

In Escape Rooms, Video Games Meet Real Life - ahamilton
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/04/arts/video-games/in-escape-rooms-video-games-meet-real-life.html

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schoen
I did the two permanent room escapes run by Real Escape Game/SCRAP in San
Francisco (in the New People mall in Japantown), namely Escape from the
Mysterious Room and Escape from the Time Travel Lab. They were great fun. (My
teams didn't manage to escape from either of them.)

I also did their Escape from the Bank (themed after the aftermath of a bank
robbery), where I think my team was the only one to make it out. That event is
possibly less awesome because you're seated at a table in a big hall with a
lot of other teams around you, rather than exploring small room all by
yourselves.

Now I'm looking forward to trying the games in New York City!

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fallinghawks
I did Escape from the Mysterious Room as well, and really enjoyed it. We
probably needed another 15 minutes to complete because we got hung up on one
of the puzzles that needed a piece we hadn't found yet.

I'd like to do it again but would like to go with people who have actually
have played escape games (esp. Japanese) before.

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Udo
It's interesting how much LARP ideas are beginning to diffuse into general
culture. Lastly I was talking to someone who basically organized themed mini-
LARPs for corporate teams. Since these are audiences who generally aren't
familiar with the medium, they're always amazed.

I think as our natural environment continues to become safer and more
virtualized, these immersive adventures and ARGs will become more popular and
mainstream.

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wzsddtc
These are really popular in China Mainland as well since about 2 years ago.
People just create rooms at their own places and put ads on WeiBo to get
people to come.

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prawn
Are they the same every time or is there an element of randomness in the
puzzles and codes?

It'd be interesting if they could be random enough that someone couldn't spoil
it for others, and people could use AR or just wi-fi to research clues?

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jevinskie
I don't think many people are paying money to go to these just to "cheat".
Unless... there are competitions.

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prawn
If there was randomness, you could offer "Free if you can escape in an hour!"

Otherwise someone could get the full experience by going in with the
instructions written down and pull it out of their pocket in the last five
minutes if they'd failed to escape.

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briggers
These are awesome. I did a couple in Warsaw, one in Budapest and now one in
Prague.

I use it mostly as a 2nd/3rd date to find out how people handle
stress/cooperate, but they're really fun too.

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martinshen
We've been working with "escape room" game event organizers like SCRAP for a
while now. They're incredibly popular on our "Netflix for Events" service.
I've done a handful and can certainly attest to this "video games in real
life" trend in events from traditional scavenger hunts to a maze that you have
to solve from the third person. I love this intersection of technology and
real life entertainment. Folsom Street Foundry in SoMA has even started
hosting weekly social game nights on Tuesdays

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personlurking
There's an entertaining Spanish film called La Habitación de Fermat (Fermat's
Room) which deals with this.

"Four mathematicians who do not know each other are invited by a mysterious
host on the pretext of resolving a great enigma. The room in which they find
themselves turns out to be a shrinking room..."

Here's the trailer (w/ subs)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8fS74Y-qBs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8fS74Y-qBs)

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brador
This escape the room as a live event started in Hong kong a few years ago.
Glad to see it finally come here.

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justjimmy
These are popular here in Taiwan, I think there's like 1 every day - held by
many different organizations. The concept's the same - solve puzzles before
the time runs outs.

Different organizations go to different lengths to make the activity feel more
immersive, some are great, some are meh. Sometimes the group is so big, it can
get very chaotic with everyone running around looking for clues.

The only downside is once they reveal the clues/answers, it can be frustrating
if they were impossible to solve in the first place.

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austinl
I was at the Escape from the Moon Base [1] in SF two weeks ago and it was a
lot of fun. I went with some coworkers, but I'd also recommend going with
friends, and would definitely participate again.

The puzzles are fairly challenging (no one in my session of 30 teams/180
people) finished with an entirely correct solution, so it's satisfying when
your team solves certain parts.

[1] [http://realescapegame.com/sf07_mb/](http://realescapegame.com/sf07_mb/)

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lukas
I played the Escape from Time Travel Lab as a team building exercise and it
was an awesome experience - I totally recommend it. I just wish they would put
out more games!

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nitrogen
Sounds somewhat like murder mystery dinner parties. Also: why does NYT hijack
the left and right arrows to take me away to another article?

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nschuett
One of the hardest things about these "escape from the room" games is keeping
all the puzzles and clues organized, and sharing progress across the whole
team. It's a pretty great exercise in project mgmt and teamwork.

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nnnnni
It's not exactly the same, but TrueDungeon has a similar premise of "a small
group of people attempts to figure out puzzles together to get through
something".

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kqr2
For a zombie themed escape, check out:

[http://roomescapeadventures.com/](http://roomescapeadventures.com/)

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seeken
I did this a couple weeks ago. The puzzles are a bit contrived but it is
challenging and fun.

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antonmaju
This reminds me of a popular visual novel game, "9 Hours 9 Persons 9 Doors".

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jsemrau
Boring, in "In Shadows" (www.inshadows.asia) video games meet real life.

