes, this intense and exhilarating ride uses binaural sound and speech recognition technology to deceive the senses and transport audience members through rooms, down corridors and into the bowels of this strange and not altogether comfortable hotel. How your dream unfolds is, in part, up to you. However, make sure you don’t volunteer to become the subject of the eulogy every guest is preparing to deliver.

Darkfield experiences are actually run all over the world, not just at the Edinburgh Fringe, so the chances are if you can’t make it out here to Edinburgh – you’ll be able to book something a little closer to home.

 

 

Punchdrunk (Hit)

That’s right, THE Punchdrunk. Quite often they run a show (or two) at the Edinburgh Fringe, or the Edinburgh International Festival which runs at the same time. In 2023, they ran show called the “Lost Lending Library” aimed at children, to wild success.

At 314 floors high and with 78 spiral side departments, The Lost Lending Library houses the largest collection of books and stories in the world. Books of all sizes and colours are crammed together on its shelves, stories bursting into life from their covers. Inside one department is a trainee library guardian weighed down with responsibility. They need your help to learn how to believe in themselves, and appreciate their own unique talents.

Whether they’ll be returning in the future or not, Punchdrunk is the first name I search when each year’s new Edinburgh Fringe line-up is announced.

 

Agent November (Miss)

Agent November is a regular face at the Edinburgh Fringe. It’s the only real ‘escape room’ experience taking place at the Fringe – consisting of a part outdoor puzzle trail, part tabletop escape room. There are a few experiences on offer, and they run on the hour, ever hour. Don’t get me wrong, we’re big fans of Agent November, but sadly this is probably on my Fringe ‘miss list’. The main down-side being that they do public bookings of up to 10 people per slot which crowded around a tiny briefcase means you definitely do not get your money’s worth at £20 per person.

 

 

The GottaGo Room? (Miss)

In 2023 at the Edinburgh Fringe there was a promising looking show called “The GottaGo Room: An Escaping-a-Room Thingy“:

Escape rooms: everyone’s favourite activity to do when you’re going to a birthday party hosted by a virgin or when your company is forcing you to go under the threat of contract termination. Escape rooms famously simulate everyone’s favourite real-life feelings of being stuck in a room with a bunch of strangers, being forced to do puzzles, and having thoughts that if something goes slightly wrong you might die. How are you going to figure out how to escape The GottaGo Room? Here’s a hint: try to solve the clues!

…Unfortunately it was one of the worst shows I’ve ever seen in my life. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I booked tickets with Rebecca, another writer here at The Escape Roomer and we both agreed it missed the mark. It felt like a student performance by a troupe of chaotic individuals none of whom has ever actually been to an escape room. The ‘puzzles’ were odd and imbalanced – an extremely hard maths puzzle next to an incredibly easy spot the difference and an awkward ‘everyone in the audience stand in a circle and hold hands’ that I still don’t really get. We really try not to be negative here on The Escape Roomer, but if they make a return for 2024 or beyond, I’d recommend skipping.

 

Look! A Clue behind the Curtain!

6 Puzzle Game Jams in 2 Months with Astra (& everything I learned doing them)

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(This article was originally posted in full on Medium, but I decided to cross-post here as well, in case anyone is here looking for game design advice!)

I am not a video game developer…

Okay, okay. That’s not quite true. I’m a puzzle game designer. I’ve worked on physical escape rooms, a bunch of tabletop experiences, outdoor puzzle trails, ARGs, and yes… A few video games as well. But I’m also the kind of person who opens up Unity and gets nervous sweats just looking at it. I mean, coding? Me? The last time I coded was some time in the early 00s when I added glitter text to my Neopet’s HTML petpage.

Those really were the good old days, weren’t they?

But despite that, someone, somehow saw something in me and decided to accept my application for the 2023 Astra Game Development Fellowship. Which meant I was suddenly presented with a dream come true, unique opportunity to learn all of the things, and learn them really damn fast.

The Astra Games Development Fellowship, for anyone who doesn’t know, is a grant to support the work of a “thinky game developer” for one year. And in case you’re also wondering, a thinky game, for anyone who doesn’t know, is essentially a really cool word to describe a game that makes you think. Puzzles, strategy, or resource management.

Are you braincells being thoroughly stretched out? Well then, you might be playing a “thinky game”.

The first part of the Fellowship focuses on experimentation and development through a series of game jams. And, as I write this, I’ve just ‘finished’ my final game of the six-jam series.

‘Finished’ is a very strong word, and we’ll get into that shortly… But first, I wanted to take time to look back the delicious jam and think on a few lessons. Over the past few months I’ve made some games I love, and some games I hate, I learned to collaborate with other people, and I learned how to discipline myself for solo working as well.

How many jams?! Six jams!

Show me the Jam(s)

The very first jam of the season was titled “Fairytales”. From the first moment the jam was announced, I knew I’d be doing two things:

  1. I’d be making the game out of Twine, and
  2. I’d be making a sci-fi game

You remember the Neopets joke? Well, I was serious. Coding was a big scary black box of doom. I wasn’t ready for C#, but I did feel comfortable with the most basic level of HTML. Yep, the kind I used to make petpages out of.

After a couple of days work, I game up with a very short story idea where the main character has to decode a series of interstellar transmissions. It’s a little more complex than that, but I’ll let the game itself do the explaining.

The background for Distant Outposts

One jam down, five more to go. The idea behind the second game jam was to take a genre that isn’t traditionally thinky, and make it thinky. For example, taking a ‘skateboarding’ game and somehow turn it into a puzzle experience.

This theme, I love! *chefs kiss* But with a new game jam came a new collaboration. For this jam I collaborated with a fellow fellowshiper (fellow fellow?), Caroline. Together, we ran through a few ideas and slowly they converged onto another sci-fi game: This time about a to-and-from conversation between you, the player, and an alien. Originally based on the idea of making a ‘music/beat/ game thinky, we slightly ran out of time, but I’m still immensely proud of the results! I mean, baby’s first foray into Unity coding, heck yes!

Call and Response

Okay, okay, so technically this was the one of the 6 game jams I didn’t actually take part in. Life got in the way and an ill-timed holiday cropped up, you know how it is. But despite that, this was still my favourite prompt. The prompter (the fantastic Ludipe) gave suggestions such as “Dance”, “Fold”, and “Grow”. But of course my mind went to verbs such as “Shout”, “Scream”, “Squat”, or “Search” (why so many S’s, I do not know).

For this non-participation round, I made a bunch of things. Pages in my notebook, a few 3D models, and some sketches. The idea that took hold in my brain used the verb “Whisper”, where the player would walk around a speakeasy trying to solve a murder by carefully listening to the whispers of the NPCs.

Again, feeling not quite ready to take this into Unity, I focused largely on bringing a scene to life in Blender, and then uploaded a number of 360 degree ‘views’ into a platform called Telescape in order to click and move around the environment.

Rejuvenated from my mini-holiday and slightly disappointed that I didn’t have time to submit any the week before, I started week 4 ready to challenge myself. The theme of the latest game jam was “Everyday Things”. Think doing the washing up, or folding laundry. Things you do all the time — but this time, make them puzzley.

I reached deep, deep into the depths of my knowledge, and bolstered by an over-confident declaration that I wanted to try VR — fired up Unity and chose the “VR” option. For this jam, I wanted to make a supermarket. But a really disconcerting maze-like supermarket where every time you picked up an item from the shelf the whole maze subtly changed so the path you just walked is no longer there. So, I did just that. And since my avatar is The Rock, it has a subtle ‘Rock’ themed vibe.

A Dwayne the Rock Johnson themed VR supermarket maze? Okay, that last jam was a little silly. I was having fun in a low-stakes “it’s okay if this turns out terrible” environment. But with Game Jam 5 came the first of the two-week long jams, and time to get serious about the ideas I may carry across into the full grant year.

For local culture, I dug down into an idea I originally pitched when I was first accepted into this Astra cohort. A puzzle game about delivering post in a town that has no street names or postcodes. Essentially a logic puzzle. The local culture was my own, hyper-specific, slightly cottage-core vision of rural England.

The result was “Delivered”, the first game in this series of jams I felt truly happy to have made. A game that can stand up straight on it’s own legs and no caveat of “well I’m not sure this works but at least I learnt something”.

Delivered

Last, but by no means least, was the very last jam. One could look on the jam and say ‘this is where she went off rails’ or as I prefer to see it, ‘oh okay, heres where she actually decided what she wanted to do and it wasn’t this’. The final topic was ‘collaboration’ and with a happy co-incidence I went on holiday with the coder who helped me with Jam #5 — my Unity Wizard brother.

I decided to play with an idea of a classic point and click adventure that’s been half-written over countless game design docs and notebooks over the years. The first week… Went well! My brother and I created some Unity scenes together, an inventory system, some simple animations…

A very early sketch of one of the scene’s (behind those windows — a parallax scroll sky!)

…And then I went home and stared at the Unity file unable to make any further changes. Why? Because I already knew the game I wanted to make for my ‘big project’, and it wasn’t this one.

So for the final game jam I submitted (almost) exactly nothing, and I’m thrilled with myself that I did it. Because A) I learnt so much in the first week and B) I used the second week efficiently, building a game design document for my ‘big idea’ and sharing with for feedback with peers.

So, what did I learn about making games?

Going from “haha this is a weird little idea” to having a link you can send to anyone anywhere in the world is… Cool. And all you need to do is literally just sit down and do it. Make the game. It’s as simple as that. Why didn’t anyone tell me this earlier? Damn I wasted 27 years not making cute little video games? That changes now.

Don’t let your dreams be dreams (or something like that anyway)

Nobody can make good games without first making bad games. It’s a tricky lesson to learn and it took me the whole game jam series to not feel bad about making something, well, bad! But game jams are great for that because they’re so short — literally nobody can make something super polished in that time, and I love that.

Without realising it, I had a pattern. Make two games, then take a break. Make another two games, then take a break. That works for me. It might not work for the next game dev, but the important thing is to make sure you’re taking the breaks you need, when you need them!

Me after sending one little email

There’s nothing quite like clicking “play” after thinking your game is finished only to discover 15,382 bugs to fix. The lesson: ‘Finish’ early, and give yourself as much time as possible to tweak later!

I spent all 6 jams telling myself “ok Mairi, we’re gonna do this Unity” and settling for a different system. Along the way I used Twine, Telescape, VR Chat, and cut up paper on my desk. And you know what? I still learned a lot, had fun, and made cool games.

I’d even take it a step further and say there is literally no right or wrong thing to make a game out of. If you want to make a game out of an ice sculpture? Go for it. Mashed potato? Even better!

I’m probably going to stick with Unity, but send me some mash and a plate and I’ll see what I can do.

Potato challenge accepted

Ok so maybe I didn’t learn this right now. I come from a background in board games so paper prototyping is my jam. But since I’m writing about game dev lessons, you can have this one for free.

Sometimes it’s quicker to prove a concept, especially a puzzley one, on paper before firing up the engine.

For example: If you want to make a game that plays top-down on a desk — why not literally go cut out shapes on paper and put it on your desk and see how it looks and feels?

There are experts. Loads of ’em. And they know lots of useful stuff. But the one thing they don’t know about is YOUR GAME. There’s only one expert in your game and that’s Jeff… Wait no, wrong notes. ITS YOU.

Of course, take feedback! But I believe strongly in not trying to please everyone. Even within the puzzle world we all have different expectations of a “thinky game”. One person might love Sokoban, and the next person might want hours of pure mathematics, the next person might be looking for an escape room where they can sort through a bunch of keys. Those are three very, very different things. So, don’t try to make something they’ll all love, just make something you’ll love.

It’s not a Mairi article unless there’s a GIF of Nic Cage in there sorry I don’t make the rules

Thanks for reading! 👋

Whether you’re a game developer yourself, a fellow Astra Fund recipient, or just my mum reading this because you love me (oh hi mum), I hope the article was useful!

For me, my next step with Astra will be making the ✨big game✨. Deciding what sort of a game you want to focus on for the next 10 months is an equally thrilling and nerve-wracking decision, but as I write this I’m feeling hopeful and excited about my idea. It’s my intention to post some development logs as I go. Perhaps on Medium, or perhaps on my personal portfolio, or perhaps on the Game Design section of my escape room site… We’ll see!

As for you, I don’t know what your next step is. Maybe you’re making your own game? Or maybe you’re just making a cup of tea. Oooh, or maybe you’re making a game about a cup of tea?! Or maybe you’re making a cup of tea about a game– no wait, that doesn’t make sense. In any case, go forth and make good things, and bad things, and share them with the world (especially if they’re puzzley) so I can support you!

If you want to learn more about what Astra is, you can read more on their website here.

Bowness Escape Room: Down to the Wire | Review

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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

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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

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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! 🙂

BreakInBox: Blue & Black | Review

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BreakInBox Review | Three locked boxes one inside the other. Breakinbox Challenges weave together versatile knowledge worlds making the solution a complex unique experience. 

Date Played: July 2023
Number of Players: 3
Time Taken: ~20 – ~60 minutes
Difficulty: Easy-Medium

I always get extra excited when I received puzzle games from far flung countries around the world, and Israel is a new one for me… Well, I’ve played a digital game or two from there – but never a physical one. How exciting! So when not one but two boxes from BreakInBox showed up, I couldn’t wait to get my regular group of puzzlers over to try something a little different.

BreakInBox is a company who specialises in perhaps the ‘purest’ form of tabletop puzzle games. They are quite literally locked boxes. Yep, you read that right. A cube with a padlock. Inside that locked cube is another cube with another padlock. You’ll never guess what’s inside that one: Another cube… With another padlock! In this way, you progress through a Matryoshka Doll- style experience, unlocking three layers of unique puzzles. Whilst each layer is locked with a padlock, the puzzles themselves are found printed on all the sides of each box. In this way, you’re encouraged to pick up and manipulate the boxes in your hands – turning them over and examining each one closely.

We played through two of the games available:

  • The Blue Box
  • The Black Box

As such, we’ll be writing about both in this review. There are some generalisations between the two, and there were some major differences. For example one of the boxes had more linear puzzles – one meant to be completed after another. The other on the other hand had much standalone puzzles that the three of us could tackle simultaneously. Similarly, one of them involved a unique sound puzzle – and the other had you send an email, which was exciting.

When the website explained the difficulty levels – they weren’t wrong. Blue is meant to be much easier, for beginner puzzlers, and black is meant to be a real head-scratcher. And yep, that’s absolutely right. We breezed through blue in around 20 minutes. Black on the other hand took all three of our collective brain power working together (and a clue or two) to crack the codes!

So, without further adieu, lets get into it:

 

 

The Blue Box

We played ‘The Blue Box’ over an evening and a couple of beers. It was sandwiched between a few other puzzle games, and it provided a very welcome break with some lighter, intuitive puzzling. In all, the Blue Box took us around 20 minutes. We think it would take the average puzzler around 30 minutes – but as mentioned, we erred on the side of “working simultaneously on all puzzles” where we could.

As such, it definitely felt more entry-level, but in a satisfying way with some particularly creative puzzles I always enjoy seeing in tabletop games like this.

The puzzles required the use of the internet. In particular, this box asks you to send an email in order to receive your next step digitally. In another way, the game also required the internet as there’s some pretty niche trivia knowledge needed – but thankfully there’s no rule against not Googling things. Unless you’re an absolute pub quiz boffin, it’s good to have your phone nearby to check some obscure detail or two.

 

 

The Black Box

We were so confident after playing the Blue Box we were all like “ahaha, this’ll be a breeze”. Oh how wrong we were. The creator, Avi, wasn’t wrong when he said to play the Black Box second because it’s significantly harder. But with the added difficulty, came the added fun. Of the two, we really, really enjoyed the second one. Each puzzle felt like a real mental workout.

In particular, I really enjoyed this game’s use of the internet. There was a fun sound-puzzle, and several puzzles which required us to absolutely scour Google Maps for very hard to find details! There was a nod to the UK we found particularly charming. But in general, it was the fact this box had so many satisfying ‘aha moments’ that scratched the itch of the kind of puzzles we love playing. As a team of three, we find ourselves taking part in a lot of online puzzle hunts, and this felt like a self-contained version of one of those – and well clued at that too.

 

 

Both Boxes

In both experiences, there isn’t so much of a “story”, other than “here’s a mysterious box, good luck”. As such, even the puzzles felt “pure” in a way I can’t quite describe in any other way. They’re like puzzle-hunt puzzles – the best versions of themselves, without being held back with the need to fit into context. For me, the puzzles were the best thing about both experiences, and I almost think there’s a certain charm to the fact they haven’t gone for story-heavy. There’s no right or wrong answer, but since The Escape Roomer always consider the story and narrative, it has to be mentioned.

In terms of quality, BreakInBoxes are simply made – with the most ‘high tech’ things being the user interface on the internet, and the three-digit locks that close the boxes. Otherwise these boxes are light-weight, and simply built, with simple graphics and colours. They’ve taken the phrase “Less is More” to heart, but in a way that feels true to their brand.

In both experiences, we also received a little bonus treat at the heart of the three boxes – the less I say about this the better! But it was super fun finally getting through to the ‘finish line’ and finding something fun waiting there. In this way, I think BreakInBox has a unique edge in the market in that it’s fully resettable and replayable – but better than that, because if you planned to gift this on to someone else you could put whatever you want inside the box. You could fill it with sweets, or a prize, or even a birthday gift..! Cute!

Last but not least, in terms of value, this one is a little harder to quantify. It’s another thing we always consider at The Escape Roomer. BreakInBox is based in Israel, but they have a shop listed in USD for international customers. Each box is around $35 USD, so about £30. Shipping comes in at $13.80, making the whole cost of a single box just under £40. Now, this is a little steep – but given the *gestures vaguely at the world* current cost of living crisis, it tracks about “what these things just cost these days”. We had a lot of fun with the two boxes we played. But did we have £40 x 2 fun? Well, I’m not sure… Maybe? Perhaps?

 

 

The Verdict

The verdict? We did have a lot of fun playing this one. The Black Box slightly more than the Blue Box, but there isn’t too much difference in it – both games are good for their respective audiences, and I commend the designers for creating such an experience like this. It’s probably slightly more expensive compared to a few other comparable games, but the puzzles are delightful and unique in their application, so I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it. In particular, the Blue Box would be great for a younger / less experienced audience. The Black Box is for more hardcore puzzlers who want a real challenge! I haven’t yet played the others in the series, but I imagine they’re well placed on the scale between these two.

 

The BreakInBox set can be purchased by heading directly to BreakInBox’s website here. The Escape Roomer readers may also use the code: TheER23 to receive $5 off their order.

We were not charged for our games, but this does not affect the content of our review.

Mystery Guides: The Midnight Body Snatcher (Edinburgh) | Review

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Old Town Edinburgh Treasure Hunt Review| In 1695, Edinburgh’s Old Town was haunted by a mysterious grave robber known as the ‘Midnight Body Snatcher’, who when supply ran out.. turned his hand to murder!

Date Played: July 2023
Time Taken: 3 Hours
Number of Players: 2
Difficulty: Easy

Here at the Escape Roomer we all kinda have that one thing we write about “the most”. For example, I actually don’t write about (or play) nearly as many escape rooms as my co-writers. But what I do obsessively play are outdoor puzzle trails. The moment I spot a new one on the market, come rain or shine I’m out there with a pen and paper ready to explore. There’s just something so much fun about combining puzzles with exploring an urban space. You get to see things in a new light, you learn historical facts, and you get a pretty fun work out too…

*cough cough*

…Well, this particular trail gave me quite literally the work out of my entire life. But even that was kind of cool in itself!

So when I heard about Mystery Guides, I had to get my hands on one. They sounded absolutely awesome. And you know what? They were! But wait, I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back to the start.

 

So, what are Mystery Guides all about?

Mystery Guides is a company based out of Portsmouth. They’ve got that small, independent feel, and you can tell the creator really loves what he does. Fast forward a few years from their foundation and now Mystery Trails has setup popular trails in many, if not most major cities around the UK. Luckily for me, one of those trails is in Edinburgh.

The format of a Mystery Guide is fairly straightforward. With your order you’ll receive a physical, printed clue book. These books are lovingly illustrated and come packed with puzzles that guide you around the city. With each new puzzle section, there’s a snippet of map showing you where to go next, the actual clue to be solved, and then a snippet of story. In our case, this was in the form of diary entries. Many clues also had local information about the history of the area, or useful tidbits about local businesses / street names / and fun facts.

The games are very much intended for single-use, as you’ll need to write all over them to solve the puzzles.

 

 

The Midnight Body Snatcher

In our case, the Old Town Edinburgh Treasure Hunt was a story about “The Midnight Body Snatcher”. Set in the cold winter of 1695 where the streets of the city were gripped by tales of a shadowy body snatcher. In true Burke and Hare fashion, we were hot on the heels of a body snatcher trying to figure out exactly who they are thanks to environmental clues.

I say “hot on the heels”, but what I actually mean was that we were playing in 2023. A new piece of evidence in the 300 year cold case has proven to be the key we need to figuring out who the body snatcher was. The fact he’s probably been dead for centuries didn’t detract from the real sense of urgency to solve the case. And for that, it was a lot of fun.

In terms of gameplay, the Midnight Body Snatcher sort of plays out like a logic grid. Well, sort of anyway. There isn’t too much ‘logic grid’ to it, but the idea is there are:

  • Five suspects
  • Five symbols
  • Five colours
  • Five items of jewellery

And with each puzzle solved you can eliminate one of these. The puzzles were a mix of more well known puzzle styles, and ones that were totally unique to the environment. But, in most cases we arrived at a landmark and had to use the physicality of the landmark to solve. Sometimes that meant looking at a plaque, other times it meant counting the letters, or getting up close and personal with a particular landmark to try to find a hidden detail on it.

At first I was a little surprised the categories of “symbol” and “jewellery” felt… Well… Quite random. But then as we neared the finale it all fell into place beautifully with the local history, in a satisfying and fun climax.

 

Puzzling around Edinburgh City

I played this game in a team of two with my co-writer Rebecca. The game arrived, and no sooner than it did we made a plan to play together on the next Sunday. The fact the weather forecast said it was due to rain all day almost put a dampener on our plans – but not quite. Because it turned out the weather forecast was completely and utterly wrong, as it was a beautiful sunny day. So sunny, we even stopped for ice cream!

If we had just one criticism about the whole experience, it would have more to do with the city than the game, and that was: THE HILLS. I’m writing this review days later and my calves are still aching. Yes, yes, Edinburgh is a hilly city. I live here and I’ve made my peace with it. But The Midnight Body Snatcher took us up and down and up and down and up and down. The whole thing takes place within a fairly small “central city” area. The beautiful old town around the Royal Mile. We began at the Royal Mile, then went up, then down, then back up to the Royal Mile, then back down the other side, then back up the Royal Mile. It’s a good job I don’t skip leg days at the gym.

But one of the good things about Mystery Guides is that the experience is entirely self-led. If you need to take a break, you can. In fact, our trail offered three opportunities to take a break in pub stops.

 

 

The Verdict: Mystery Guides Edinburgh

We really enjoyed Mystery Guides’ Edinburgh Trail. There’s fewer pleasures in life than spending time in the sunshine with a friend.

We’d in particular recommend it for families – it struck just the right balance of educational vs fun in an almost Horrible Histories style, and we felt the style of puzzles that pushed us to search about the physical environment would go down a hit with a younger audience. We would also recommend setting aside a full day for this. It does recommend around 3 hours to finish, but there’s so much to see and so many wonderful places you might want to stop and stay a while in. Plus that will definitely break up the hill-climbing!

 

 

The Old Town Edinburgh Treasure Hunt can be purchased from Mystery Guides website here.

Note, we were not charged for our experience but this does not affect our review in the slightest.