Macclesfield, Oct 2023
There are vanishingly few occasions in which I’ve replayed an escape room, and I’m not sure this counts as one of them. This new version of Henry Fortune is part of Escape Quest’s Chapelgate Mysteries, an overarching time travel setting that now includes four different games. The general premise, some of the decor and a distinctive segment of the game are familiar from the original Henry Fortune; but all of the actual puzzles are new.
Each time I’ve visited Escape Quest they’ve made a further clear step up in the scale and quality of their set designs, and the Chapelgate set provides a proper ‘wow’ moment. If you’ve played any of their rooms since 2022, you’ll know what I mean, since some of it is shared. Escape Quest are completely unique in only running one of their rooms at a time, rotating between them every few months, much to the frustration of travelling enthusiasts who want to binge-play them all in a day. This system also has the huge advantage that your game will be run by the designers themselves, two of the most experienced and passionate hosts around; and it also allows sharing of some of the physical space between the different games.
Like the other Escape Quest rooms, and unlike its previous incarnation, Henry Fortune is a solve-all-you-can game. There is a baseline goal, and it counts as a win as long as you achieve it, which is unlikely to be difficult for most experienced players. Beyond that point it’s a question of how many of the puzzles you can solve, and only the fastest teams (or those most efficient at dividing work between players) will complete them all.
Henry Fortune was a delightful game before, and it’s a delightful game now. One reason for that is a particular theatrical element that been retained, and is still a lot of fun; as well as the looming ominous presence of the game’s namesake.
The score-based puzzle-fest structure is wildly popular with enthusiast players, but perhaps comes with a trade-off; in my memory, the original Henry Fortune it had a lovely sense of escalating peril that gave a highly effective story arc to the game, which here is replaced by frantic puzzle solving. But the puzzle-fest is delivered expertly: there’s a distinctive format for the individual puzzles and clear signposting to connect them to the right clues, and you always have multiple options for what to work on, without the overwhelm of being set loose on everything at once.
I loved the previous version, and I miss a few elements of that game that are no longer there; but in many respects the new version is a clear upgrade, particularly the beautiful expanded setting. This game gives an intense hit for anyone who gets a thrill from popping open a padlock; enthusiasts will find it both a challenge and a treat. 
