Escape Rooms

What are they?

Escape rooms are a type of puzzle that consist of one or more people being locked in a room filled with puzzles, codes, and ciphers. In order to get out of the room, the players must obtain items or clues necessary to unlocking the room’s exit or prize, hence the name, “Escape Room”. These fun puzzles are highly customizable, sometimes including a time limit or overlying theme.

Background

A publishing company in Kyoto, Japan by the name of SCRAP created the first escape room in July 2007. SCRAP’s escape room originally consisted of 5-6 players trapped in one room. Today, SCRAP can as far as fit thousands of players in a shared space as part of their Real Escape Game Event. Modern escape rooms have become famous for training important critical thinking skills, as well as being an effective team building exercise.

Types of Escape Rooms

There are three main types of escape rooms. The first are Physical Escape Rooms, the escape rooms that take place in real life. These can be played with one or more players and include puzzles that the players physically interact with. Examples of physical escape rooms are board games and literal locked rooms. The second type are Digital Escape Rooms, the escape rooms that take place through a virtual format. In these challenges, the room and, all its components are interacted with through a device such as a smartphone or game console. The digital type is most commonly used in video games on a handheld or mobile device. Though less common, there are types of escape rooms that exist as hybrids between the physical and digital format. An example of a hybrid is an escape room that has physical board game components and has you solve the puzzles through a device. All types can have differing difficulty levels and themes, making escape rooms a fun activity for all audiences.

Ciphers

As previously mentioned, the majority of the escape room consists of various puzzles required to be solved by the players. One of the most commonly used puzzles are known as ciphers, which are messages with various forms of encryption performed on them. One of the more famous forms of encryption is known as a caesar cipher.

Caesar ciphers encrypt the message by shifting every letter in the sentence or phrase a certain number of shifts ahead. For instance, a Caesar Cipher with shift 2 to the right would turn every a into a c, b into a d, etc. Other popular encryptions for written messages include translating the message into binary, morse code, or hexadecimal. For ciphers, it is best to include an encryption chart as part of the puzzle, as some players may not be familiar with certain encryptions.

Puzzles and Codes

Throughout the duration of an escape room, the players will solve puzzles that will give clues on how to get out of the room. Most of the time, the room's main lock will either have a number lock, a lock where you have to input a specific combination of letters, or a lock that you have to find the physical key to unlock. The types of puzzles included in the room will differ depending on the kind of lock.

In the case of a key lock, the puzzles will usually contain clues that will hint the location of the key to the players. The key can sometimes be hidden in locked items in the room that can only be opened by solving a separate puzzle. Rooms with number locks will usually contain puzzles that give the players a part of the needed sequence upon completion. Puzzles relating to phrase locks are similar to number locks, but may instead contain clues about the required phrase or letter combination.

Sub Locks

Every good puzzle, escape room or not, needs to have challenges for the players to overcome throughout their experience. This is why there may be multiple locks or rooms in one escape experience. Despite the name “Escape Room”, some escape experiences require the players to go through multiple sections or areas to unlock the main lock and escape. Multiple room escapes are more popular with multiple players, as it gives each person more room to move around and break down the puzzle. Some rooms or key puzzle components may have to be unlocked by solving the room’s other puzzles first. Solving these “Sub Locks” will give the players valuable information or items needed to complete the escape.

Replay Value

The replay value of escape rooms vary across platforms. Physical escape rooms typically range from being a one time experience to having low replay value. The components in physical escapes have a chance at being destroyed in order to unlock certain puzzles. An example of this is paper or cardboard objects having to be folded to solve a lock or puzzle. The destruction of objects in physical escape rooms can be somewhat avoided if the players make a copy before they start playing. However, this cheat only works well with paper objects by using a printer or copier, and is much harder to pull off with different materials.

The replay value for digital escapes are slightly higher than physical escapes due to the threat of perishable resources being mostly eliminated. The replay value on all types of escapes though are low due to the fact that the players may have muscle memory on how to solve the puzzle during a second playthrough. It is possible for some digital escapes to have something akin to a new game + mode, where the puzzle components will be scrambled to offer a unique experience each time.

Other Unlock Experiences

While escape rooms have been vastly popular through many forms of media, there are other experiences where the player will have to unlock something other than a room. Popular versions of these include the player unlocking a single, complex item, or solving puzzles to complete a story driven goal. These encounters can still have themes, time limits, and similar puzzles to those of an escape room. Escape segments have even shown up in media that is not directly focused on escape rooms. In conclusion, escape rooms are fun activities worth a try for any audience.

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Source used: https://nmescaperoom.com

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