Enigma Quests: Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time | Review

Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time Review | Inspired by our love of time travel films like Back to the Future and Whodunnits like Knives Out, this dazzling new escape room in London tasks teams with assisting a genius inventor with her latest project, through the use of time travel! Featuring amazing effects, a captivating story, and a wealth of devious puzzles, this is an amazing experience for players of all ages.

Date Played: 22nd August 2025
Time Taken: 50 minutes
Number of Players: 2
Difficulty: Medium

The first escape room we played at the Enigma Quests press night was their brand new Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time. This was shortly before stepping into the World of Witchcraft and Wizardry room (which you can read all about how much I enjoyed it in this review). The press night was to celebrate the opening of three new rooms at Enigma Quest’s new site. Largely, each of the rooms replaces, and in some cases is the sequel to, an original Enigma Quests room. World of Witchcraft and Wizardry replaces School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, The Billion Pound Heist appropriately for inflation replaces The Million Pound Heist. Which means Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time must replace Submarine Mission Wavebreak? Well, not really. This is where it breaks the trend.

Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time is loosely steampunk-ish. Not quite the submarine-level of steampunk, this is more “eccentric inventor creates a time machine” brand of steampunk, and as such it feels like the most different and most new of the rooms. Unlike the other two, it is it’s own, standalone experience. However unlike the other two, this felt like the one of the three which didn’t quite land with us as much as the others.

On the one hand, it’s set is excellent. An enormous footprint, multiple environment-based aha moments, and some clever details in the environment. On the other hand, it suffered an identity crisis, a lack of signposting, and some illogical puzzles. That and there was a lot of AI imagery on the walls. Here at The Escape Roomer we call out (and deduct points for) AI imagery so much we really should have an editorial policy against it by now, but the TLDR is: We don’t like to support rooms, experiences, or games that rely on AI generated imagery. This is both from a legal and a moral point, but ultimately – why would we bother to play / read / enjoy something someone else didn’t bother to create. And sure, there’s a big distinction between “here’s an entirely generated AI game” versus “we used AI to fill in a few pictures on the walls”. But for a room which was so detailed and delightful in other ways, it felt like a shame to cut corners and undermine that effort.

But anyway, now I’ve addressed and led away the elephant in the room, it’s time to talk about exactly what Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time is. This room is your classic time travel themed escape room in which you’re tasked with journeying back and forth through time in order to recover a MacGuffin to save the world. Inventor’s Odyssey was centred around one room but split into multiple timezones, with a very cool mechanic to travel between them. Changes we made in one time would affect the world in the next, and so on. This part, I enjoyed a lot. It was excellent setting the time machine and stepping into and out of the different eras seamlessly. If anything, I wanted to use the time machine even more and be able to go back and forth.

In terms of the puzzles, these were a little more confusing. I don’t know if I ever fully grasped exactly what we needed to do in a space, and there were a few moments it wasn’t immediately obvious if we’d solved a puzzle or not. Take this with a pinch of salt, as we may just have completed things in the wrong order, but a little signposting might have gone a long way to make it clear what to do next, and the answer once something is done.

In terms of set design, AI imagery aside, the set was brilliant. There’s a centrepiece I won’t spoil which was absolutely delightful and fun, and stepping out of the time machine into a new environment each time we traversed through time was a delight unique to only a time travel room. Where objects weren’t a part of the room they added some great world-building. From strange items in glass cases, to myriads of wires and boxes of strange trinkets from strange times here and there.

Last but not least, credit where credit is due, our Games Master did add in an Easter Egg for us whilst we were playing because we asked very nicely. This showed they were being attentive and cared a lot about our experience. So I can’t fault the hosting either.

Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time – The Verdict

As a whole, despite my praise, I did feel the room was a little flawed. Especially compared to the Wizarding World game we followed it up with. It could have been it didn’t quite click with us, but there was something a little off about the gameplay flow, the individual puzzles, and the overarching narrative. I also, unfairly, can’t help but compare this room to Escape Plan’s Pushed For Time which is another time-travel themed escape room in the centre of London with a very similar gimmick at the core.

Of all the escape rooms I’ve tried so far at Enigma Quests, I get the impression they’re all designed to allow for a conveyor belt style. Meaning once one team is out of the first room, the next team goes into the room behind them. Whilst this is great to get more players through, it does run the risk of spreading Games Masters a little thin and missing out on the opportunity for players to return to rooms they’ve previously been in. But hey, this is just my assumption due to how they’re built and how the particular press night was run.

I’d recommend this room for folks looking to try out a time travel game, and who appreciate a good environment and set. It’s got it’s fun moments, and there are a few details that are delightful. It may not be an accessible room, both in terms of physical mobility and in terms of sound / colour, as some puzzles required both.

Inventor’s Odyssey Through Time can be booked at Enigma Quest’s Fetter Lane location in London by heading to their website here.

We were invited to play for free, but this has not affected our review.