puzzlebitch

We really enjoyed this game despite one of the puzzles not working properly and the music generally being much too quiet. Very fun and with clear objectives which is always a plus! 

There is nothing wrong with the Unlock games (most of them) but this was a really refreshing break from using just cards! We really enjoyed this one and all the different aspects to it. Not super difficult but very enjoyable (especially if you listen to a spy music compilation while solving puzzles like we did!)

Meh

Wow x10000! What an absolutely outstanding experience this was. What Tom has managed to create with The Great Loudini is just stunning. The combination of escape rooms and magic is so beautifully done from start to finish, with Tom taking hosting to new heights. It was such a beautiful and magical and exciting experience, I actually teared up halfway through the game!

I don't want to say too much (and also try not to read too many of the reviews here - the less you know the better!) - but I truly cannot recommend this room enough. 

Tom and Jenn are both lovely and it was an absolute pleasure to have an in depth chat with them after the game. 

This is an absolutely unmissable game that has set a new bar for me. By far my favourite escape room experience to date. I wish I could do it again! 

By far the best of the games Escape Rooms Durham has to offer. The setting makes the theme really immersive and there are some great puzzles! 

What a fun game!! Absolutely loved visiting the past (complete with perfect accompanying soundtrack) and there were some amazing moments. Just an absolute blast overall, this one was really REALLY fun. Luke was a great gamesmaster also! 

Would highly recommend this room, even if you haven't seen Back To The Future (I haven't but it didn't affect my enjoyment of the room at all)!

Our box (previously unopened) was missing probably the most important card in the set... 

Posted in r/games and someone sent a photo of the card but with the dimensions (viewing it on a phone) being different to the other cards and having to line things up etc, this was completely unsolvable. Big let down

One of my favourite Unlock games so far! Very fun

Least favourite Unlock game we've played by far, including one where a card was missing. Not a fan of this format at all

That one music puzzle was an absolute disaster! But it was fun apart from that

Each Unlock game has its own little gimmick - this was by far one of my favourites and definitely the most fun! 

This one was fun and interesting. Only let down is the gimmick got old after a while as you had to use it for so many puzzles

The Pit was my favourite of the two games we played at The Escapement. The set is incredible, the experience was very immersive and it was also refreshing to have more physical tasks to complete than combination locks/padlocks. A lot of puzzles I've never seen before and very on-theme. I had so much fun playing this game!

Bethany was a brilliant GM, extremely funny and great in character. 

Same as with Pirates of Polaris, my only critique would be the 75 minute label on the game when there is not 75 minutes worth of tasks to complete. We got off to an extremely slow start (didn't solve anything for the first 10 minutes or so) and still managed to complete the game in less than an hour as a team of two. The lack of timer also detracts from it for me, as I like to know how much time has elapsed. 

I would still highly recommend this game though. It's extremely unique, immersive and fun, and leagues above other games I've played. 

We had a lot of fun in Pirates of Polaris! The set is absolutely outstanding, with parts of a real pirate ship built into the game. That was the absolute highlight of the game for us, you really do feel immersed in the game due to the authentic, epic set and well-themed puzzles, some of which I've never seen before. 

A few minor issues with one prop not working and there being no timer which I never personally like. This room is also extremely key heavy, which detracted from the experience slightly for me. We still had tons of fun though, it's a great room and I would recommend playing!

Adam was a brilliant GM, huge props to him as he was really fun, friendly and great in character. Even when the prop wasn't working and he had to intervene, he did so in character which I liked. 

I do feel however, that the games at The Escapement don't need to be 75 minutes. We were told that they have a 75 minute timer to allow everyone more than enough time to complete everything (so everyone escapes), which takes the fun out of it a little as it was essentially a guaranteed win. 

This is one of two rooms we played at Extremescape and again, they have absolutely knocked it out of the park with the incredible room design, super cool puzzles and some absolutely epic moments along the way. Lots of things we have never seen or done before in an escape room which is always a plus! I really cannot over-state how impressive the rooms here look, the craftspersonship is just unbelievable.

A few small issues we had with the room: we thought they could do with an override switch for one of the puzzles as we had solved it correctly a few times before it worked. We also thought the ending was ever so slightly anti-climactic (it took us a minute to realise we'd actually escaped) but honestly, these things were pretty minor in what was otherwise an absolutely incredible experience. I screamed with delight and joy so many times as magical things happened around us. Lots and lots of fun, I really loved this game. The negatives are far outweighed by the positives and even despite these small issues, the rooms here are leagues above others and a must-play for enthusiasts! 

Wow wow WOW! We had big expectations for this room after reading the glowing reviews on here and we were still absolutely blown away. The craftspersonship that has gone into this room is just incredible! An extremely immersive game with lots of magical surprises and incredible moments along the way. All of the puzzles were perfectly on theme and extremely fun to solve. The final 10 mins of this game was one of my favourite escape room experiences of all time. I could not recommend more, this room is an absolute must-play! We travelled 4 hours to get to Disley just for this (and the Lost Tomb) and it was well worth it! Simply stunning.

Fun but once you've played one Exit game, you've played them all. I hope to never see a cipher again! 

Really really enjoyed this one! 

This is a fairly decent room, with some good puzzles, scary moments and interesting history. However, the story is quite convoluted and for more experienced teams, there were a limited amount of puzzles we hadn't seen before. Would definitely recommend Witch over Plague!

This was by far my favourite game The Escape Key has to offer. A refreshing lack of combination locks and a great introduction based on local history to get you in the mood for the game. Really enjoyed this one!

This game has a very interesting start, a lot of fun puzzles and great theming throughout! Similarly with Armageddon at the same venue, there is a lot to do in this game so I'd recommend a bigger team unless you're quite experienced!

This game is a lot of fun! Theming is very much on point and there are some good hands-on puzzles. There is a LOT to do in this room though so inexperienced players or smaller teams may want to consider a larger team!

This is by far the worst escape room I have ever done. The set design is pretty tragic, if you put me in there and asked me to guess the theme of the room I would have absolutely no clue whatsoever. The puzzles themselves were illogical and badly written with little structure (one of the puzzles actually required you to just tumble through the last number on the lock and guess every number until the lock opened which is horrific and lazy puzzle design). Apologies for the slight spoiler but truly, don't waste your money on this game.

We were also incredibly frustrated with how our game was run. Our GM was friendly enough upon arrival but when asking for clues, instead of giving us a hint and letting us work things out for ourselves, they just explained the whole entire puzzle to us step by step? They had no idea where we were at in the game as they (by their own admission) were not watching us on the cameras or listening to us on the microphones. We told the GM before the game that we had done many rooms before and therefore small hints would have sufficed, so this was particularly frustrating. Every time we asked for a clue, we also had to spend a few minutes explaining where we were up to due to the fact our game was not being monitored. Obviously not great in a timed challenge. After reading some of the TripAdvisor reviews, it appears this has also happened to other teams, as well as GMs running multiple games at once which probably explains the lack of attention given.

Absolutely horrendous, I would honestly not play a room here again unless you paid me. It was two and a half years ago and I still remember it like it was yesterday because of how bad it was.

This was fun, yet overall a pretty average room. The puzzles are fairly interesting and the theming in the room is good but there was nothing especially exciting.

Probably the better of the two games at the city centre location, although Lily of Lumley is much more impressive and well worth the trek to Lumley Castle compared to the two games here. A fun game with some good puzzles, but nothing especially exciting or special. 

The set design is quite cool and there were a few fun puzzles but I didn't enjoy this room overall. Way too dark, one of the mechanical puzzles didn't work even though we were doing the correct thing, and there was no timer which is always a problem for me as it causes a lack of tension and I like to know how long we have left/how urgent we need to be! (This was 2018 so might have been updated since then). 

We also had some issues with the GM. One of the puzzles was audio related and we missed it twice because the GM was talking to us over the walkie talkie at the same time. After asking if we could hear it again, the GM essentially berated us over the walkie talkie saying 'Come on guys!!! How are you not getting it!!!' which obviously didn't make us feel too great. Aside from the fact that he was talking over the clue so of course we couldn't solve it, English was not my teammate's first language and so it was just taking us a little longer to solve some of the wordy puzzles. I really didn't think it was necessary to behave that way with us and we left feeling pretty patronised and deflated.

We escaped this room in 13 mins and 52 seconds (top of the leaderboard woohoo!) and despite only being in the room for less than a quarter of the allotted time (which could have felt rather underwhelming), we still absolutely loved it and found ourselves enchanted by the beautiful set design and lovely story. This is clearly more of a family-orientated/kids room but even as four adults, we really enjoyed ourselves and thought it was a beautiful and fun experience!

This game was fun with a few scary moments (I screamed a fair few times!) and the GM was wonderfully in character which added to the experience. I really enjoyed some of the production and there were some great moments, perfectly themed to a creepy old orphanage. 

Our main issue with this room was that one of the props/clues was so ridiculously faded and impossible to read that we figured it couldn't be part of the game so we lost a lot of time on that. The GM cannot hear you in this room unless you talk to them over the walkie-talkie so they obviously weren't aware we were having this issue until we asked over the walkie if the clue was part of it after about ten minutes of being stuck. We said we were totally unable to read it and asked if they had a spare they could provide. After taking the clue, they agreed that it was completely impossible to read even in the light and wrote over it to make it clearer. Not the biggest issue in the world but still took away from the immersion and overall game experience, and obviously made us lose a fair bit of time. Could just do with double checking props in between games, especially since they can't hear you during the game and are therefore unable to know if you are having a problem like that.

Be aware you are also in complete darkness at times!

This room was super fun, intense and exhilarating! Prison/jail break is quite a common room theme but the immersive nature of this game with the guard coming to do cell checks places it higher than other games of the same theme and had us running around like headless chickens trying our very best not to be caught. Lucardo recommends a 3-person minimum as players can be removed from the game if they are caught trying to escape (not a spoiler as this was told to us over the phone when booking), however you can play as a team of two if you call up and ask. This really heightened the intensity of the game as we desperately didn't want to get caught and leave the other player alone in there. We were extremely sweaty by the end of it! Shoutout to Rick who was an awesome GM and really did an amazing job in character as the prison guard.

The puzzles themselves are nothing particularly impressive and there are not that many of them due to the room being more story-driven but the immersion and atmosphere really made the game very exciting regardless. Super cool ending as well!

One thing I will say is that the room on here has an accessibility symbol but this room is definitely not suitable for wheelchair users or anyone with mobility issues.