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Photo above is property of Paragamix Company: Paragamix Country: Germany 🇩🇪 Language: English, German, Spanish, French Type of Game: Digital Game 💻 Size of Team: Unlimited (Ages 16+) Price: $11.80 (for 2 ppl) Game: Adele Genre: Horror Date Played: July 29, 2021 Time: 90 Minutes Difficulty (based on 5 players): 4/10 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 In 1945, hotel Anno was a meeting place for many famous stars. One night, the beautiful owner Adele was murdered and the hotel was never the same... Game: Bermuda Wrecks Genre: Adventure Date Played: July 30 2021 Time: 2 hours Difficulty (based on 3 players): 7.5/10 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 You are ready to explore the beautiful island of Bermuda. Your mission is to see if the rumor about the gold ducats on the sunken Sea Venture is true or not. Will you get lucky this time? Game: Carries Family Genre: Horror Date Played: August 1, 2021 Time: 1 hours Difficulty (based on 5 players): 6/10 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 The Lueder family has many hidden dark secrets. The family is involved in organized crimes, drug deals and even murder! Are you ready to meet this infamous family? Game: Secret Society Singapore Genre: Mystery Date Played: August 1, 2021 Time: 90 Minutes Difficulty (based on 3 players): 4.5/10 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 You seem to be short on money and perhaps the only person that can help you is Huang. You have a choice of being the perpetrator or the detective. Which side do you choose? Game: Sherry Adventure Genre: Adventure Date Played: August 1, 2021 Time: 45 Minutes Difficulty (based on 4 players): 3.5/10 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 You've arrived in the picturesque town of Andalusia, Spain. They are famous for their production of sherry. Maybe if you don't drink all of it, you might become an expert in sherry wine by the end of the game? 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 All the games mentioned above were designed on the same platform using similar formats. Once you receive the game code and link, you can enter the code directly on their website. The game will always start with an intro video so if you're playing with your team on Zoom, it might be good to inform all your teammates to watch it at the same time. We each had a different code but I presume if you use the same code, the game will be synced for both of you. On the bottom right corner, you'll see a chatbot looking circle. Click on that once the video finishes. Pick the language you want to play the game in. If you select wrong language, type "restart" to restart the entire game. Do not refresh the page as that will also restart the entire game. The chatbot is where you'll receive the backstory, web links and videos from the different characters in the games. This is an ARG type of game where you'll get to choose various paths and options. Some of the social media platforms we've encountered in the game include Flickr, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and more. None of which needed you to create an account to access the information. We also had to sleuth through internet websites and blogs as additional resources. Additionally, we also had to use email several times to receive messages. One thing we thought could be useful for players would be for the game designers to inform us on which tabs could be closed after use. This would really help eliminate confusing and the amount of tabs we had to keep open for the entire game. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 If you are a beginner, you'll want to pick either Sherry Adventure or Adele. The answers to the questions were to be entered into the chatbot once you've found them. In these two games, you will even receive multiple choice options. The other three games will give you options during the game to choose either "moderate" or "tricky" mode. For instance, if you had to find a painting in a museum, the moderate option might take you right in front of it but you'll need to find it on your own with the tricky option. If you are looking for harder puzzles, Bermuda Wrecks or Carries Family would be your best bet. Secret Society Singapore had a really cool concept where you had a choice of choosing to play either the preparator or the detective right at the beginning. We played both paths. The puzzles were slightly tweaked but the answers were the same. It's interesting to view the storyline from two different perspectives. There were definitely some cool tech uses that were designed into the 360 interfaces. In some games, the players were also able to divide and conquer by choosing different puzzles to work on. We found that kind of confusing as we would need to key in puzzle 1 again and then puzzle 2 in order to move on with the story. It didn't really make sense to divide up the team due to this reason. The puzzles can be solved in a non-linear way but the platform was not designed to support this type of input. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 Paragamix did a great job with tying the storyline between all of the games. Sometimes we would only realize towards the end that this was the prequal or sequel to something we've played (although you don't need prior knowledge of any games in order to play the others. They were all independent from each other). If you love ARG style games, you might find this quite intriguing to be able to follow the breadcrumbs. The game designers really took the players with them to places we didn't know that existed on this planet. Through the 360 image tours, we're able to enter abandoned buildings (very creepy by the way in Adele and Carries Family), explore the beautiful island of Bermuda, enter sherry cellars and roam around the busy streets of Singapore. Most of these games felt very educational. If you're here solely for the puzzles, you might think there's a lot of information that won't interest you but if you're here for history and storyline then this game might suit your needs. If you're still unsure if this type of game is for you or not, try their Secret Society Singapore for FREE ! 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Melvin L. Carrie's Family by Paragamix is a digital escape game played on a webpage with a chatbot. To start, you will key in your mission code and the chatbot will give you more webpages, links and clues and you will need to answer a question (which is solving the puzzle) to move on to the next. The gameplay's interface was quite confusing. Not that there are a lot of tabs to take note of (which there is a lot), but rather the smoothness of the game. One clue was given on Flickr, and I realized that after scrolling through the pictures, I had to wait for the 'ads' to clear, as I did not have a paid Flickr account. Secondly, after keying in the answer to the puzzle, the feedback response was quite confusing. It was phrased in such a way that we were not sure if our answer was correct as the whole solution came out just as if we asked for a hint, but we didn't. Only then, after reading the 'explanation' then we realized that our answer was correct. Not sure why that would appear. Moving on to the puzzles - I got the story and idea behind it, it was quite good. We had to figure out who is related to who in this family and connect the crimes to certain individuals. The premise is good, but how the puzzle was designed and executed needs polishing. You basically have to click and search on every single link you find to get what you need to solve the puzzle - it will not be given to you clearly where you are supposed to search. The puzzles themselves were quite easy - the hard part is just drawing the inference which search site is the clue for that puzzle. What I liked about this is the designer really went to abandoned places and creepy areas to place his 'puzzles and clues'. After looking through a few google sites, I have seen a few interesting yet creepy places that would be nice to visit one day. At least he kept to his promise that we will go to creepiest areas around the world! Mike S. STORY: Bermuda Wrecks In this online adventure, you are given a history adventure to search all along the shores of Bermuda for shipwrecks and artifacts hoping to find buried treasure. In order to complete this mission you will need your investigative skills as well as keen eyes and ears to find your “booty.” GAMEPLAY In order to start the game you must initiate a chat bot where you will be receiving most of your puzzles from as well as inputting any puzzle answers into the bot. A very simple and intuitive way to start the augmented reality adventure. Augmented reality, in this game, includes pictures and objects that were not originally (or there in the first place) placed in 360 degree views of fascinating locations all in the island of Bermuda. Once you are acclimated to the chat bot feature, you will be given a choice of moderate or tricky (If this is your first paragamix room I would suggest moderate), I chose tricky. Now the adventure begins! The game consists of reading blog posts, exploring the island, and perusing through items of ships long since lost. Pay close attention to each post and each chat bubble, you will never know where the best place is to look if you don’t look at your resources first. The game advertises as a 90 min experience (no time limit) and with myself as a solo player it took as advertised. Also be aware that there will be plenty of different tabs open on your computer at any given time during this game and a minor knowledge of how to use your web browser is needed. For the tricky puzzles one must also be ready to listen to some sound files in order to complete the adventure. PUZZLES The puzzles in this game surprised me in the way that they were implemented throughout the experience. Some puzzles were search and find, other puzzles you had to “walk” along a path and find the hidden detail that the game asks for. Some of my favorite puzzles included browsing through image albums of items that came from the actual shipwrecks from the ships. I spent a little bit of time just reflecting on the age and history of each piece. Don’t fret if you are not a fan of “search and find” though, riddled (see what I did there) throughout are puzzles that need a bit of logic and/or physical awareness in order to solve. It gives a nice flow throughout the game and doesn’t tire one out of doing the same type of puzzle. CLOSING THOUGHTS Paragamix has a unique approach to “escape rooms” and one that could need a little bit of improvement. I did experience some technical glitches during the game and one link I was not able to get working and causing me unable to solve the puzzle myself. Thankfully, they do include a way to view how the solution is derived and give you the answer if something like that happens. I also would recommend playing this game either solo or with one other player and making an evening out of it. Take your time, enjoy the game, this is not something that should be rushed. The unique mix of puzzles and historic locations that not everyone may get to see in person creates a game that is not only fun to search around, it lends itself well for the design of augmented reality. Finding things that trigger a different view of the room, walking around real bars, beaches and streets searching for that one piece of information is relaxing and creates a moment of clarity when you keep progressing. If one goes in expecting an evening of exploration and puzzle solving, then Bermuda Wrecks gives you the best of both worlds. (If you do decide to try this game, please remember to let them know that you heard it from"ESCAPETHEROOMers"!) Disclosure: We thank Paragamix providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #Horror #Mystery #Germany #Paragamix #Adventure

Photo above is property of Webscapade Company: Webscapade Game: Season 0: Welcome to Argenia! Country: Canada 🇨🇦 Language: English Type of Game: Digital ARG Game 💻 Genre: Mystery Date Played: July 25, 2021 Difficulty (based on players): 6/10 Size of Team: 2-5 Players (Recommended) Time: 90-120 Minutes (Suggested) Price: $25.00/Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 Uncle Rory hasn't contacted you in ages and out of the blue, you receive a letter from him. It sounds like he's offering you a super easy task with a lucrative incentive. Is it too good to be true? 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you purchase the game, only one person needs to register for an account. You'll need to complete the game within 24 hours after the activation. The game will autosave so you can come back anytime during the 24 hours to pick up where you left off. There'll be a link that you can share with your team. From that point on, the game will be synced. If you try to brute force or guess the answers, you'll be penalized for wrong entries. Time, wrong entries and hints will all be taking into account when calculating the final score so if you want to make it onto the leaderboard, you'll need to be cautious about the mentioned items. This ARG style game utilizes websites, social media platforms (at least one player should have access to FB) and email. This is the second company that we've seen that informs the players on what tabs to close after certain websites are no longer useful. We really appreciate this type of game design as in ARG games we often find ourselves lost with over 20 windows open at once. The interface is very easy to use. Other than beautifully designed websites, we're also able to interact with certain items via hotspots and discover more hidden reveals. Photos above are properties of Webscapade 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 Most of the ARG games we've played focuses more on searching for information either through context or Google maps but Webscapade surprised us with actual puzzles that we had to decode, deduce and solve. There were definitely a few challenging ones that really made our team excited when we finally figured out the answers. In some parts of the game, we were able to divide and conquer. This really made the cooperative aspect fun for all the players since every one of our teammates was able to pick the puzzle type that they were better in and everyone got to be a "hero" and had their moment to shine. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 The storyline was really well written. It had us hooked right from the beginning. We're wondering what would happen next throughout the game. It was like watching a drama unfold right in front of our eyes. The creator dropped just enough of breadcrumbs for us to follow in order to search for the truth. The game had a perfect balance between narrative and puzzles. The graphics to the clues and websites felt so real that sometimes we had to double check to make sure we're not booking a real room on a hotel website. Our favorite part was definitely the ending. It was so unexpected yet bought so much joy to the team. All I have to say is we all got to show off some dance moves. If you're wondering how that happened then you will probably need to play the game to find out! *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Webscapade for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #ARGGame #Mystery #Canada #Webscapade

Photo above is property of The Incredible Chase Company: The Incredible Chase Game: USA Country: USA 🇺🇸 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: July 25, 2021 Difficulty (based on 5 players): 5/10 Size of Team: 1-6 Players (Ages 13+) Time: 75 Minutes (Game is available for 3 Hours 15 min after activation) Price: $20.00/ Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 "The Clown" has hid a bomb somewhere in the US. He's been taunting you, agents of C.H.A.S.E. by leaving clues behind. Will you be able to find it in time? Thousands of lives will be depending on you. 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you purchase the game, you can share the access information with up to 6 players. Once everyone logs in, the game will start and you'll have 75 minutes to gain as many point as possible. After that, the game will remain active for 2 hours but anything solved during that period of time will not be counted towards the final score. The game has 9 levels that you must complete. Each level will give you 5000 points if you don't use a hint. If you use a hint (life saver), you'll only receive 3000 points for that level. If you can't solve it even with the hint, you can skip the level but will only gain 1000 points. If you finish before 75 minutes, each minute will give you an extra 200 points. Check out our perfect score below with no hints used and 35 minutes left of game. Go team! The game platform had a nice clean design. Although we had to use Google maps for a lot of the puzzles, we were able to open it up right from the game itself. There were times we had to use Google for other searches though so this is definitely an "internet sleuthing" type of game. One little tip from us, make sure to enter the passwords in all caps. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 This is more of like a puzzle hunt rather than the typical puzzles you'll see in an escape game. Most of the questions were formed by images or numbers you'll find by searching the internet or by using Google maps. You might need to do a little Math here and there but nothing too difficult. Being a native here in the US definitely helped with recognizing a few landmarks and slogans. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 Instead of a reginal puzzle hunt, this game definitely widen the spectrum as it took us to many places all over the US. I really loved learning about things in the US that I didn't know about even after living here for many years (you can virtually take a tour of the White House? WOW!) One thing we wish the creators would improve on is the storyline. Since we are following "the clown" by the trail that he's left for us, we should be seeing some sort of association with the character. Why did he choose these places? How could they be strung together to give the player that "wow" finale? If there could be a count down timer or maybe even an added puzzle at the end after the 9th level where we actually have to diffuse the bomb, that will definitely add in some urgency to "The Chase". Hopefully we'll see some more implementation of the storyline and added effects like sound into their future destinations! 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤❜ ℙ.𝕀.𝕤❜ 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Melvin L. The Incredible Chase - USA is a digital game held over several web pages. Each webpage will contain a puzzle, and you have to input the solution to reach the next webpage. Hence, it is a linear game with a total of 9 puzzles, some requiring multi steps. The puzzles are mainly 'search and hunt', using Google street views and general knowledge (or googling) to find the answer you need. Hence, there isn't too much difficulty in the puzzles as all you need to do is 'find' the information. Hence, I wouldn't really classify it as a puzzle/escape game for those rather play a virtual escape game. There isn't much story into it as well, basically, you have to find traces of a 'clown' who left a bomb behind and you need to defuse it. However, when we reached the final stage, there wasn't much to tell what happened. All we had was we found his hideout and that was it. Overall, the game just requires you to answer questions based on statues/memorials and interesting places in the USA. There was nothing in terms of puzzling nor story. The good thing is that I felt mainly like a tourist, learning about new places and facts about the USA. It seems like they are expanding into different areas, the next ones being the UK and Australia. If you enjoy learning about historical facts and having a sightseeing tour since we can't travel much nowadays, you can try The Incredible Chase! *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank The Incredible Chase for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #USA #Adventure #TheIncredibleChase

Photo above is property of A/MAZE Company: A/MAZE Game: Ghost of Pointe-à-Callière Country: Canada 🇨🇦 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Mystery, Paranormal Date Played: July 25, 2021 Difficulty (based on 3 players): 5.5/10 Size of Team: 2-6 Players (Ages 16+) Time: 90 Minutes Price: $50/Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 There's always been a mysterious ghost that resides inside the Pointe-à-Callière museum in Montreal, Canada. No one knows who or why the haunting persists. It's up to you and your team to dig out the truth. 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 This is a point-n-click adventure build using Matterport 3D so you can explore the entire three floors of the museum at the comfort of your home. Within the game, you'll encounter build-in videos, hidden clues on museum displays and more! It was quite easy to navigate as the written instructions clearly tells us where to visit within the museum. We were able to use the floor plan as short cuts to travel to that particular destination with one click. Once you think you have found the right answer, type it on the online portal to proceed to the next question. If you get stuck, there are build-in hints available through the auto chat function. Photos above are properties of A/MAZE 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 This game was more of a puzzle hunt rather than an escape game. You'll find embedded information on various parts of the museum but most of the time the solution would be just names or titles that you would find on a plaque. It looks us 1 hr and 16 minutes to complete the game and we had to use 2 hints. We felt that we wasted a clue because some solution inputs sound like they are looking for an answer but in reality that was the answer. It would be great if clearer instructions could be given on what the game designer is looking for. Some clues were also quite difficult to see even with the zoom in function. We had to enlarge our screens a few times in order to fully visualize the puzzle. Photos above are properties of A/MAZE 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 What we liked about this game was the fact that we're able to visit such a cool museum virtually and learn about the history behind certain item or character. What we didn't like was the cluing that went along with the puzzles. Some puzzles were really fun for us to discover on our own but the clues were quite confusing and thrown us off the right path. Often times we just ended up giving them a try and was surprised that that was actually the answer. I can see the potential in this game since there's a ton of space and props that the game designer can utilize. I hope the navigation part and the game flow could be improved in their future designs. 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤❜ ℙ.𝕀.𝕤❜ 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Melvin L. Ghost of Pointe-a-Calliere- is a digital escape game which is linear as well. It uses a 360 view of the actual museum and web pages - with each web page containing a puzzle that requires you to use the 360 to search around the museum for the information needed to solve the puzzle. The story is basically about a ghost being in the museum, and it seemed to be giving us historical facts in every subsequent puzzle. However, the entire gameplay was quite messy. It was a pity as the puzzles themselves were quite excellent. The puzzles were not that easy but they were creative and innovative that really requires you to think out of the box'. What fell flat was the phrasing and what was required for these puzzles. It wasn't clear what was needed to solve the puzzle. For example, the clue might talk about 4 objects, but the actual puzzle requires you to spot 4 humans so we were unsure what we're looking for. Secondly, after you solve the puzzle, you might get an instruction on what to do, like ' place the bottle on the shelf. However, we spent a lot of time following that instruction when the answer actually required us to key in 'Place the bottle on the shelf' to proceed. Most puzzles answers will either be a word or a series of numbers. It would be good if the designer would let players know what they are looking for. The answer will be a phrase or 5 English words as it is not intuitive if the entire instruction was meant to be the answer. I am not sure why Telescape wasn't used for the 360. It seems that it can be translated into Telescape. The current 360 interface used was not as user friendly. Some clues were on the exhibitions, but it was so small to even see. The only way to see is that you have to go into Full Screen, and then click the exhibit to zoom it bigger. But doing so, you will not be able to see the puzzle's requirements. If you want to see the puzzle's instructions, you have to exit Full Screen, and the problem comes back again. For players who are not very well versed in computer skills, I believe they will have a hard time navigating around the 360 as you will tend to 'fly' across places very easily as the 'spots' to teleport around aren't very well placed. The two things I liked about this game were 1) the puzzles and 2) the museum itself. I didn't know such a museum existed and its interior looks really cool. There is even a preserved underground sewer as well as a crypt. It is understandable that an escape game would be designed based on this museum as there are a lot of interesting things that can be used, but it is just not executed and polished in a proper way to be labelled as a game. *** We regret to inform this game is no longer available for booking but check out other in-person escape rooms on their website*** Disclosure: We thank A/MAZE for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #Canada #Paranormal #Mystery #A/Maze

Photos above are properties of So You Wanna Save The World Company: So You Wanna Save The World Country: USA 🇺🇸 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Game 💻 Genre: Mystery/ Detective Date Played: July 20, 2021 Size of Team: Unlimited (one game code per device) Time: Unlimited Game: Episode 1: Into The Fire Difficulty (based on 3 players): 6.5/10 Price: Free 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 You are playing the role of Kenzie Keaton. It's just an ordinary day at your boring office job when... Game: Episode 2: Sins Of The Past Difficulty (based on 6 players): 5.5/10 Price: €30 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 Continuing on with the success of your first mission, you're assigned a new case. What will you have to do this time? 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you register an account, all your purchased games will be saved in there. You can take as long as you like to finish the games and your progress will be autosaved. However, the timer will continue to be accounted for even if you log out of the account. If you decide to play this game with a group, you can share your login or screen and join forces over Zoom. One person on the team must have a US or Canadian phone number as the game will be communicating with you via text and phone calls. One thing that we really liked is the fact that they provided a written transcript of the phone calls or messages as sometimes it could be hard to understand. The game is broken into chapters filled with voice narrations and comic strip videos. After each story, evidence or clues will be inserted into the case file section. Once you solve the puzzle, access will be granted to the next chapter. If you need assistance, hints and solutions were provided within the case file. It was interesting to see that there was a percentage measurement per chapter on how many people took a hint for that puzzle. You can use this to determine the difficulty of a particular puzzle and see if you like to take a hint or not since if you want to get on the leaderboard you might want to reconsider. Photos above are properties of So You Wanna Save The World 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 Both chapters incorporated some really clever way of using technology with the puzzle design. After decrypting hidden messages, we're "wowed" by hidden websites, images and more! At one point, we had to use a voice response to answer a certain puzzle and we haven't seen that used in any of the games we've played before. Most of the puzzles were not difficult but we suggest taking good notes as information within the storyline could be used at a later time, We did get stuck on one puzzle for quite long as we weren't sure what the reference point was as that information was given awhile ago and not within the same frame of the puzzle. You'll also be needing the internet to do some sleuthing as this is a detective game after all. Some parts could be quite repetitive in terms of the searching but if you have a large team it'll be fun to divide the task. Since the storyline was quite extensive and there were a lot of characters involved, its best to finish the entire episode at one time if possible. You might forget who's who and where the story is taking place if you leave it behind for too long. I know that a 10 minute penalty for one hint might seem too harsh, but it's worth to keep the momentum going rather than being stuck on the game for 30 minutes or more. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 There were a lot of production value that went into this game. From the hand drawn comic strip graphics to the voice narrations and sound effects to the various websites and phone numbers, the game really made the players felt immersed in a world that made it hard for us to differentiate virtual versus reality. We always had to question ourselves before dialing or opening up a website. For enthusiasts who are looking for just the satisfaction from solving puzzles, you might feel that the narration part is too long. Videos ranged from 1 minute to over 6 minutes each. You can drag and skip but that would defeat the purpose of enjoying this game as a cinematic experience. There were a lot of twist and turns in the storyline that you wouldn't want to miss (episode 3 is in the making!) I will still leave it for you guys to decide though as it's definitely a preference thing. One thing I will suggest to the creators is to be consistent with the voice narration as some characters spoke but others didn't. Overall, this was a very refreshing digital game that contained many elements that we haven't explored with and it was nice to see the creators able to implement these technology into the online gaming world. It's too bad the current version only allow US and Canada players but if they can implement a version that will include a digital phone within the game I'm sure they'll be able to capture a wider audience! *** We regret to inform this company has closed its do*ors ** Disclosure: We thank So You Wanna Save The World for providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion of the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #USA #SoYouWannaSaveTheWorld #Mystery #Detective #freegame

Photos provided by Escape Hunt UK Company: Escape Hunt UK Game: The Codebreakers Country: United Kingdom 🇬🇧 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: War, Spy Date Played: June 9, 2021 Difficulty (based on 4 players): 5/10 Size of Team: 2-4 Players (Ages 8+) Time: Once you start the game, you have 24hrs to finish Price: £9.99 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 November 1941, we've received intel that there's a spy among us. One of our submarines was sunken by the enemies. You and your team of expert codebreakers have been called in to assist with finding out who's the spy that's been sending secret coded messages to the other side. Britain is depending on YOU! 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you have purchase the game, you'll receive an access code. You can share this access code with your team so everyone will be able to log in at the same time. The game won't be synced so each of the players will have to enter their own code in order to proceed. We played the game over Zoom and I shared my screen so that our team could follow along. The game came was an enjoyable background music to set the tone. You can turn it off if you prefer to play it in silence. There are also video components so it's probably best to wear a headset. This is not a point-n-click game as most of the puzzles were presented in image formats. Once you've solved the puzzle, you'll be able to enter the answer on the website. If you are correct, you'll be able to proceed to the next area. Your goal is to identify who's the spy at the end. If you choose incorrectly, you'll still have an option to reselect so don't worry about actually failing the game. Everyone will enjoy a happy ending. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 Since the theme of the game is breaking codes, you'll see many variations of ciphers in this game. If you're an enthusiast you'll probably recognize some of these right away. But if you just started playing online games, you might need to look up some of them just to get familiar with how they should be used. There's also a little fun trivia type of meta puzzle at the end which tied everything together nicely. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 We use to push the reading materials to one another when we see them in games but now we've came out with a little game that's really been making the narrative part really fun. If you guys haven't tried this before, definitely give it a shot. Have the players take turns reading the stories out loud in different character voices. I guarantee you'll have a great time. You might even discover a few talents that you never knew you or your friends have. In this game, each of the puzzles were introduced by a short narrative so we had a blast adding our own little RPG to it. We had to visit 8 different departments within the Secret Agency and eventually by using the decoded messages, we were able to predict who's the spy. If you an enthusiast that's familiar with various ciphers, you'll probably finish the game in less than 30minutes. If you are looking for a game to brush up your cipher knowledge, this could be a great introductory game. Check out our interview with the creator to understand more on the development side of the game: Video above is property of ESCAPETEHREOOMers ** We regret to inform you that this game is no longer available for booking. Check out the other games on their website. Disclosure: We thank Escape Hunt for providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #CiciCao #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #PrintNCut #EscapeHunt #UnitedKingdom #Detective #Espionage

Photos provided by Escapists Company: Escapists Game: The Corporate Kidnapping Language: English Country: Netherlands 🇳🇱 Type of Game: Digital Game w/ Live Host 💁 Genre: Adventure Date Played: 6/1/2021 Difficulty (based on 5 players): 5/10 Size of Team: 2-8 People (Ages 16+) Time: 90 Mins Price: 14€ (per person) 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 Anna, your coworker at Interwish Company, has gone missing. There seems to be a lot of information hidden in various departments. Can you dig out the dirt and find out what happened to Anna? 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 This is the first time we used Microsoft Meetup as a virtual conferencing platform for an online game. It's very similar to Google Meet but did take us a bit of time to get use to the functions. The GM will meet with the team briefly to explain the rules before she leaves the screen completely and will only engage with us if the team needed hints through the chat box. You'll need to be pretty savvy with the computer for this game as there's a lot of platforms that you'll encounter. Before starting the game, it's strongly advised for the team to open up a Google share document and have one teammate share their screen. We didn't use a share document but I did share my screen which helped some players follow along and catch up to the same places. During the game you'll encounter programs and apps such as Microsoft Outlook (which didn't work as we're in the US but our GM was able to send us a link to bypass this problem - Update: this issue has also been resolved now by the company. You can access the files now with a password), Excel, FB and various websites. At one point, you'll also need to call a Netherlands number which we also bypassed by having our GM send us the audio file (Update: they've came out with an alternative way to resolve this issue so you no longer need to make the phone call). You'll be able to search, interact and open hidden messages through these platforms. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 The puzzles were designed with escape room mentality in mind. You'll only need to use an item (website) and password once and this is stated very clearly at the beginning of the game. You'll encounter red herrings just like in some escape rooms so try not to go down any rabbit holes. There's not too many actual puzzles like decoding or logic as the game focuses more on the storyline and revealing information through videos and text. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 If you are into detective style RPG type of game then you'll have a lot of fun with this game as it takes you from a very clear plot of Anna being missing into something very unexpected. Sometimes we weren't even sure if this organization was real or not as we got lost in this virtual world. Make sure you're use to having lots of tabs open as you'll be maneuvering between multiple screens. This was more challenging than the puzzles themselves. Since it's a timed game (we finished in 58 minutes), you also felt the urgency especially towards the end when there's a decision to be made. Round up a strong team so everyone can take on different tasks and hopefully you'll be able to discover who's behind the kidnapping. 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Melvin L. Corporate Kidnapping is a digital game held over Microsoft Teams Meetups. There will be a game master present if you need hints and to add to the immersiveness of the game as you will need to 'contact' the character at times. The game is basically a rabbit hole full of information, where we have to find out what happened to our colleague who was kidnapped. It is not a real life escape room on Telescape nor is it a webpage with puzzles. We were given a google drive link to begin with and there were some documents there. Of course, these documents are password protected. Looking through the google drive, there will be clues to help you unlock the documents to get even more documents/clues. This game really made use of everything on the internet. Be prepared to look through google drive, Facebook, LOTS of websites that they have created for the game, audio, excel files and make phone calls. They really used everything short of Instagram/Twitter I suppose. It made the whole game feel realistic as we were like hunters digging through files to find out what happened. The puzzles themselves were clever and fun. There was a variety of all kinds. One technicality we faced was that a certain puzzle was clued slightly differently so it threw us all off for at least 10 minutes because once you brush that idea away, you will never go back to thinking about it because it just looks so different. Hence just a heads up, approach each puzzle with an open mind and even if it does look weird, consider all possibilities. That's what I can say to teams playing this game. Besides this, it is a fun game that I can recommend for all sorts of players. Perhaps they can consider a purely digital experience, whereby a game master is not needed, as this would be a game that sounds fun when playing solo. Helen B. You've just started a new job, and your first task is to find a colleague who has been kidnapped? Wow! Rough first day! This was an interesting concept that I had not yet experienced. You join on Microsoft Teams, and have a host who takes on the role of one of the characters. Through a series of videos, images, live chat communications, websites and a wide variety of documents on Google Drive, you are plunged into the shady world of Interwish and some dodgy dealings. Luckily I have used all these platforms extensively, but if you are only used to Zoom for things like this you may struggle. The other option is that one player shares their screen so you can see what is going on, and all just contribute while watching. The puzzles mainly centred around locating passwords for documents, locating information in documents and the like, so nothing like locks, items to find or that sort of thing. There is a time where you needed to see an email account, but we were unable to get in as the site (an official email client) decided that all these people accessing it was very suspicious and wanted us to verify the account! There was also a phone number to call but it was based in the Netherlands so we couldn't call it. It was a shame as we had to "break character" in the game to report these. I believe that both of these hitches have not had workarounds put in so kudos to the company for making changes based on our feedback. You also have to access Facebook for information. Certainly making use of all the technologies, but you can end up with a LOT of tabs open so easy to get lost! Hunting for information and through sites meant this felt like a sort of mystery/detective story rather than an escape room per se, but if you are a fan of crime-solving hunts then this is a great idea for you - and might make a great team-building exercise as you could get everyone working on the different bits of information to solve the case together. There's also a decision to be made at the end so read everything carefully! Our host was really lovely and very receptive to feedback - this was a very enjoyable brain-stretching game that has clearly had a lot of time and thought put into it. *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Escapists for providing us with a sample of the game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #Escapists #TheCorporateKidnapping #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #mystery #thriller #detective #adventure #puzzles #teambuilding #pointnclick #puzzlesolving #solve

Videos/ Photos provided by Bewilder Box + Eltham Escape Rooms Company: Bewilder Box Escape Room in partnership with Eltham Escape Rooms Game: DR. V.H.'S Marvelous Movie Maze Country: United Kingdom 🇬🇧 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: 5/2/2021 Difficulty (based on 4 players): 4/10 Size of Team: Up to 6 ppl Time: Approx. 60-90 Mins Price: €19.99/Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 Dr. Van Hollywood created an new invention called "Quantum Projector". We were sent on a mission by him to close wormholes that seemed to have created doorways to different movies. The more props we collect, the bigger the chance we'll have at end to close these wormholes! 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you purchase the game, you'll receive a PDF with detailed instructions on how the game should be played. We assembled our team of 4 over StreamYard and used that as our communication device. If your team decides on a captain before the start of the game, that person will need to sign into the game first. If for some reason that person loses internet connection or click out of the game by mistake, the captain will be replaced by the next person in line. So if you want to take turns on being the captain, you can try this method. Once all the players are logged in, you'll be able to see each other's cursors in the same platform. Only the team captain can assign games to individual players. Once that player gets the assigned role, then they'll be able to take control of the mouse and only they will be able to interact with the current game. The rest of the team can still watch and help them solve the puzzle or cheer them on. There are 4 genre-themed sectors: Fantasy, Action, Adventure and Science Fiction. Each sector has 4 challenges. This is a perfect game for 4 people as we each had a chance to play 1 game at each sector. Every game was inspired by a big motion picture but filled with hilarious puns. The epic movie announcement introduction and music really made us feel like we're in a game show. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 There were various types of puzzle categories like observation, logic, wordplay, skill etc...A 3 minute timer will start once the player finishes reading the instructions. The screen is interactive so you can click/drag/drop items base on the type of game. We each tried a different category in each of the quadrants but if you want to be strategic, you should probably assign players who's good at arcade type of games to skill, deduction/Math to logic, etc... I would suggest to enjoy the game rather than trying to rush through as this is not really a competition type of game. Some puzzles were quite easy like wordplay as players can help call out words they see fit and the player in control can just put them in the right places. Skill puzzles were probably the hardest since other players could only cheer you on and if you happen to get the racing one, all I have to say is "Good luck." For every puzzle you solve before the timer runs out, you'll receive a movie prop. We got 15/16 all thanks to that crazy racing game... Each movie prop will give 3 seconds more for the ending challenge so the more you collect, the better chance you'll succeed. All the members will get their own chance to collect as many blue tickets as possible and avoid the reds. The total is then tallied amongst the players and if it surpasses a certain number, you would've successfully completed the mission. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 We are big fans of the show Crystal Maze so once the game started we felt the inspiration from the show right away. It's such a pleasure to be able to enjoy this type of challenge at home with friends from all over the world. We really felt that teamwork element throughout the game. My favorite part of the game was the tickets were being tallied. All of us were shouting on the top of our lungs: "keep going, keep going!!!" And when we finally successfully pass the required limit, we all yelled "YES!" and virtual hi-fived each other. If you think you didn't get enough of this game by the end, you can even replay it again as they'll have a set of different puzzles waiting for you and your team. Perhaps this time you'll be able to collect all the movie props! full set of the movie props! Gotta catch 'em all! 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Helen B. This was a fantastic, as close to the Crystal Maze experience as you can get! Four Zones, four games of different categories within each, all arranged in a fantastic interface. It's a perfect game for groups of 4, and if you allocate a team captain to manage you all :) The games were a wonderful mix of types and all fairly balanced in terms of difficulty, except one game where you have to control two cars - even though our teammate had an amazing attempt we thought this one was just far too tricky. The themes are cleverly but thinly disguised popular movies you will recognise, and that will give you an idea of what to expect in the game. There's a nice mix of maths, logical, shooting/aiming games and word games and we could of course chip in to help unless it was one of skill, where we could only shout support! There was one slight itch in the tech whereby someone would lose contact and have to refresh, and if this happened to the team captain then another captain would be allocated in their place. A really well made, thought out and enjoyable experience lasting around an hour, culminating in a Crystal Maze style grab for tokens at the end as a finale. Thoroughly enjoyed it, and the game hints that there are other puzzles available so if you were to play it again hopefully there would be a different mix to play the next time. Fabulous fun and highly recommended. *** We regret to inform this game is no longer available for purchase *** The creators have also created a FREE printable escape room game for kids (7-10yrs old), You can download it HERE. (If you do decide to try this game, give us a shoutout or tag us on social media so we know you heard it from "ESCAPETHEROOMers"!) Disclosure: We thank Bewilder Box for providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #escapetheroomers #escaperoom #bewilderbox #Dr.V.H.'sMarvelousMovieMaze #movietrivia #movies #trivia #adventure #review #fun #puzzles #onlinegames #digitalgames #jokes

Videos/ Photos were provided by Queen City Escape Room Company: Queen City Escape Room Game: An Office ESC ROOM Misadventure Country: USA 🇺🇸 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Mystery Date Played: 4/27/2021 Difficulty (based on 5 players): 4.5/10 Size of Team: Unlimited (Recommend 1-4 Players) Time: Unlimited (Suggested 60-90 Mins) Price: $9.99 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 It's your first day temping at your new job! As soon as you arrived at the office, you're informed that all of the supplies have gone missing. It seems that one of your co-workers thinks everyone is a suspect and is determined to find out who the culprit is by locking them inside the office. It's now up to you now to work with your new co-workers to solve this mystery! 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 This is a digital game inspired by the hit tv show "The Office". The graphics were designed to feel like a 8-bit video game (got to love that bird poop at the beginning). No prior knowledge is required to solve the puzzles. The gameplay is delivered with a series of websites, images, and YouTube videos. In order to progress in this game, each player is responsible for entering the answer on their own computer after they've solved the puzzles. There is no time limit, so you can each play at your own pace. Should you need any help, there's a hint button that will provide a little nudge. Throughout the game you will need to take notes so be sure to have pen & paper ready. Since most of the videos will have clues to the puzzles you'll need to solve, you might have to watch it a few times in order to gather all the information. There's a free demo titled "Punch Card Puzzle" available for you to familiarize yourself with their gameplay. If you solve all the puzzles, you'll get a 25% discount code that you can use to purchase the game. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 The puzzles were pretty straight forward and since we are a group of enthusiasts it was on the easier side. Since the storyline involves one of your co-workers trying to stump with various challenges, the puzzles were also quite different in terms of types. At the end, he even created a meta-puzzle for you to piece together! As you jump through hoops to prove your abilities as the new temp, the story continues to unravel. I was pleasantly surprised at how they were able to intertwine comedy with their puzzles staying true to "The Office" humor. Just as we thought we're done, there's an entire chapter 2 waiting for us. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 The puzzles in this game were a lot fun to solve and the comedic narrative was so cleverly implemented and had me laughing the whole time! Although "An Office ESC ROOM Misadventure" was more on the easier side, there was plenty of puzzles to keep you occupied and satisfied! For the price, it's definitely worth the value especially when you can enjoy this with a group of friends. The pixelated 8-bit style was a great decision and definitely a unique attempt to deliver a classic escape room adventure. Whether you're a fan of "The Office" or not, the script was extremely entertaining and complemented the storyline and gameplay! But if you're a fan of "The Office", you'll probably appreciated even more because of all the Easter Eggs. Perhaps you may even want to organize a game for your own office? 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Melvin L. 'An Office Escape Room Misadventure' is like a small box of chocolates - it contains sweet stuff and is enjoyable for all ages. The gameplay is via a series of 8bit classic videos based on a story in the office. Basically, you watch the video, then solve a puzzle. The video will contain the puzzle and/or clues, along with the webpage itself. The videos themselves are a gem, with some humor added in, along with a classic 80s soundtrack. Halfway during the game, I actually switched off the music because the music is quite distracting - in a good way! It actually made me lose focus and missed out on the clues given, because it was so relaxing to just sit back, hear the audio and watch the video! The puzzles themselves were plentiful but they were mostly on the simple side. It started out really simple, but in the halfway stage, when you thought it was over, they actually ramped up the difficulty, but not a lot. I would say this game is suited for solo play or couples, but not more than 4 people. Overall, it is just as described, a short and sweet experience for small teams who wish to do some brainwork, but not overly taxing, should consider playing this game. Be prepared to just have fun, relax and laugh at the puns during the videos! *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Queen City Escape Room for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #QueenCityEscapeRoom #AnOfficeESCROOMMisadventure #TheOffice #MichaelScott #DwightSchrute #OnlineEscapeRoom #DigitalEscapeGame #fun #solve #adventure #mystery #comedy

Photos provided by Trapped Puzzle Rooms Company: Trapped Puzzle Rooms Game: Furlock Holmes: The Museum Mystery Country: USA 🇺🇸 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: 4/4/2021 Difficulty (based on 4 players): 5/10 Size of Team: Up to 8 Players (4 Recommended) (Ages 8+) Time: 120 Hours to complete the mission once press "start" Price: $19.95/ Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 There's been a break-in at the London History Museum. You are very excited when the world's greatest detective, Furlock Holmes decided to ask for your assistance on this case. Hopefully you'll be able to prove your worthiness... 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 This is a digital point-n-click game designed in the Telescape platform. Once your team signs in through the portal, you will be able to start the game at the same time. During the game, every player will be able see the location of other players by their cursor. All the items that were collected during the game will be shared in the inventory area and if an item has been used, it'll disappear from the interface. If you get stuck, there's a nudging hint system provided by clicking on Furlock Holmes. The game is not your typical digital game where a physical escape room was translated to an online version. All the artwork were hand drawn by their talented artist Gabe. The cartoony type of artwork integrated with the various audio recordings of the different animal characters really made this experience feel like we're inside a children's storybook. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 The game really tried to stick to the detective theme. We're able to talk to various suspects, visit different locations to collect evidence and ultimately put the information together on a deduction board. The goal was very clearly through out the game. One puzzle during the latter part of the game was very creative and we have only seen it used in tabletop games. This is one game that we were really impressed by how they're able to use the limitations of Telescape to create something so unique that we haven't seen before in other online games. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 Trapped Puzzle Rooms never forget the importance of narrative, even in a digital game. Humor is definitely an additive that you'll always encounter in all of their games. Some digital games we've played felt unfinished but not "Furlock Holmes: The Museum Mystery". You'll get a complete package of an intro video, storyline, professional audio recordings, interactive puzzles and an ending video. I'm constantly surprised by how fast Trapped Puzzle Rooms is able to put out games onto the market with such high quality. I'm definitely not complaining though, the more the merrier! 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Helen B. This was my second experience of a game using the Telescape system but a very different one to the last as this one is made from hand-drawn scenes and characters. The premise is that you are helping Furlock Holmes a foxy Sherlock, to solve the case of break in at a museum. From the very start this is a cute game, and has a very handy room and inventory system on the left hand size of the screen. As you progress you unlock new locations and clues, and can travel quickly between the areas. There are characters to be interviewed, documents to read and puzzles to solve to help crack the case. There is a lovely Egyptology theme which runs through but you don't need to know anything about the topic in order to solve the puzzles. The nice thing about the Telescape system was that we could all be in different locations and solve the puzzles together, with one person reading out information, another checking a code and another entering the code into the right place. The puzzles were well constructed and fun to solve. I found the puzzles more fun that the deduction part of the room, we knew one thing for certain but in the end it turned into a bit of a "just try every combination and see what works". There was no penalty for this method do why not! There's a lot of reading to be done too, so I ended up taking screenshots of the screens so I could refer back without having to jump around too much. The graphics are beautiful and engaging, we didn't need to use any hints for the puzzles (only by gaming the aforementioned deductions!) and the interface worked well. A very enjoyable way to spend some time and stretch the grey cells! (If you do decide to try this game, give us a shoutout or tag us on social media so we know you heard it from "ESCAPETHEROOMers"!) Disclosure: We thank Trapped Puzzle Rooms for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #TrappedPuzzleRooms #FurlockHolmes #TheMuseumMystery #OnlineEscapeRoom #DigitalEscapeGame #Telescape #detective #mystery #solvethecase

Photo above is property of Cryptex Hunt Company: Cryptex Hunt (by Errol Elumir) Game: 2021 Cryptex Hunt Country: USA 🇺🇸 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: March 31, 2021 Difficulty (based on 2 players): ~4-8/10 (Depending on game) Size of Team: 1-10 Players (Ages 10+) Time: Unlimited (Suggested 12 hrs) Price: Free 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 There is no overarching storyline across the entire hunt. However, each individual game had its own unique theme and varying degrees of story. There were some classic locales like an Egyptian temple and a wizard’s tower, as well as unusual themes like being stuck in a mall full of monsters. There were 10 different designers across the games, resulting in a playfully eclectic series of games. 🆃🅷🅴 ❞🅻🅾🅾🅺🆂❞ While there was a lot variation in theme and story, all of the games were built with Adventuron and had some similar 8-bit aesthetics. For anyone old enough to remember, there will be some serious 80’s nostalgia going on! That being said, some games featured more simplistic scenes than others, and they each had their own distinctive vibe. 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Cryptex Hunt 2021 was intended to be a “beginner” level, online puzzle hunt consisting of 12 main puzzles and a meta experience. For the masters in it to win the grand prize of an incredible, custom Cryptex from Justin Nevins, the puzzle hunt ran over 6 days at the start of March, with several puzzles released daily Monday to Friday and the final series on the Saturday. For the more casual puzzlers, anyone who finished by the end of March 2021 was in a random drawing for a standard Cryptex from Justin. Seriously, the standard ones are amazing, but the custom is just unbelievable. For anyone who missed it, the hunt is still up and available to play! (Even if the only prize is fun. And pride.) Each game was typically played more than once, where you first played to beat the game, and then got to solve the actual hidden puzzle. While it was occasionally frustrating to have to continue to restart a game, there were built-in features to help reduce some of the redundancy, and it was fun to discover new aspects of repeated games. We also found that this dual nature made it quite family-friendly. Beating the 8-bit games themselves was something that the tween in our house really had fun with, and then we tended to do more of the heavy-lifting for the actual puzzle-solving portion. You ended up with a final word for each mini-game, which could then be entered on the main Cryptex Hunt 2021 puzzle site. There was an incredible Discord associated with it, where hints were available once the main contest was over for the grand prize. Each individual game was a text-based adventure, where you could give commands to move around, look at stuff, use and interact with things, etc. Despite the variation in the 8-bit games, there was a lot of consistency in the types of commands used to navigate, which helped to streamline gameplay after getting used to the system in the first few games. There were occasional frustrations where we knew what to do but couldn’t find quite the right syntax to enter to make it happen. Overall, though, things went smoothly. Photos above are property of ESCAPETHEROOMers 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 While they are not all as insane as the MIT Mystery Hunt, which involves teams of up to 150 people competing for multiple days, puzzle hunts are known for being more challenging (and much longer) than your average escape room. As such, they can be a little intimidating. This one was specifically intended to be accessible to beginners! We found that the puzzles started off pretty easy but got progressively more challenging; though, there were a few towards the beginning that were perhaps a little harder than intended. We definitely leaned on the Discord community for hints a few times! There was definitely a search element across most of the games, and a lot of trying to see what might have changed when you re-play the game. The meta-puzzle was quite devious! Photo above is property of ESCAPETHEROOMers 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 Participating in the Cryptex Hunt was such a fabulous experience. The whole set-up is so innovative, and the gameplay is varied and entertaining. While we still recommend playing it now, part of what we adored was the community-building nature of the event, particularly via the Discord channel, which included not only Errol and designers but scores of passionate and helpful players. Not to mention scores of equally stuck players, which always makes you feel better…We also really appreciated the collaborative nature from the creative side, bringing in so many talented designers with varied backgrounds. Now we are just impatiently waiting for March…This should be the 5th year of the annual Cryptex Hunt, though the style has been completely different each year.` We cannot wait to see what they’ve come up with this time around! (If you do decide to try this game, please remember to let them know that you heard it from"ESCAPETHEROOMers"!) #KristaJones #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #CryptexHunt #2021CryptexHunt #ErrolElumir #Adventure #Canada

Videos/ Photos provided by Enibot Company: Enibot Game: The Vaccine Chase Country: Israel 🇮🇱 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: 3/31/2021 Difficulty (based on players): 5.5/10 Size of Team: Unlimited (Recommend 1-6 Players) (Ages 13+) Time: Unlimited (Suggested time Approx. 45 minutes) Price: $20.00/Game 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 There's finally a vaccine for COVID-19! Safely delivering the formula to the Center of Disease Control and Prevention is your top priority right now. Time is ticking... 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 There's two ways you can play this game: 1. If you want to work together as a team, you can just purchase 1 ticket, set up a Zoom call and share your screen with your group (be mindful that the videos may experience lags when played in Zoom). You can invite as many people as you like to solve the puzzles but I probably wouldn't recommend more than four. 2. You can also purchase separate tickets and play the game in competitive mode with your team. For the sake of review purposes, the company provided us with 4 codes. We decided to log in from individual computers but still worked together as a team to solve the puzzles. Our leaderboard score was an average scores from the four of us. The puzzles were presented in video and image formats through a chatbot interface. The answers were to be submitted to the chatbot. The interface is really easy to use and had high quality visuals and audios. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 The puzzles were on the easy side for enthusiasts. I think the creator had the intention of creating this game targeting audiences like beginners and corporate clients. Some things to bear in mind is that any wrong inputs, hints used (there's a build-in hint system in the game) and time taken to complete the game will affect the final score. We did enjoy the narrative as we were solving the puzzles. One thing we thought would be cool is having different puzzles or paths if the players chose different answers as there were various points in the game we had to make decisions. Currently no matter what you choose, it'll lead to the same scenarios for all the players. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 We've played hundreds of digital games since March of last yr. This interface is definitely quite refreshing and beautifully designed. For the price point of $20/game code, I would've wanted some more play time as we finished in 23 minutes and 24 seconds. If the creator wants to market this game towards enthusiasts, then I would suggest a longer game with harder puzzles that the entire team can sign in using one code as it'll be more fun to play as a synced game in a cooperative way. If two players want to play it in a competitive way, they should still be able to use one code and sign in through two different portals. The price point just doesn't justify for individual purchasers for a digital game but could definitely be affordable if the players decided to split the cost as a team. 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Helen B. Vaccine chase is something very different to those I have played before but is a really slick, fun and interesting game with a lovely mix of puzzles. With a theme that is very relevant to the moment, I wondered how they would make a game out of such a subject! There is a preview puzzle you can play together to get used to the interface, and then all teammates can start the game together, as it is timed (I don't believe there is a time limit but they say the average is 45 minutes). The game is a one-page chatbot style interface, where a character speaks to you then introduces the puzzles, of which there are 7 to complete. There are a mix of short videos and interactive images to view. The videos progress the story but don't really give any clues. The puzzles are a lovely mix, not too hard with some lateral thinking, and very nicely presented. There are codes, Math puzzles, visual puzzles and a logic puzzle even! As a team we raced through the puzzles, going for the coveted top spot on the leaderboard, and finished just shy of 23 and a half minutes. Scoring is based on your speed with penalties for wrong answers. We thought we might be able to take our highest score to go on the leaderboard but the owner took the average of our scores which put us further down, which was a shame! If we had known that we wouldn't have been so gung ho letting one person try wrong answers! I actually feel like I learned and was interested in the content as well as enjoying solving the puzzles. It was a short and fun way to spend a bit of time and kudos for the lovely graphics and clever interface - it worked very well! Andrew K. In this fun digital puzzle experience, you're racing against the clock to get a vaccine from point A to point B. There aren't really any major obstacles that get in your way. Instead, you have security guards, transportation issues, and a identity confirmation scenarios that require you to use logic and puzzle know-how to get the vaccine delivered. There were about 7-9 distinct puzzles in this experience, and each puzzle was prefaced by a brief video. The animation provided was fun, and the music was upbeat and fun. The puzzles aren't too difficult, but be warned that there is a math puzzle and a logic puzzle. The desire to be at the top of the Leaderboard may also create a sense of urgency for your team. But if you're a casual player that doesn't care too much about bragging rights, there's no harm in taking your time. If you like to play it as an individual, the $20 per person price is a bit steep for the experience (especially if you're in a group), but you gather a group and play it on Zoom with one game code, it might not not as bad (not sure about the video quality as I didn't play it that way) . But if you have the budget, you might want to give it a whirl. *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Enibot for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #Enibot #TheVaccineChase #OnlineEscapeRoom #DigitalEscapeGame #scifi #covid19 #case001 #science

Photo above are properties of Enibot Company: Enibot Game: Mission: Mars Country: Israel 🇮🇱 Language: English, Hebrew Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Sci-Fi Date Played: August 18, 2021 Difficulty (based on 3 players): 5/10 Size of Team: Unlimited (Recommend 1-6 Players) (Ages 13+) Time: 45-80 Mins. Price: $30/Per game on a single computer 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 The time has finally come for the first manned mission to the red planet Mars to search for life! Can you pass the tests to prove yourself worthy to become one of the crewmates for this exciting opportunity? You must pass a series of challenges to prove your intelligence and suitability! Good luck! Video above is property of Enibot 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 I had previously played Enibot's Vaccine Chase game and been very impressed by their interface, the puzzles and the whole experience, so I was super excited to try the new Mission to Mars title from them. Again they have a very clever chatbot style interface and the screen cleverly reorganizes itself to fit the content as it appears. You can also scroll back through the whole past narrative if you need to. I played this game alone (and our teammates played it as a group of 3), but have played as a team on their other game "The Vaccine Chase", and we just connected on Zoom, and used a ticket each so we could all play along on our own screens (but the game does not sync you all up, so you will need to share the answers when you have them). You could also purchase 1 ticket and just screen share too, with just one person entering answers. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 The game cleverly combines multiple types of puzzle - 3d environments, still images, videos and more. The quality of the introductory videos, animations and graphics are top-notch. The puzzles are a good mix, the usual logic, wordplay, Math and codes. I fell foul of making some assumptions on a few of the puzzles - and that's easy to do when you think you have spotted a pattern or you think you've seen this before, but they threw some very clever curveballs in to really challenge you, and the two times I did actually use a hint, I smacked my forehead and said yes, that is totally my fault for not properly reading/thinking about that! A timed game will do that to you though :) I played alone so didn't have any other voices of reason to help out! At one point through the hint system did refer to a coffee cup, when it was a cup in a water cooler, so that confused me a bit!! The hint system is very good, and blends seamlessly into the game as a “chat” from your bot. When you get to the end, your time, plus deductions for any hints used AND any incorrect answers (so don’t get attempt happy or try brute-forcing them all!) is used for working out your final score - can you make it onto the leaderboard?! 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 I loved the personalization of the game, the science facts that are sprinkled within the game which are genuinely fascinating, the certificate and fun photo booth at the end which add to the whole experience. For the price point, it probably makes sense to play this as a team. You will need to screen share if playing with friends on Zoom. We are waiting for the day when all the players can login through the same account and don't need to share the video and can all enter answers at the same time. I think this game will appeal to a very broad audience. Science and space-obsessed tweens and teens, adults, puzzle-fans of all ages! It can also be easily used for large corporate bookings. Fantastic job, Enibot! I can't wait for more! P.S. We did make it to #1 on the leaderboard at the time when we played the game! *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Enibot for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.. #HelenBailey #AtHomeGames #DigitalGame #Israel #Space #SciFi #Enibot #MissionMars

Videos/ Photos provided by HiddenCity Company: HiddenCity Game: Moriarty's Game: A Killer In The Hive Country: United Kingdom 🇬🇧 Language: English Type of Game: Digital RPG Game 💻 Genre: Detective Date Played: 3/27/2021 Difficulty (based on 4 players): 4.5/10 Size of Team: 1-5 ppl Time: 60-90 Minutes (Approximately) Price: £11/pp 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 Hive Program is looking for new agents again. You've been assigned to assist Kayla Watson in her assignments. If you can successfully solve the case, you could become a real agent! Are you ready to play Moriarty's game? 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Please note that you'll need to have either a UK or US cell phone number in order to play this game. When you register, the team captain will need to input everyone's cell phone number. We played the game as a team of 4 and one of our teammates did not have a US/UK number. It wasn't too much of an issue as we pretty much read the text out loud and shared the links the agent provided to him. Most of the interaction between the agent and us were through text messaging. The answers were submitted through text as well. You will need to be very specific with your answers as any wrong input will result in a time penalty and count as an incorrect response. At the end of the game. you'll be able to review your score. I thought the detailed break down was pretty cool as you got to see where your team spend most time on and which answers were entered incorrectly. It's best to designate a team captain to submit all the answers as if all players were to submit the same answers, the replies from the agent will be repeated over and over. We actually have no idea how we got 2 answers wrong and got penalized for time off when the answers were correct so perhaps there are still some bugs to be figured out with this scoring system. Besides text messaging, the game also incorporated various websites, phone call interactions, sleuthing through social media/Google maps and more! 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 This is not your typical escape game where you're presented with logic or cipher type of puzzles. It's heavy on narrative and should be categorized more as a RPG. You'll encounter searching through criminal databases, looking through security cameras, and even planning an arrest. Most of the "puzzles" were to provide solid evidence to the agent so that she could catch the culprit. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 This game made me feel like I was listening to an audio mystery book. I love CSI and any type of crime solving TV show so this is right up my alley. The actors in the game did a great job with portraying the different characters. The sound effects such as police sirens, foot steps, door knocking, etc. really helped with painting realistic scenes in our heads. I know the game is trying to be more immersive with having the conversations through text messaging, but I would've preferred to have an online portal instead. Since the text message provided links that were easier to see on a desktop, we had to constantly "transfer" various web addresses from our phone to our computer. If the text message aspect could be bought to online instead, it would also open up more opportunities for worldwide audiences. My favorite part was definitely the ending. It was exactly the type of cliffhanger I was looking for... 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕣𝕠𝕟❜𝕤 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Andrew K. I should preface by saying that I went into Moriarty's Game with the expectation that this was going to be an escape room game. After finishing the game, I would say that this is less an escape room puzzler, and more of an interactive audio drama experience. The audio acting is phenomenal, and you have opinions and feelings about the agent that you're working with right off the bat. The mechanics of phone calls and twitter searches also make the game feel real, as if you are a new recruit of this investigative agency. In terms of solving an overall mystery, the story was linear and you find yourself moving along and solving one piece of the story to the next. It's pretty typical of our standard detective stories - find the suspect, prove the evidence, find a way into some safe house/bunker, capture the suspect. The major misses for me are few but still impacted my experience: 1) the game setup process was fairly confusing and took us at least 15-20 minutes just to figure out, 2) there was only one fairly easy cypher puzzle, and 3) it seemed as if the advertised theme of the puzzle (a killer in the hive) did not really come to fruition, and it was more of a catch a low-level criminal type of experience. Overall, I do look forward to learning more about especially with the cliffhanger, but will approach it with different expectations - this is an interactive audio drama, not an escape room - but it's a good one at that. Kobi R. First of all, it's really a bummer that they only support US and UK numbers. Nowadays, you can get an international number fairly easily or just an online solution for communication. As far as the game goes, this shouldn't be a digital escape game IMO, but more of an audio online experience. I felt like an Analyst in the back office of a law enforcement organization, so I think that's a better marketing option: "Do you wanna help Veronica Mars? Come research information as an analyst to help solve crimes" I enjoy more riddles and puzzles, so this wasn't my favorite. Judging this experience in it's own category, the narrative is great and the acting really makes you feel like you're hearing from an actual person. This is a fun activity for escapers who know what they're getting into, although relatively short. (If you do decide to try this game, give us a shoutout or tag us on social media so we know you heard it from "ESCAPETHEROOMers"!) Disclosure: We thank HiddenCity for comping our tickets for this game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #HiddenCity #MoriartysGameAKillerInTheHive #MoriartysGame #AKillerInTheHive #SherlockHolmes #OnlineEscapeRoom #DigitalEscapeGame #mystery #detective #Solve #Crime #SerialKiller #Explore #Investigate

Photos provided by Escape Stations Company: Escape Stations Game: Humbug Hijinx Country: United Kingdom 🇬🇧 Language: English Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻 Genre: Adventure Date Played: 3/7/2021 Difficulty (based on 4 players): 5/10 Size of Team: Up to 5 Devices Time: Unlimited Price: £15/ Team 🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈 A year ago, the world famous confectioner, Honey Humbug went on a mission into the Amazons to find ingredients for her new recipes. She hasn't returned since then. If you're able to find the last will then perhaps you can become her successor. 🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈 Once you purchase the game, you'll be given a link that you can share with your team. Once everyone is in the portal, you can press the "start" button. The game is synced so if one person enters in a passcode, it'll unlock for the rest of the players. Although every player can click and explore the interface, whatever one player does, the other person will see it on their screen as well. So if I'm examining a clue, the rest of the team will have to look at it with me until I close that particular clue. This type of game design forces the teams to solve puzzles together and puts limitations on the "divide and conquer" method. The graphics were colorful and screams fun. We liked how there were many different scene changes in the game since our mission is to find the last will in Honey Humbug's residence. 🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂 If you pay attention to the instructions at the beginning, you'll receive a pretty big hint that will help you tremendously with the game play. Since the areas you've explored or items you've opened will lock again after you "leave" that screen, it's best to write them down after you solve them. This game had a lot of puzzles that will put your memory to the test. A lot of the solutions did require us to click the right sequence so having too many people clicking at the same time was counterproductive, We ended up assigning one player to solve one puzzle per time. We finished the game in about 35minutes or so with 4 people. I would definitely recommend playing with just 1-2 devices due to the puzzle design and the interface. If you do want to play the game in "divide and conquer" mode, have all the players take snapshots of the puzzles with their phones so they can solve that particular puzzle while the other teammates move on to another area. 🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂 Humbug Hijinx felt like a video game. Some exploration methods reminded me of Minecraft. If you want to fully experience this game, I would suggest playing it as a one player game. If you need some help with puzzles, maybe team up with one other player. If you have teammates that don't mind watching the action then you should be fine playing with 2+ players. The ending seems to suggest that there's more to the story...Perhaps there's a sequel? We're ready! 𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤❜ ℙ.𝕀.𝕤❜ 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤 Koen D. Pro's: - Nice graphics and a funny environment - Good technical puzzle system - Puzzles have a nice flow - Lovely, sweet storyline Con's: - System not remembering answers - Puzzles a bit on the easy side, but this must be great to play with a family with children ______________________________________________________________ Mike S. With this game being my first online exclusive escape room, I really didn't know what to expect when going in and after participating, I can safely say it was a fun experience! The basis of this story is that you need to go out and search for the last will of a beekeeper in this world. She has left clues all around her mansion (which so happens to take place in a Hansel and Gretel, fairytale-esque, décor) in order to locate these documents. That is all you need of the story because the rest of the game doesn't give any more depth into what happened to her. It was a simple, easy to follow story that gets you into the world so that you can do what this game does best, the puzzles. When it came down to our team of four solving the puzzles, we breezed through with ease! Not to say that these are extremely easy puzzles, on the contrary, these puzzles had a good mix between physical and mental solves with varying degrees of difficulties. One might be aware though, memory and details are key in this game, retracing your steps happens quite a lot during the game and if you forget a keyword or a passcode, you have to go and redo the puzzle previously. This game DOES NOT save your completed puzzles. The puzzles were well designed and there was a hint system included in the game that would help parties out (although we did not use any hints during this experience). When this game is treated like a team based point and click adventure game, it is a lot of fun. We solved all of the puzzles and got to the end screen about 35mins in and through that time, everyone in the group was able to contribute and work on a puzzle that best catered to their puzzle solving skill set. There was a unique look to this game as well. Very much one that looks like it was created in Microsoft paint. This was done in a manner that possessed the game to have a childish like atmosphere. Once we understood the "world" of the game, it made sense to have it look this way but it still felt...unfinished. Almost like playing a flash game that you would find online. Overall, it is not a bad experience but a party should expect to go into this game for the puzzles first and foremost. The story and the scenery are lacking which turns the game from more of an escape room to a puzzle adventure. *** We regret to inform this company has closed its doors *** Disclosure: We thank Escape Stations for providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever. #ESCAPETHEROOMers #AtHomeGames #EscapeRooms #EscapeStations #HumbugHjinx #LiveStreamEscape #DigitalEscapeGames #Mystery #Detective #Adventure #Candy #OnlineEscape #puzzles