Room Escape Southend: Hunt for the March Hare | Review

Can you and your team solve the Clues and Puzzles and Locate the March hare before he runs off? Use your wits and determination! All proceeds from this game goes to Havens Hospices.

Rating: Excellent!
Completion Time: 17 minutes
Date Played: 9th August 2021
Party Size: 4
Recommended For: A seasonal, Alice in Wonderland themed point and click adventure

Whenever I see “all proceeds go to charity”, it gives me the warm fuzzies. In this case, your purchase of Hunt for the March Hare is donated to Havens Hospice, as part of the city-wide Hares About Town campaign. So when Escaping the Closet, our friend Tasha and I got together for a weekly digital escape room, I immediately remembered Room Escape Southend’s new point-and-click experience.

Plus, we’ve had a lot of recent success on other Alice in Wonderland themed games, such as Escape from Wonderland, or Escape from Puzzleland – so why not put our combined skills to the test and give this new game a go?

Let the Hunt for the March Hare Begin!

The idea behind Hunt for the March Hare is deceptively simple and executed perfectly. The Mad Hatter meets you as you log into the digital game, explaining that he needs your help to find the missing March Hare. After searching the whole town up and down it appears this curious character has vanished!

So off you and your intrepid team go down the rabbit hole armed with a map of all the possible locations the March Hare may be found. By searching the room and analysing all the clues it’s your job to determine where the March Hare is not – thereby eliminating all the possibilities and being left with just one: the truth!

The Hunt for the March Hare is essentially one giant logic puzzle and actually, I don’t hate that at all! Logic puzzles are one of my favourite style of puzzles and Room Escape Southend have done pretty well converting the loved format into an interactive, point and click game.

Things are getting curiouser and curiouser…

We finished Hunt for the March Hare in around 17 minutes, however I don’t necessarily think I’d call it an easy game so don’t let that put you off! As mentioned, the core mechanic of the game is that you’re presented with a number of locations and each puzzle solved gives you one or more ‘is not’ clues.

The Hare IS NOT here, or The Hare IS NOT over there.

This feels straightforward, but it is worth mentioning that you should make notes as you go along because certain items will disappear – taking the solutions with them! We got caught up once or twice with this, reaching a point where none of us could remember exactly what an earlier, no longer retrievable, clue said.

However, the puzzles you’ll solve to get there are a comfortable mix of finding keys, inputting 4 digit number and letter codes, finding the odd one out, and quite a bit of looking for hidden things in the world. Actually, the hunting around (read as: button mashing) was one of the things I liked most. This game, built in Telescape, doesn’t spoon feed you the hidden clues. The name is a clue itself: you have to hunt around for them.

Even though were was an abundance of more ‘escape room’ style puzzles, they were themed in the world nicely enough with the occasional moment of having to think in terms of the upside down world of Wonderland. You may think you know how to read a clock in the real world, but how could you do this in Wonderland? That’s the question.

Thankfully, you can see all other players’ pointers on the screen, so you know exactly who is interacting with what. Always useful to know!

Beautiful Alice in Wonderland Artwork

One of the stand out features of Hunt for the March Hare which absolutely has to be mentioned however is the artwork – seriously, it’s lovely! As you click your way through the environment you’ll explore three unique locations that feel perfectly at home in Wonderland. Winding streets and curious architecture populated by flamingos, mushrooms and clocks.

If nothing else, it was a joy to just ‘be inside’ the world of The Hunt for the March Hare for, wondering if the next nook and cranny you click will trigger an exciting sequence or the missing clue you need!

The Verdict

The Hunt for the March Hare is a sweet and un-complex game tying into the real life Hares About Town event in Southend. For a game this inexpensive we weren’t expecting much, yet we still had an enjoyable evening down the rabbit hole, puzzle solving and marvelling at the artwork.

Don’t forget! Your purchase of Hunt for the March Hare goes to a good cause as part of Hares About Town. You can purchase your game here, or read more about Hares About Town here.

Ratings