Escape the Night

Let me tell you about one of the greatest inventions of this generation in the world of personal entertainment. A little thing called an Escape Room!

I am neither a noob nor am I an expert, but I can claim nine rooms and seven wins to my name! I have plenty of compelling excuses about those two that we lost, but I won't subject you that conjecture.

I'm sure there are plenty of you wondering: What is an Escape Room?

To take a quote from Wikipedia: "An escape room is a physical adventure game in which players solve a series of puzzles and riddles using clues, hints and strategy to complete the objective at hand."

Just imagine for a moment being dropped into a spy thriller, an ancient Egyptian tomb, a pirate ship, or the den of a deranged serial killer, all with a simple goal: survive, escape, and learn the secrets of your captivity! This interactive experience takes you out of the seat of the spectator and puts you in the shoes of the adventurer! Who hasn't dreamed of getting to live that out?

So what does it involve?

With an average of sixty minutes on the clock, you and your team and are put inside a thematic room, the door shuts and it's up to you whether you survive or not. It involves exploration, puzzle solving, and some astounding mechanics, all in spectacular sets made to make the situation feel as real as possible. Some rooms focus on your skills at mental puzzles revolving around critical thinking to make your daring escape, while others are more hands on, relying heavily on their mechanics to get the job done. Whichever you excel in, both types of rooms will never cease to intrigue and astound!

The first one I ever did was a pirate ship escape, in which our team was a group failed mutineers making our way through the ship's many rooms to uncover the captain's secrets and escape our execution. Our team has taken on a mad scientist's lab, a vampires lair, false imprisonment, and, yes, as I mentioned before, the escape of a serial killer's gruesome den - which was by far the most disturbing and grotesque of them all. 

Many of the ones we have done had a fright element, but that is not true of all of them. There are some with themes as docile as Alice in Wonderland or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Horror aspects are not a given, but they are common. I've seen more than a few escape rooms that were created and run by people who owned and designed fright trails or haunted houses, so such themes are not unexpected.

It isn't something I recommend for pre-teens, since the puzzles can be tough and challenging. But they are made for everyone to enjoy! A good group size is about five or six people. Some rooms are outfitted for more than that, but most of the time seven or eight in a team is a bit crowded. Just as important as any other aspect of doing an escape room you want to be sure to assemble a good team. Not in the sense that your teammates should be geniuses or puzzle solving whizzes - even though those are good qualities to look for - it's mostly important that they are people who will enjoy there time there and add to the experience. It also helps if you can stand to be yelled at frantically when everyone panics as the little time left on the clock counts down to your demise and your team scrambles with the code to open the last door - I speak from experience, with our team recently breaking out of a room with 0:03 seconds to spare. 

Everyone wants to step out of reality now and again. If you are looking to move out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself, while taking a quick visit to a fictional universe or an ancient place in history, then this is something you must try!  Every room I have done is an experience I would never trade and I know you will feel the same. 

I'd love to recommend places to go, but I can only vouch for a few that I have been to and enjoyed myself:

Escape Room Louisiana - Lake Charles, LA

Vidor Escape Room -Vidor, TX

13th Gate Escape - Baton Rouge, LA

Escape Room Pittsburgh (Homestead) - Pittsburgh, PA

If you live near these or any other escape rooms then please take the plunge, you won't regret it! But I will warn you, they are addictive and you will want to do them every week!

Let me know if any of you have had any fun Escape Room experiences you'd like to share! 

~Revaliciousness