Locked In: The Cutting Room | Review

The Cutting Room Review | In 1987 a series of bizarre murders plagued the city of Edinburgh. Over a span of a few months, 6 victims were found in various closes in the city. The victims were all male, in good physical condition and in their twenties. When dissected it was clear they were all missing an organ but a primitive replacement was found in its place. Just as swiftly as they had started the murders stopped. The police never found out who was behind it all and eventually gave up the case after years of searching. But last night there was an unexpected development in the case, 5 new victims. we don’t know why he’s back, why he’s taking organs but let’s be clear. If we don’t find the missing organs in the next hour 5 men will die. We’re counting on you.

Date Played: November 2023
Time Taken: 50 minutes
Number of Players: 3
Difficulty: Medium-Hard

…And with that, I’ve finally played all of the escape rooms at Locked In. Only one year after moving to Edinburgh. But hey, I knew they’d be good, so I was saving them and spacing them out for special occasions. This such special occasion, my co-writer Rebecca’s birthday! Rebecca is also one of the only people in the world who can convince me to do a “horror” escape room, which is exactly how Locked In’s The Cutting Room brands itself. In hindsight it definitely wasn’t as scary as I’d hyped myself up that it might be, but it was still a perfectly fun time with plenty of screams to boot.

Photo (c) Locked In Edinburgh

Arrival at Locked In Edinburgh

Locked In begins slightly unusually, since it doesn’t have a traditional waiting area. Instead you arrive at the door, and simply wait there to be found by your Games Master. In our case we arrived super early, but since we were familiar with Locked In, we knew what to expect, and so went to wait next door in the pub (Summerhall’s Royal Dick – hey stop giggling). There’s a QR code on the wall… Outside the door, not in the pub that is… That lets you sign your waiver on arrival. Then promptly, a Games Master or two will arrive, confirm your attendance and take you straight to the room.

One of Locked In’s great strength is that the physical venue is inside an old vet school… You follow a winding labyrinth of white tiled corridors that definitely wouldn’t be out of place in my recurring nightmares. This is particularly cool though because it means the ‘decorations’ aren’t really decorations at all, but instead literally what the rooms used to look like. This makes it the perfect environment for a very creepy dissection room in a draughty medical environment. The posters on the wall, the weird equipment, and cold metal tables… It looks perfect. I found this when I played their other rooms, notably The Secret Lab (not yet reviewed, but played this time last year), that there’s this sort of brilliant blurring between reality and the game, making for excellent immersion.

Photo (c) Locked In Edinburgh

Get the Organs, Escape in 60

In terms of the puzzles, The Cutting Room is creative and fun. You’re tasked with the goal of recovering all the organs… Yes, it’s an unusual premise, but it worked. Every time you found an organ, you had to store it in a literal ice bucket. On top of that, you had to get in and get out within 60 minutes before the organ harvester himself returned. Too slow? And we’d have been the next ones on the metal table.

The game was fairly non-linear, in that multiple people could be working on different puzzles at once. In fact, we did complete multiple puzzles at once – and at one point two people were both triggering the release of an organ at the exact same time it wasn’t immediately clear who had triggered which. An amusing organ mixup you definitely don’t want to happen in a real hospital.

One of our party of three had already played The Cutting Room with a much larger team of 6, and several years ago. With a team of that size, he hadn’t been able to experience everything back then. Although he anticipated a few of the moments – the room largely felt brand new, for all the puzzles he tried out he hadn’t seen the first time around, and things were hidden in a different location. It was interesting to hear that perspective afterwards, whilst as this is definitely not intentionally replayable – there is a LOT to do. So much that, depending on your team, you may not see it all just by playing through once.

One of the things I enjoyed a lot were the search-and-find elements. Especially towards the beginning, there was a lot of racing around looking for small things. We found ourselves putting all the keys and notes we’d found in the central area and immediately buzzing about looking for more clues. This is a personal preference thing, but I enjoy “search-heavy” rooms, and The Cutting Room certainly falls into that category. In terms of locks, it’s also a fairly lock-heavy room, but it fits well with the theme and the era, whilst also integrating some very fun non-lock a-ha moments inbetween.

The Verdict

I have weird feelings about Locked In. I talked about it in an earlier review, even though it was such a long time ago. I like to think I have a fairly good, first name term relationship with all the escape rooms in Edinburgh now – except Locked In. But if anything, that just makes this review even stronger. Despite my hesitations and misgivings, I always, always have an excellent time. It’s one of the companies I recommend to all my enthusiast friends when they come to visit. Having now finished all their rooms, I can safely conclude they are all hit, with no misses.

In particular, I really enjoyed The Cutting Room as an “entry level horror” experience. Yes, it’s scary – but if anyone is super scared of horror rooms, play this one. It’ll ease you into the genre with some very light-hearted faux-organs, and mild threat level that makes you realise that even the scary rooms can be fun. I enjoyed it a lot, and I don’t enjoy scares – so do with that information whatever you will!

Our quote of the game was: “You seem very upbeat for someone whose colleagues are all dead!”

Locked In can be booked in Edinburgh by heading to the company’s website here.