Riddlr – The Brunel enigma

From riddlr.co.uk

The year is 1842. Your friend and colleague Isambard Kingdom Brunel has sent for you by telegram. When you arrive at his office, he is missing and all is not as it seems. Fearing for his life, and with a limited time, you must work through the clues he has left, to find out what has happened and hopefully regain contact with your friend. Expect an early Victorian, Bristolian twist in this intriguing puzzle escape room.

Team- Ster, Ni, Simon, Stu, Ros

Played 22/07/18

(Reviewed by Ster)

Riddlr

This was the second game that we played at Riddlr on this visit and the hosts were great, squeezing us in before our booked start time after we finished the first room early and very friendly and welcoming. The reception area of Riddlr is large and open, with plenty of space to wait and grab a drink of water before the game begins.

The Room

There was quite a lot to look at in this room and we couldn’t resist getting started before the pre-recorded message had finished playing so we might have missed some of the theme set up in our eagerness!

It was a fairly standard office room set up, but with some interesting elements that we haven’t come across before, making it a bit more than your average run of mill escaping from an office type game. There was a good variety of different puzzles which were engaging and interesting to solve, some with obvious solutions and some that required us to put our heads together for a moment and really think about them.

I loved some of the physically larger puzzles as they made the room a bit more exciting to work through. There were a few puzzles which didn’t have clear solutions due to the variety of different problem solving devices (for want of a better term!) that could theoretically have been used to figure out multiple puzzles, so some of the challenge was in finding the correct solution out of those which were available to us.

Simon – Another really well created room which, despite being a common theme across a lot of different rooms, managed to feel fairly fresh throughout. The puzzles felt interesting, particularly because they could have applied to a couple of different aspects of the room, which gave them an extra challenge. This room also did the impressive feat of being linear, but not feeling linear, which is an added bonus.

Ni – Really enjoyed this room, they did well to make an old theme feel new with their larger puzzles pulling the team together, instead of the usual split up and tear everything apart technique that most office set-ups require throughout. As the others have mentioned, I was impressed by the linear but not linear set-up, a very fun room.

Escape time – 28:00

Score

This room, as Simon said, managed to be linear without feeling linear at all and we used a bit of a divide and conquer technique right up to the end. There was only one moment when some of the team were left with nothing to do, and that was only because two team members were struggling with a puzzle they were finding a bit fiddly! Overall, it was great fun though we didn’t find it quite as hard as we expected to, given that it is Riddlr’s most challenging game. The average time is 60 minutes and we managed it in 28, though they were a very fun 28 minutes that really flowed together!

Difficulty

3/5

Overall

3.5/5

 

 

Riddlr Escape Rooms– Séance

From riddlr.co.uk/

Will you perform a Séance at 13 Paper Street?  The eminent paranormal investigator Clarissa Stubbs disappeared last year while exploring an abandoned house known for paranormal activity.  When retracing her footsteps and attempting to discover what happened, you and your team awaken the same foul phantoms as she did that fateful night.  Can you make your escape or will you join Clarissa on the long list of forgotten souls who were foolish enough to venture into the crooked old house on Paper Street?

Team – Ster, Ni, Simon, Stu, Ros

Played 22/07/18

(Reviewed by Ster)

Riddlr

Full disclosure – We were given 4 complimentary tickets to play this game, though we’ve tried not to let this influence our opinion of the experience. We witnessed 3 other teams either departing or arriving while we were there and they were treated with the same friendly welcome that we received!

Riddlr were very friendly when we arrived and we spent a few minutes discussing different rooms that we had played while we waited. The lobby was very spacious and they monitor their games from here, which meant that when we arrived and there were two teams nearing the end of their experiences, the first team to escape were allowed to peer over the desk at their friend’s progress for the last few minutes of the game, which I thought was a great experience for them and not something that I have ever witnessed before!

The Room

The theming of this room was incredible, I was a little freaked out before the timer had even begun just due to the décor of the room! We’ve never played a horror room before, being the member of the group who scares the most easily, I tend to avoid rooms with this kind of theming, so we don’t have a similar themed experience for comparison. That being said, this was one of the best implements of a theme that I have ever come across! The music, the lighting and the decoration were just superb.

This game was a truly immersive experience, made possible by the way that any help players might require is received through a haunted mirror holding pre-recorded clues, so we didn’t hear from our hosts at all. The puzzles were linear, which isn’t usually our favourite set-up, however it was necessary for the story of the game and it really added to the atmosphere to have the whole team huddled around one element of the room, especially during the section of the game when we were navigating using a single torch!

There was a nice variety of puzzles, a few padlocks but also some automated elements which were great for providing jumps!  There was only one puzzle that we got a bit stuck on, we knew the solution we just weren’t sure how to implement it, everything else seemed to flow together pretty intuitively. While the room wasn’t easy by any means, we didn’t find it too difficult to navigate – the average completion time is 55 minutes and we were out in 25. Though it didn’t feel easy while we were playing and we in no way felt short changed by escaping so quickly (I for one was glad to be back in the real world!) I think it just happened to be a room that really played to our strengths as a team.

Simon – It was really obvious, even from standing outside the room, how much effort had been put into theming this game, and it paid off. I’m not particularly a fan of horror games, but this one was enjoyable, with a good mix of puzzles. Although it is most definitely in the horror genre, I wouldn’t say it was absolutely terrifying, so I’d recommend it for a group like ours who would normally avoid this kind of game.

Ni – I really enjoyed this room, they did a great job of building the theme and we all got sucked in. It had a good mix of puzzles that always kept the whole group occupied. I’d definitely recommend going even if you don’t like being scared.

Escape time – 25:18

Score

This room was terrifying but also amazing. We were all really impressed with it! From the décor of the room to the immersive experience, everything about this room was brilliantly done. It has been one of my favourite escapes that I’ve played – even though I was mostly terrified throughout!

Difficulty

3/5

Overall

5/5