Tag Archives: cluequest

clueQuest: cQ Origenes | Review

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In order to stop the Professor from breaching our firewall, you and your team will have to access Mr Q’s old base. The only way in, however, is to shrink down to the size of a mouse with the help of the Shrink’o’Mat. Word of caution, agents: the technology you’ll be exposed to is…a bit unstable and still experimental. You’ll have only 60 minutes to counteract the cyber attack and secure the mainframe before the Shrink’o’Mat’s effect wears off and things get messy.

Image (c) clueQuest

Battling the storm en route to escape!

We played cQ Origenes back in February 2020, just before the pandemic began, which must have been the last time we were in London (wow that feels like a long time ago!).

Our first mission however was actually getting there, as this was during the ‘Storm Dennis’ weekend… Luckily, escape rooms are literally the PERFECT rainy day activity! Although, they are also ideal on: sunny days, snowy days, windy days too.

This trip was our second time at clueQuest. We had previously taken on Operation Blacksheep with the same team and thoroughly enjoyed it, so were very excited to be back to face the slightly more challenging cQ Origenes room. cQ Origenes is one which is always recommended as a top room in terms of the capital’s offerings, and it’s easy to see why. Even clueQuest’s reception area feels special, bustling full with teams. It makes for a very lively pre-escape atmosphere!

It’s clear clueQuest would be so great to host a big party with lots of people taking on different rooms and all coming back together to discuss times, and inevitably, searching fails!


…Hm, maybe this is something we would do for the big 3-0…?

The Mission Brief

Back to the mission: the briefing for cQ Origenes was consistent with the overarching CQ storyline – our group of ‘spies’ have to break in and retrieve an SD card. However, this is more challenging than it first appears! The first step of the two stage mission requires you to operate the shrink-o-mat to infiltrate the lair – making everything after this point ‘larger than life’!

Beyond this, the room is split really well, with the decoration tying into the storyline allowing for a super smooth puzzle flow. 

Image (c) clueQuest

The cQ Origenes rooms are decorated brilliantly, which is no surprise as the production value on clueQuest’s rooms is SUPER HIGH. This really pays off to create an immersive atmosphere with a humorous twist.

The mission offers great interactivity and clever puzzles to solve: varied, challenging, logical and original… There was plenty to get on with. We were glad that we went in with a strong team of 4, Tilda and Johnny are always super on it for escaping (our favourite kind of friends haha!).

There was even one very special padlock in the room – we’re sure even the biggest padlock-phobe would enjoy opening. 

Good things come in small packages

We absolutely loved the concept of this room, it was so simple but designed incredibly well. We had so much fun exploring all the props and clever, special touches in the space. The props were well designed and pretty much everything really ‘worked’, meaning a great deal of exploring the room pays off, not only for progressing the story, but also for the wow-factor of discovery!

We were particularly blown away by the final puzzle: this really impressed us with its design… But you’ll have to go and play to see what we mean!

Image (c) clueQuest

Alas, we did hit a hiccup at the end and spent around 10 minutes stuck on one (tiny, tiny…) piece… However, our overall escape time came in at just over 56 minutes, successfully returning to full size! That said, looking at the photo it looks like Johnny is full size and the rest of us are still slightly shrunk haha! 

cQ Origenes is great for enthusiasts or large groups of newbies looking for a challenge! We definitely hope to return to help Mr Q face Blacksheep again next time we return to London.

Which room would you recommend we try our hand at next?! Check out our reviews for clueQuest’s other games here.

cQ Origenes can be booked on clueQuest’s website here.

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clueQuest: Beyond Medusa’s Gate | Review

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In an age of eloquent philosophers, merciless gods, and death-promising oracles. Somewhere on the Peloponnese peninsula, in a vast Aegean coastal cave, an old artefact has been hidden. It could be the legendary ship of the Argonauts… Using the Animus simulation program and our database of recorded genetic memories, we will send you back to Greece. Find the ship, if it exists…

Rating: Immersive!
Completion Time: 50:02
Date Played: 3rd June 2021
Party Size: 4
Recommended For: Fans of Assassin’s Creed, Ancient Greece, and VR

So if you remember back to my 30 Before 30 post:

16. Introduce ALL my closest friends to the joys of escape rooms!

It took me exactly 2 days from writing that to booking Beyond Medusa’s Gate at clueQuest for 2 of my best friends (who have never done an escape room) to experience. I think Ubisoft’s escape room games are ‘gateway escape rooms’, ideal for a team of experienced video game players to get into the vibe. And how was it? SO MUCH FUN!

*excited screaming in Ancient Greek*

About the Game

Beyond Medusa’s Gate is part of the Ubisoft Escape Games series. They’re all short (around 1 hour) VR escape room experiences set in the worlds of Assassin’s Creed. Unlike Assassin’s Creed, you can’t play these at home so you’ll have to find an escape room near you to play them at. In my opinion, the best place in London is clueQuest, but if that’s a little far to travel you should check and see if there’s anywhere closer.

The other games in the series are:

  • The Dagger of Time (based on Prince of Persia)
  • Escape the Lost Pyramid (based on AC: Origins)

I’m quietly hoping they make an escape room on my favourite in the series, Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla so that I can live out my Viking fantasy life and scale some cool mountains whilst solving puzzles. But a girl can dream!

The Story

Beyond Medusa’s Gate takes you, in a team of 2 or 4 players, back to Ancient Greece via the Animus (a device from the video game franchise which allows you to simulate the lives of adventurers past through their DNA). This time you’re in search of a mysterious and long lost artefact – a ship! Rumour has it the ship is buried somewhere inside a vast cave… Beyond (you guessed it) Medusa’s Gate.

Even though this location is lost to time, stepping into the shoes of puzzle solvers from thousands of years ago enabled us to seek out this treasure. So who were our Animus counterparts? We emerged in the bodies of…

3 bald old men and one strapping young lad.

This is entirely by choice, of course. How could we possibly resist going for the ‘old man’ in the character selection!? To me, it just makes the story even more immersive. Perhaps we are three gay dads taking our son on an outing? Or perhaps it’s a day trip from the old folks home? The story is whatever you make of it!

The Gameplay

Any VR game is really hard to get into it if you’re not used to it, and one of our team had never played any VR before. Thankfully the introductory part of your quest is all about communication and finding your feet. The team were also super patient with us past any technical hitches.

Once we’d found our feet, we were off to a flying start through the game and it is a LOT of fun. Having now played all three VR experiences at clueQuest I would rank this one as probably the best for beginners as it’s got a great story, not too difficult puzzles, and some great game mechanics (what can I say, I love a bow and arrow).

Beyond Medusa’s Gate can be played in a team of 2 or a team of 4 as you’ll have split into two groups at various points throughout the game and complete tasks on opposite sides of the cave in tandem. The game begins, after a brief customisation area, alone inside a dark room. This is a kind of ‘demo’ area which helps you get to grips with the controls – teleporting, grabbing, sliding, pushing, setting fire to yourself. You know, typical VR game stuff. Once you’ve cracked the first area, you’re reunited with your teammates and the journey toward Medusa’s Gate begins.

The Puzzles

Less the puzzles, the real stand out is the mechanics of this game. VR allows you to do things not possible in a physical space. For starters, the area is HUGE. You can clime to incredibly high locations and fire bows and arrows at moving targets and even interact with magic. Most of the puzzles you’ll encounter are literally impossible in real life, unless you have a billion pound budget and a set the size of my entire block of apartments.

In terms of difficulty, Beyond Medusa’s Gate isn’t terribly hard. Again, this makes it great for a beginner team, or a team more accustomed to playing video games than escape rooms (though now I’m quietly hoping a ‘real life’ escape room won’t be a letdown for my friends when they ask “Where’s the waterfall and 100 ft drop?”).

It’s a very linear room with one puzzle needing to be completed before your team can move to the next area, with many mechanics relying on a little trial and error before figuring out how to do them. Between each puzzle area is at least one or two action scenes where you’ll find yourself doing other things – jumping from platforms, firing arrows, doing battle with monsters, or crowding round at the front of the boat pretending to be in Titanic.

For a casual Wednesday evening before a pub trip, the difficulty was just right!

clueQuest

Since Beyond Medusa’s Gate is available at lots of escape rooms and VR cafes, I’ll take a moment to also mention our experience specifically at cluequest! We were hosted by Games Master Josiah *cough* I mean our Agent Handler was Josiah. Despite some technical issues with the VR halfway through, he was super professional and helpful in both keeping us on track and reassuring members of our team less familiar with VR.

I always have a fantastic time at clueQuest, from the moment you spot the sign as you walk down the road, to waiting in the bright lobby, to interacting with the team – I love it! Today was no different and a huge thank you to them for making us feel so welcome.

Beyond Medusa’s Gate can be booked at clueQuest for £25 – £30 pp on their website here.

ClueQuest: Operation E.G.G.

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As any hard-boiled detective knows, it’s important to keep your sleuthing skills at the top of their game. Luckily, the egg-heads over at clueQuest HQ have developed this training course for all our agents. So scramble together a team and get ready to foil the villainous Professor Blacksheep as he attempts to poach our latest technological marvel – the Elastic Gateway Generator.

Rating: Eggs-cellent!
Completion Time: 26:59
Date Played: 2nd April 2021
Party Size: 1
Recommended For: Family Easter Fun!

So… Many… Egg… Puns… And that’s no eggs-aggeration!
*crickets*
I’ll show myself out.

No, but seriously I was really impressed with Operation E.G.G.! It’s got everything you want in a light hearted Easter escape room game and, as usual, ClueQuest have hit the mark with their target audience. Whilst I played this one as a solo escapist (my partner sat next room, backseat escaping with his hilarious Mr Q impression), this would be such a perfect game for a family setting, a couple, flatmates, new escapers and ‘veterans’ alike! What I mean is, the puzzles felt somehow really accessible and solvable. So let’s get into it:

The Story

We’re once again joined by MM7, the plucky robot you may recognise from Mechanics of the Heart and it’s time for your first day of Secret Agent Training. Mr. Q has simulated various secret agent scenarios to see if you’re up to the job. You, the mastermind in Mission Control and MM7, the boots on the ground (actually err, he kinda floats above the ground but yeah, you get the idea). Was I up for the task of taking on the nefarious Professor Blacksheep? Sure, I’ll give it my best shot. It’s not my first rodeo with Blacksheep.

The Experience

As with every Print + Cut + Escape game there’s a fair bit of printing out. No printer? No problem – ClueQuest also offer a home delivery service which is pretty cool. After a long lockdown of playing ‘at home’ escape rooms my printer is on it’s last legs but it managed the 20 pages required by Operation E.G.G… Phew!

I think it’s technically possible to get away with printing less than 20 pages. In this game there was a lot less cutting out as usual – possibly only 4 or 5 pages in total? Although other pages had folding puzzles, some you needed to assemble things, and in others it’s very helpful to write on the paper – so you should aim to print as much as possible.

For the full experience, I just went for it and printed everything though and that worked for me! From here, you pre-cut everything out, lay it all out into it’s various chapters, and hit ‘play’ on an online web portal ClueQuest have set up. You get your intro video, you jump into the game and at each stage, enter a password to proceed to the next ‘level’. Some levels require only the printed material, others a combination of video + print, or click and drag digital interface.

The Puzzles

USUALLY with a ClueQuest game I struggle with the puzzles but nope not this one, which is why I highlight it as being especially accessible for a family audience. I smashed through the whole game in just under half an hour – fuelled by elderflower cordial, the sun, and chocolate Easter eggs… HEY! I see you looking at the date and judging me for eating my Easter eggs early!

Players can expect to encounter a big range of puzzles including (but of course, not limited to), a folding puzzle, a puzzle akin to a jigsaw, puzzles with moving cogs and dials, puzzles where you have to watch a sequence and repeat it back on your paper, puzzles where you have to search and find symbols, puzzles where you have to match up very abstract shapes… The list goes on!

In particular, my favourite involved a lock and the wildest looking set of lockpicks I’ve ever seen in my life. Seriously, I laughed! No spoilers here – but just light warning to look out for that one, it’s fun!

Overall

So how did I do? Well I’ve eaten a whole Easter egg and a box of Quality Streets oh- you meant the game? Yep, you bet I saved the world! I think that deserves some more chocolate? No? Okay.

In any case, if you’re reading this and wondering what to do this Easter honestly this is a pretty fun game. We’re not quite out of lockdown here in the UK and annoyingly there’s snow warnings for this weekend so heck, looks like another Easter indoors. But with a fun game like this to look forward to, it’s a real silver lining and I can’t recommend it enough.

I also recommend it if you enjoy any of the following: puns about eggs, anthropomorphic mice, secret agent stuff, saving the world, wacky puzzles, or great illustrations.

Operation E.G.G. can be purchased for £15 on ClueQuest’s website here.

ClueQuest: Mechanics of the Heart

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Mr. and Mrs. Q’s helpful and reliable reconnaissance droid, MM7, is starting to ask questions all robots inevitably ask, “What is Love?” and “How do you know you’re loved?” You’ll be tasked to help MM7 decipher the complex and puzzling ways of love in our world in order to help focus him on our daily mission to save the world from the villainous network of the Evil Professor.

Rating: Romantic!
Completion Time: 33 minutes + 25 minutes
Date Played: 21st – 22nd February 2021
Party Size: 2 (1)
Recommended For: A Valentine’s activity

I did Mechanics of the Heart in two sittings – complicated? Yeah! Maybe. But hey, it makes for an interesting perspective and hopefully an interesting review. So here goes…

Valentine’s Day unfortunately got away from us this year inbetween playing the Civilisation board game (sorry babe for giving you the plague and sacking your city if you’re reading this!), baking brownies, and watching films. So we tackled Mechanics of the Heart 7 days after the big red day – as if I need an excuse to have a second Valentine’s Day!

But, puzzles aren’t really my Player 2’s thing, so we tapped out at 33 minutes after getting a bit stuck (and a little bit prosecco-and-cheese-lazy too). But not before secretly making a note of answers so I could come back to this in my own time at a later date. Which I did the following day!

So how did I find this Valentine’s themed game for two as a solo adventure? It still worked! That said, the main selling point of Mechanics of the Heart that are that it IS really a game for two to share together perhaps sipping red wine beneath a gorgeous sunset. For example, there’s personalisation. You can input your partner’s nicknames, ideas for cute dates, and funny stories from your relationship. I put a couple of jokes in mine and only misspelled my partner’s pet name once (with hilarious consequences).

Another way in which it’s best played with two players are the style of puzzles. Many of the puzzles actually benefit from having two pairs of eyes, for example comparing lots of information quite quickly. There’s a cool bit of “divide and conquer” which worked well in a play at home setting. I’d look at one half of a puzzle, or one half of a folded paper divider and try to describe what I saw and my partner would do the same and opposite.

What this tells me is that ClueQuest (as usual!) put SO MUCH thought and effort into making this game perfect for ‘the season’ and with a lovely plot and beautiful illustrations to boot, it makes Mechanics of the Heart an exceptional game in the printable escape room genre!

“So what is that plot you speak of?” I hear you ask. The story goes, MM7, one of the ClueQuest droids has their heart (no pun intended) set on becoming a secret agent! But Mr. Q has his doubts, arguing that secret agents must be able to understand EE-MO-SHUN. So this is your quest, to help MM7 understand the most powerful emotion of them all: Love.

It was a surprise not to meet Mr. Q in this game (I suspect he’s still in peril after Prison of Memories), but I’ll never say no to learning more about the ClueQuest world lore, and this game’s got buckets of it.

I’d recommend this game for a date night, for any level of puzzler. This game is all about affection, compatibility and like NY Times’ 36 Questions to Lead to Love, it might just make you fall in love.

Mechanics of the Heart can be purchased for £15 via the ClueQuest website.

ClueQuest: Prison of Memories Part 1

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After a sneaky attack from an unknown assailant, Mr Q is trapped in a coma. With time running short it’s up to Mrs Q and Lord Hammerschmidt to dive into Mr Q’s mind and find a way to wake him up. But they can’t do it without your help!

Rating: Tricky!
Completion Time: 59 minutes
Date Played: 30th December 2020
Party Size: 1
Recommended For: Fans of ClueQuest, Puzzle Enthusiasts

ClueQuest are back at it again with their brand of cat-and-mouse *cough* I mean, sheep-and-mouse world domination madness. After their first Print + Cut + Escape series of games ended with an exciting bang, October brought the spooky Halloween Survival Training game (and was one of my favourite play at home games of 2020!). I’d been wondering (and stalking their social media, of course) if after all the success, they’d be turning their hands to a new series. Which is where Prison of Memories comes in!

For me, Prison of Memories Part 1 is a step up in difficulty from their other games. Perhaps I’ve been pacified by the recent games aimed at a child audience, but for some reason I found this one HARD. Really, really hard! True, I did play it as a solo player, on a post-Christmas cheese fuelled afternoon in that period between Christmas and New Years where time has no meaning. This might explained why Prison of Memories was the ClueQuest game I took the longest on, asked for the most clues, and *gasp* skipped a couple of puzzles (I’m sorry!).

The game goes as a lot of their other Print + Cut + Escape does: You receive a download pack and an online login. To begin the game, you should print everything out, separate them into the parts, and hit ‘start’ on the website when you’re ready. From here, the production value only gets better each time! I’m a huge fan of the witty and charming animated intro videos and the deep dive into the ClueQuest lore is always so exciting and fun.

In Prison of Memories, an attack by the nefarious Professor Blacksheep leaves our hero Mr. Q trapped in his own mind and unable to break free. So this time, in a change of environment, you play with Mrs. Q and deep dive into the incredible, wonderful mind of Mr. Q in order to rescue him. Think of it along the lines of a 90s episode of “The Magic School Bus”, but with more mice.

After the initial, “ooh this is a cool idea” you jump into gameplay. Overall, the game is quite intuitive rather than signposted. I think it unlikely a brand new player would play this first (and if you ARE a brand new player wondering if this is a good place to start, I’d recommend going back to Stolen IQ first). For this reason, I believe Prison of Memories relies on a certain amount of comfort with ClueQuest games and understanding what the game expects you to do. But of course if you do get stuck, you have hints, answers and a password box to type your answers and proceed at the end of each level.

Despite the hints and answers there are a couple of puzzles I couldn’t quite get my head around. I blame the Christmas cheese and wine. Well, this game IS about mice, isn’t it? But that doesn’t mean I didn’t have fun! It’s good to be challenged by some really ‘out of the box’ puzzles, and ClueQuest dishes those types of puzzles up like a breakfast buffet.

I don’t want to give any spoilers because the puzzles are really unlike anything else I’ve played in other games, but you’ll have to rely on pretty much all areas of the brain to crack this one. In each level there’s at least one very cool ‘thing’ to assemble out of paper and in more than one case something you thought was just “pretty art” turns out to be integral to the puzzle. Oh! Let’s not forget the maths know-how. How’s your adding up? I’m kidding, this game is packed with ‘fun’ maths, like pattern recognition or spatial awareness of shapes.

For me, I don’t think I can really mark this one as “finished” as I did skip a couple of puzzles, oops. But I’ve got nothing but absolute admiration for ClueQuest and their experiences, so I still wanted to write about the Prison of Memories because I had a good time playing it. This review can serve as advice, OR if nothing else, it gives you (yes you, the reader!) bragging rights over me when you manage to absolutely smash this game without a single clue.

In summary, it’s a challenge! A fun one, inspired, awesome art, packed with “woah I’ve never seen this puzzle before” moments. I’m excited for Part 2 which I’ll take on with a clear head, not under the influence of a week’s worth of camembert and wine *burp*.

ClueQuest: Halloween Survival Escape Training

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Around this time of the year we get numerous reports of Halloween horrors terrorizing neighborhoods across the world. That’s why we have developed this emergency training course for all field agents – including you!

Rating: Spooktacular
Completion Time: 1 hr 7 minutes
Date Played: 21st October 2020
Party Size: 2
Recommended For: Ghoulfriends, Little Monsters, Best Witches (aka everyone!)

ONLY ONE WEEK TO GO UNTIL HALLOWEEN, GHOULS!

I almost never get to play Halloween themed escape rooms! Unless it’s horror themed, most companies don’t have permanent rooms kitted out with vampires, mummies and jack-o-lanterns. 2020 has presented a unique challenge for this new medium and Cluequest have risen to the occasion! Enter “Halloween Survival Escape Training” a brand new Print, Cut & Escape game for the whole family.

It’s got EVERYTHING – a nervous scientist running the program, vampires, zombies and experiments gone wrong. I learned more about the universe of Mr. Q and his friends than I’d ever wanted to know, and Player 2 even exclaimed “WHAT? [Redacted Character] was a vampire this whole time and we’ve been helping them?!”. It’s hilarious! Frighteningly good fun!

As with the rest of Cluequest’s Print, Cut Escape series you have the option of the team shipping a full colour version of the pack, or printing your own black and white one at home. We went for the latter – I actually really love that it’s print friendly. Colours or no colours, the illustrations are gorgeous as usual and really pop out from the page.

In Halloween Survival Training there are 4 parts. Each part represents a different Halloween character – you have Zombies, Vampires and a creepy lab experiment gone wrong! At the end you must complete an exam to find out if you’re ready to survive Halloween.

To help along the way, there’s an online portal that sets the scene. Here you input passwords and navigate through each chapter of the game aided by the Cluequest Crew.

In terms of puzzles, we found this one to be on the harder end of ClueQuest games! (There’s actually one puzzle we had to get the solution for – and I’m still not completely sure how to figure it out!) But that didn’t deter us from powering through our Survival Training and completing the exam at the end! Sometimes when the puzzles are harder it just means you feel an extra sense of accomplishment when you finally figure them out – I love this.

One of the puzzles we absolutely adored involved learning the Zombie language. Armed with the words I now know, I’m confident I can communicate in any global zombie outbreak. Bring it on, Day of the Dead! This puzzle was just so charming and funny to work through.

Other puzzles involved searching and finding, rearranging and putting things in order, cutting (oh yes, there’s a bit of cutting involved) and assembling Tetris-like shapes, as well as a fun cipher wheel! There’s a good mix and all with that familiar ClueQuest flavour to them.

We clocked our finish time in just over an hour! I think that’s a pretty respectable ‘escape time’, but you could easily get over 2 hours fun from this game. It’s absolutely perfect for Halloween and great for the whole family, so if you haven’t got plans already – you do now!

Halloween Survival Escape Training can be purchased for £15 on ClueQuest’s website here.

ClueQuest: The Dagger of Time

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You and your friends are summoned by Kaileena, the Empress of Time to stop an evil being. She restores and gives you the Dagger of Time, an incredibly powerful artifact that contains the very essence of time itself. The dagger contains the Sands of Time, and with it’s power, you’ll be able to manipulate the time to your liking: slow, stop, or even rewind it! Reach the Hourglass Chamber and stop the Magi!

Rating: Incredible!
Completion Time: 1hr 7mins
Date Played: 18th October 2020
Party Size: 2
Recommended For: Videogame Enthusiasts, 16+

The Dagger of Time is HERE! After being teased quite early in 2020 (before *gestures at the world* all this happened), it finally launched this month at ClueQuest! After dabbing our way to victory through Escape the Lost Pyramid back in 2019, I was pleasantly pleased to say the dabbing mechanic is the same … No, improved in The Dagger of Time!

The story goes that you and your intrepid band of adventurers must journey in this virtual reality simulation to ancient Iran, to the brink of a beautiful kingdom quite literally falling apart at the seams. Your guide, the scantily clad Empress of Time Kaileena gives you a mysterious dagger to help you. This dagger can turn back time, literally! You can freeze time, speed it up, reverse it all in one go. Falling rocks? No biggie for me and my dagger. I’ll just pause that right there.

At the end of your adventure is a deadly magi is threatening to destroy time. Or destroy the world. I’m not sure but he’s out to cause a lot of problems for you and your team.

The series has come a long way since it’s arcade debut in the 1980s! I’m a big videogame fan and any sort of VR (or escape room) experience that ties in with a popular game franchise is a huge win for me. The Dagger of Time was thoughtful and respectful to the game origins with some cool new mechanics that only work well in a VR setting.

In particular, I enjoyed this game for its puzzles! It felt as close to a real life escape room as any other VR game I’d ever played, but with the added bonus that you can do things in VR you could never do in real life. Such as scaling enormous heights, crawling monkey bars over ravines, rummaging through cupboards to find clues… Oh wait, that last one you can actually do in a real escape room. But hey! It was twice as fun rummaging in VR. You can also throw things at your fellow players without risk of hurting them.

In terms of puzzles, the feeling of playing Dagger of Time was just like playing a puzzle based videogame. So a little different from your usual escape room experience. This is also recommended as the hardest of the three VR games available at ClueQuest – so perfect for veteran escape room players or gamers. You must do a lot of looking and searching, you must twist dials into place, you must rewind time and freeze it in order to solve several chambers, and there are some interesting colour mixing puzzles I was pleasantly surprised to play!

Overall, we really, REALLY enjoyed it! I’ll let you in on a little secret. My blog is called “The Escape Roomer” because Player 2 (my partner) isn’t really an escape room player. I’m a soloist. Yep, I’ve played rooms before as a team of 1. But you know what Player 2 is? An avid gamer! We really bond over VR escape games. It’s the best of both worlds for somebody not that enthusiastic about escape rooms, but willing to try something exciting and new.

Shout out to our Games Master Miquel!

The Dagger of Time can be booked for £25 pp on ClueQuest’s website.
If you’re not based in London, you can find an escape room that does it near you.

ClueQuest: TimeQuest Kids

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The Earlybirds are the youngest ever members of the Supervillain Organization of the World, and now they’ve got their hands on time travel technology! When they make their move, then the timeQuest team are going to need all the help they can get in stopping these juvenile villains, and saving the universe from a catastrophic time paradox!

Rating: Great Fun!
Completion Time: 1hr 14mins
Date Played: 18th October 2020
Party Size: 2
Recommended For: Kids

Today was a very ClueQuest kind of day! First thing in the morning, logging into Zoom and playing TimeQuest with my 11 year old brother then, in the afternoon, heading onto the site to play the new VR game “Dagger of Time”. But more on that later!

Due to the new London lockdown restrictions we’d planned to play this one in person around a table over Sunday lunch. But at the last minute we swapped to Zoom as to not mix households. I’d definitely still recommend giving this one a go face to face, but in a pinch playing digitally works nicely too.

Okay so I’ve NEVER played anything by ClueQuest I didn’t absolutely love. When I heard they’d released a game for kids, I couldn’t wait to play this with my brother. The same brother I took to Cluequest for his 10th birthday – yep, I reckon you could say we’re a family of fans.

TimeQuest did not disappoint, it was just as exciting, charming and fun as everything else the company produces. The puzzles were unique and brilliantly crafted, the illustrations engaging, and the narrative hilarious. Let me climb up on a roof one second and shout it a little bit louder for those at the back: “THIS GAME IS AWESOME!”

The story goes, the youngest two super villains (the Early Birds) have concocted a new, nefarious scheme to eliminate bed time forever. After all, if they keep getting sent to bed early how can they get up to more villainous activity? So, they travel back in time to get rid of time. Bear with me on this one. No time = no clocks = no bed time.

I hear kids around the world suddenly stirring, interested in this proposition. I for one can never get Player 2 to go to bed before midnight when I’m minding him. I think the Early Birds are onto something!

You, a team of secret agents working with Mr. Q (if you’re new here, he’s a mouse), must follow them through time and undo the damage they’ve caused. You’ll have to right all the historical wrongs, repair clocks from history, and put the Early Birds to bed once and for all.

In terms of puzzles, they’re actually challenging enough to be enjoyed by the whole family, not just kids. Player 2 and I were off to a rough start having to request rather a lot of clues on the first puzzle (oops!) – but once we got into the swing of things, we nailed it!

You’ll find yourself using good logical reasoning, hunting for hidden things in images and putting jigsaws back together. In other words, a good and accessible mix of puzzles!

As with the rest of Cluequest’s Print, Cut, Escape series, you get a series of chapters (in this game, 3!) and an online interface with which to input your answer at the end of each. I’ll admit – ClueQuest games are heavy on the printing and cutting, but it totally pays off with the creativity of puzzles and how much fun they are. It’s recommended to print and cut everything out in advance – especially if you’re preparing this game for a younger child to play.

We printed and cut as we went along, and generally took our time playing this one at a fun pace with snack breaks and spy music. Overall, a great time had by all.

TimeQuest can be purchased for £15 on ClueQuest’s website.

ClueQuest: Humanity 2.0

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Agent Crimson and MrQ have destroyed the Alpha Brain System, but not before Professor BlackSheep managed to escape. But the Professor no longer needs that old piece of machinery. He’s now setting his sights on a new vision, Humanity 2.0, a world order where humans only have access to the intelligence they deserve.

Rating: Outstanding!
Completion Time: 1hr15
Date Played: 17th of July 2020
Party Size: 2

Causing another exciting ripple in the play at home escape room industry, Cluequest’s final chapter in the Agent Crimson saga is here! If you’ve been following the story so far with Stolen IQ and Alpha Brain System, you’ll not be disappointed with Humanity 2.0.

There’s something so absolutely innately charming about Cluequest’s world. If you’ve played at least one of Cluequest’s real life games, you’ll know what I mean. In a world populated by scientist mice, evil sheep, and a hapless human population to save … The possibilities for adventure are endless. Once again you join Mr Q and go up against the nefarious Professor Blacksheep. This time, you’ll meet a surprising familiar face too.

In terms of puzzles, Humanity 2.0, just like it’s two predecessors really pushes the boundaries of what is possible. As a player, I don’t get the impression (like many other games out there) that a puzzle has been shoe-horned into the play at home format. No, each puzzle feels completely at home in the printed format. They’re effortlessly unique and creative. Assemble a laser maze? No problem. A 3-dimensional wire solving puzzle? Amazing. Creating and assembling a paper jacket? Flawless.

It’s really hard writing a review for a game I enjoyed SO MUCH. I just want to shout and rave about all the brilliant things … And there are so many of them! But equally, the game is full of “wow” moments, I don’t want to spoil a single second of it for any interested player out there!

So… I’ll just end this review by saying without a doubt in my mind, the ClueQuest series of play at home games are some of the best quality, most exciting and all rounder games on the market today.

Humanity 2.0 can be purchased for £12 on ClueQuest‘s website.

ClueQuest: Alpha Brain System

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Professor BlackSheep is developing a weapon called the Alpha Brain System, capable of hijacking humanity’s brain power. Agent Crimson is moving further into The Cube to find it – will you help her?

Rating: Exceptional!
Completion Time: 1hr 8min
Date Played: 28th of June 2020
Party Size: 2

Here’s a representation of me, playing this game, happy like Agent Crimson, playing Alpha Brain system:

Jokes aside, ClueQuest have done it again! Another fantastic episode in their play at home game series that is a cut above the rest in uniqueness and ingenuity. Escape room companies across the world take note!

Sure, there were some extremely frustrating parts. And, watching the ending video, we realised we didn’t quite set up some of the 3D levels like we were supposed to. But frankly, all can be forgiven, as ClueQuest once again push the very boundaries of what is possible within an escape game at home – and it works!

Picking up exactly where Episode 1: Stolen IQ left off, we once again join Agent Crimson, Mr Q and the whole band of ClueQuest characters as they begin to face ‘The Cube’. What follows is a classic (and I say classic, for sure it is a very common ‘trope’ in the escape room industry, but ClueQuest manages to make it timeless), heist-style infiltration adventure where you reassemble rooms, security networks, and floating tanks as you make your way into the heart of The Cube.

In particular, there is a section of the game where you recreate a laser maze and navigate your way through it. It’s so perfectly reimagined as a printable escape game, about as close as a real life escape room experience (or dare I say it, better?) but in paper format.

If I had to think of one tiny criticism it would be, as seems to be popular consensus, that there’s an awful lot of printing and cutting. But if you (as they suggest) cut ahead of playing, you’ll set yourself up for the best experience possible when you sit down to play. But if you can look past that, the cutting and printing is thoroughly rewarding to create the cool structures Alpha Brain System encourages you to.

To conclude, a perfect game? Maybe. Thanks ClueQuest!

Alpha Brain System can be purchased for £12 on ClueQuest’s website.