If you’ve never experienced the relatively recent phenomenon of escape rooms, you should really change that. They’re a lot of fun. Recently my family attempted to escape from a difficult one unsuccessfully, and it got me thinking about all the things we should have done differently. Since it has been ages since I’ve posted anything, I figured I’d share some of those thoughts. So here it is, how to escape from an escape room.
Escape Room Tips and Tricks
- Think simple. Clues won’t usually require specialized knowledge to solve. If you received sheets of music, look at the names and the words, not the notes on the page.
- If tasks are partitionable, assign them to different people. You want to avoid having too many cooks in the kitchen. For example, if pictures of people have date ranges, pre calculate ages, who is the oldest, etc, while others in your group are solving puzzles. You might need that information later.
- Think before speaking, to avoid distracting those are trying to solve puzzles. However, talking through what you’re thinking can help when people are stuck.
- Turn off/on lights. Some rooms use black lights.
- If a switch appears not to work, have somebody in another room check if something is happening.
- Look through peepholes in doors or similar openings in pictures, etc.
- Keep in mind what types of combinations you’re looking for based on the locks. Are you looking for numbers or letters? How many characters are you looking for?
- Look on the underside of tables and other objects in the escape room, not just in obvious places that draw your eye.
- Search for hidden doors and rooms. Unlocked a wardrobe? Try walking through it, Narnia style.
- Recognize when you’re spinning your wheels. If you have an allocated number of hints to use it’s better to burn one early if you’re just going to be wasting time.
- If you are in a room where the host can always communicate with you, be ready to think outside the box. Possibilities open up when you aren’t constrained by having to put in a physical combination to “unlock” the next part of the escape room.
- Let others work on the puzzles you aren’t good at. Old as dirt? Let young people with good eyes and nimble fingers read clues aloud and put in combinations on locks. Suck at math? Leave the marker and whiteboard on the table.
There you have it, some tips and tricks to help you escape from an escape room.
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