CineRoom Bamberg: The Kramer Accident

9/10 (second out of six in Franconia) 

This booking was a bit of an afterthought. We could have well overlooked this place, had it not been for the fact that we ended up actually staying in Kramersfeld, in easy walking distance of the venue. 

The first thing I will say about this room is that it cost us 184 Euro. 

In the same week we did two very similar 90min rooms with Finest escapes (Bamberg und Nuremberg) that both cost us 145 Euro. 

So the first question I would ask is - was this room worth almost 40 Euro more? 

Well extremely unexpectedly, this turned out to be my colleague's favourite room of the trip, and my (close) second; so second out of six. 

So I can certainly say it's expensive, (it's a dear hobby) but I can't really say it's overpriced. 

It's quite difficult for me to put into words quite why this was such a good room, but I'm going to try... 

The initial vibe of the welcome here felt pretty cold, from the 'too cool for school' goth girl on reception, but once we got in the room, Sebastian who did everything else, was absolutely amazing, and goodness knows how he even managed to do what he did. 

But the introduction was brilliant, and we were immediately immersed. 

And that is what really made this room for us, the immersion. 

Was this the most immersive room I've ever been in?

 It was certainly up there.

So much of this experience hinges on his performance,  and character which is so often the case with these things. 

There's possibly something about going into an industrial looking environment and being able to believe, it's an abandoned industrial unit. 

Another thing about this room, it was nice to see a room that wasn't an obvious horror cliche, it was something a bit different, for us. 

There were two distinct levels here, which worked well, because you have the dread of going upstairs, and feeling (relatively) safe downstairs. 

However the overall space wasn't all that big. Or that impressive in terms of set-design. Nothing like that. For the money I would perhaps have expected more from the set. But, regardless, it worked really well. 

It was all very coherent, I think that's the key word here. 

So there's the thing of going into an industrial unit and then trying to pretend it's say a jungle. But there's also the thing where you get into said "jungle" and start doing puzzles that have absolutely no relation to an actual jungle. 

Here everything seemed on point. I didn't feel that anything was a stretch, or broke immersion. 

I think they say something in the blurb about doing tasks rather than puzzles. 

 I'm not  sure I understood what that meant when booking. 

 I'm not sure I quite understand the difference between a puzzle and a task?

But maybe it makes a bit more sense now, than it did. 

The tasks we did all very much fit the theme and it felt very realistic. It really did feel like we were in an industrial until, dealing with the challenges we were faced with. 

When you've done a lot of escape rooms and a puzzle you've done before comes up in a different context, it could potentially feel a bit tired, a bit like "oh this again" But that wasn't an issue here. 

Also the room was liner, which I'm not usually a fan off, but it suited this room perfectly. And we were always clear with what came next. 

And with one exception everything flowed very well. 

That exception was the separation technique. It seems de rigueur in rooms such as this that there is a period of separation or isolation for one or more participants. I didn't feel it worked particularly well with this room, they really need to come up with a better way of doing it. Not a huge criticism, just a minor gripe. 

I'm concerned that this room could get overlooked, in terms of both punters and awards, but I sincerely hope it gets the recognition and credit that it so richly deserves. 

We walked to this venue. But even though this venue is outside of the town, it's accessible by bus. There is also a car park.