This is my spoiler-free review of my experience at Mystery Escape Room in Salt Lake City.
This game is located downtown in the Rio Grande mall. This is one of the nicer malls I've seen, an open air, design with (when I went) good parking. There's plenty of food and other distractions around before and after your game. That may not seem like much, but it can be a lot of fun to have somewhere to go with your group and decompress afterwards.
One thing about Mystery Escape Room that surprised me is how often they rotate games. They run something like five rooms at a time, but they've had over a dozen rooms since opening a year ago. Some rooms are only open less than six weeks! I can't say I understand how that level of regular refurb is cost-effective, but it must be! They often run beta weeks, where you can test new rooms at half price, which is a neat concept.
I decided to do their newest and hardest room, Mystery Impossible. Just out of beta, less than a dozen groups had run the room, and nobody had escaped. Fine, I said. I'd done eight other rooms, escaped from seven, and escaped two alone. They promised a free game to any group that escaped, and I was sure looking forward to that second game.
I thought I was good at these things...
This game is located downtown in the Rio Grande mall. This is one of the nicer malls I've seen, an open air, design with (when I went) good parking. There's plenty of food and other distractions around before and after your game. That may not seem like much, but it can be a lot of fun to have somewhere to go with your group and decompress afterwards.
One thing about Mystery Escape Room that surprised me is how often they rotate games. They run something like five rooms at a time, but they've had over a dozen rooms since opening a year ago. Some rooms are only open less than six weeks! I can't say I understand how that level of regular refurb is cost-effective, but it must be! They often run beta weeks, where you can test new rooms at half price, which is a neat concept.
I decided to do their newest and hardest room, Mystery Impossible. Just out of beta, less than a dozen groups had run the room, and nobody had escaped. Fine, I said. I'd done eight other rooms, escaped from seven, and escaped two alone. They promised a free game to any group that escaped, and I was sure looking forward to that second game.
I thought I was good at these things...
Mystery Impossible is well named. When they say hard, they mean it. I ran this room with five other people, one of which had done even more rooms than I had. And we still only made it through half the room before time ran out. We didn't even spend much time stuck on things, either, at least not by my usual standards!
The game masters said one previous group had gotten 70%, but that even knowing the solutions to everything, it still takes 35 minutes to execute it all. That's 25 minutes to solve all the puzzles, when there are probably twice as many as any other room I've seen, and all of them are twice as time-consuming, even once you figure out how to solve them!
I'm told there are groups that travel the country doing escape rooms. Maybe they could pull off a room like this. But I feel comfortable saying that mere mortals are never going to get out of this room. Unless you're a professional-level escaper, or just want to see a cool room and don't care about getting out, I'd recommend trying one of their easier rooms.
The difficulty level was frustrating. But I really can't complain about that, because they do label it and give the escape statistics. I knew what I was getting into, and now I have a 7/9 record. I think we could have done better if we'd been well organized. Perhaps if we'd had a leader, or something, we could have knocked a few minutes off. But I still don't think we'd have gotten out, no matter how efficient we were. We just weren't that caliber of players.
The game masters said one previous group had gotten 70%, but that even knowing the solutions to everything, it still takes 35 minutes to execute it all. That's 25 minutes to solve all the puzzles, when there are probably twice as many as any other room I've seen, and all of them are twice as time-consuming, even once you figure out how to solve them!
I'm told there are groups that travel the country doing escape rooms. Maybe they could pull off a room like this. But I feel comfortable saying that mere mortals are never going to get out of this room. Unless you're a professional-level escaper, or just want to see a cool room and don't care about getting out, I'd recommend trying one of their easier rooms.
The difficulty level was frustrating. But I really can't complain about that, because they do label it and give the escape statistics. I knew what I was getting into, and now I have a 7/9 record. I think we could have done better if we'd been well organized. Perhaps if we'd had a leader, or something, we could have knocked a few minutes off. But I still don't think we'd have gotten out, no matter how efficient we were. We just weren't that caliber of players.
While I will not give any hints to solving puzzles, I will be describing some minor details about the room. Nothing I say will help you solve anything. Shoot, I don't even know the solutions to most of this room! But I will tell you some details that are obvious to you as soon as the room starts. If you wish to remain utterly surprised by everything, stop here.
The plot of this game requires you to break into a bank vault. This room has some of the best production values I've seen; it feels exactly right for what they're going for. Unlike any other room I've seen, they actually give you a bag of tools to start with, which alone is perfect for this story. Some of the ideas involved are sheer brilliance. You're given an instamatic camera, lamination film, paper, and an ink pad. With this, you have to create a fake ID, in the room. Pretty sharp.
Another detail is that, like any bank, there's an alarm that can go off and summon the police. Set it off, and you have limited time to figure out how to disarm it. Don't disarm it in time? Game over, no matter how much time is left on the master clock. Great touch.
Now, the puzzles. Some puzzles just have to be explained by the game master; I have trouble imagining anyone would think to do them properly otherwise. There are some math puzzles the likes of which I've never seen, and I've seen a lot of math puzzles. There are some that, even if you've seen them and know how to do them, take some significant time to execute. And this is the first room where I've seen a really time-consuming red herring, at least one the game master doesn't tell you about. (Believe me, I asked.)
This room is extremely, extremely hard. I don't think I could escape now on a second try, even with the head start I have! But ignoring that, it's a fantastically well-done room, and a lot of fun.
Rating: 10/10 (if you don't mind losing)
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