How to complete all the trails at Phantom Peak, London

Phantom Peak is London’s most popular immersive experience venue. Located just a short walk from Canada Water in London, it boasts a large, 30,000 square feet (+) “playing area” consisting of an indoor wild west down, an outdoor board walk, a river, countless NPCs to meet and interact with, and plenty of secrets. It describes itself as a fully immersive, open-world experience, part escape room, part immersive theatre, part real-life videogame.

Now, let’s be sure about one thing – there’s a lot to do. In fact, by design, there’s too much to do. Phantom Peak is best played over multiple days and spent really enjoying everything the world has to offer. The puzzle trails, the arcade, the food and drink, or simply relaxing by the waterfall in the sunshine and watching the world go past. We don’t actually recommend rushing to try to solve everything. Phantom Peak is, by design, almost impossible to “complete” in one go. It’s like, imagine you just downloaded and amazing open world RPG but decided to skip every cut scene and sprint your character through the world ignoring everything. Sure you might finish the game fast, but you’d… Well… Miss the game.

But despite that, plenty of players still love the challenge. So, if you’re going for 100% full puzzle trail completion, here are our recommendations and top tips on how to do it.

Let’s Crunch the Phantom Peak Numbers

Depending on the season, there are anywhere from 12 – 16 trails to complete, and some also include bonus secret trails to find and solve. You have exactly 3.5 hours puzzle solving time, since the first 30 minutes and the final 30 minutes are reserved for the opening and ending shows. This means 210 minutes for potentially 17 puzzle trails at the game’s busiest. So you can spend about 12.35 minutes per puzzle trail.

We’d estimate that the ideal time to solve a puzzle trail if you’re a fairly experienced player actually sits around 20 minutes, and 30 minutes if you’re playing a little more casually, but again this depends on the specific season and trails. Some are much more active, some are much more puzzley, others involve lengthy character interactions. If you still want to attempt 100% completionism in one go, it’ll be tight, but technically not impossible.

To maximise your time and chances,

When to Book: I’d love to say the “off peak” times, but Phantom Peak doesn’t really have an off peak. Most slots book out reasonably quickly. The game runs on a seasonal basis in four blocks a year. Whilst I personally prefer playing in the sunshine, the Winter and Autumn shows are probably more popular than Spring and Summer. During a season, it’s typically bookable over the weekend on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Of those, Saturday is the most popular day, so if you’d like to book when it’s a little quieter, Friday or Sunday are your best bet.

Recommended Team Size: 2 to 4 players following each trail is perfect. Any larger and it’d be unwieldy – 5+ people showing up at each quest location is a lot.

One tactic you may wish to employ is working on the same mission but splitting up between inside and outside. Since the trails are linear, you won’t be able to (nor should you want to) be completing multiple at the same time. So whilst on a particular trail, you’ll be sent to locations all over the park, frequently be going from inside, to outside, from inside, to outside and so on. For something simple like “check the noticeboard”, or “what is the name of this shop”, having a team split between locations but in constant communication will make ferrying information back and forth much, much quicker. Although a note of warning, only one phone per team should be used to track trails, and often NPC interactions and items are involved. If you do split up, you might complete a quest faster but you’ll not enjoy it as much as you should.

Tips and Tricks:

• Take a photograph of important things, such as:
  • The map of Phantom Peak
  • The noticeboard
  • Anything that looks out of place

…and do your best to remember where things were. In our particular playthrough for example, we were sent to the Post Office, the Jonagraph Centre, and the Robodoc multiple times, so it quickly became second nature where to go. Other times, we hadn’t encountered an area yet and had to pause and mull over the map a while. Before your adventure really begins, you’re given 20 minutes or so to explore the space. This is the perfect time to memorise where things are.

When we played, we snapped photos of some interesting notices which ended up being useful later. We also followed a mysterious set of footprints, which meant that when this cropped up in a trail later, we knew exactly where to go.

• Don’t be afraid to ask for help

If you don’t know who a certain NPC is or where a certain shop is located, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Costumes at Phantom Peak are fantastic so it can be hard to tell players from actors apart, but actors wear little silver name badges. If  you’re stuck or confused, feel free to flag anyone down and they’ll point you in the right direction.

• Skip the side activities

If you’re committed to completing every trail, make your peace with not having time to experiencing the other delightful things Phantom Peak has to offer. These include a hook-a-platypus activity outside, an arcade full of digital games, and a circus themed fairground with physical games, as well as many scheduled tours and events. You may also wish to browse the shop, or pause for a bite to eat and some delicious drinks. Make sure you eat before you play, and keep a bottle of water with you so you don’t need to stop to fill up.

Our Biggest Tip?

…Maybe don’t try to solve everything in one day! It’s tempting, and we get it. We’re completionists too. But when we visited, we took it a little slower and were pleased to only get through a few trails, because it meant we got to have other moments of delightfulness, from playing arcade games, to exploring areas not covered in our trails.

Book 2 or more slots

The best way to experience Phantom Peak is actually to take your time. The web-app will save information between visits, so if you choose to visit on one weekend then return the next, you won’t be sent on the same quests. If you do happen to be, you can always speak to one of the NPCs and be sent on a different quest instead.

Or, bring 2 teams and divide and conquer

If you’re just about collecting cards, you could alternately try splitting up, tackling different trails, and then meeting up again at the end to compare cards and swap stories. It won’t mean that you personally completed everything, but you’ll get a bigger sense of everything Phantom Peak has to offer, and a shiny deck full of completed Phantom Peak quest cards to boast.

Have you completed every trail at Phantom Peak? Let us know in the comments below.

And if you haven’t yet visited, you can book Phantom Peak directly by heading to their website here.