Escapism Chester: Amphitheatre

By | March 20, 2019

by Escapism Chester (website)

1 Cestria Building, George Street, CH1 3ER

Chester

2-6 players

Languages: EN

60 minutes

closed
The roar of the Amphitheatre rumbles through your cell as thousands mercilessly bay for blood. The Roman guards are on their way to take you into the Gladiators’ arena but you still have time to avoid this gory fate. Escape your cell and have your vengeance.
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Overall rating

Rated between 2.5 and 3.5 out of 5

based on ratings from 18 users
combined with 3 pro reviews

Your review

Player reviews

TheEscapeBoomers expert rated this:Rated between 35 and 35 out of 5
Team size: 2

We liked the teams working together, but overall puzzles weren't great. 

Ollie C rated this:Rated between 35 and 35 out of 5
Played: 15 Nov 2017 Team size: 3 Time taken: 46:00 Outcome: Successful escape!
original

Love the original theme for this room. Playing off the history of Chester. However the room itself felt quite cheaply made and wasn't that immersive. Even though it was a 5/5 difficulty rated room on their website we found it quite easy and breezed through a lot of the puzzles. Some felt like they didn't really fit the theme/narrative of the room but the others worked well and seemed to flow well enough. Had a great time and managed to escape in a decent time as well.

Escapetopus experienced rated this:Rated between 25 and 25 out of 5
Played: 26/12/2018 Team size: 4 Outcome: Successful escape!

Two of my favourite things in escape rooms are historical themes and locally-inspired themes, so a room inspired by Chester’s Roman Amphitheatre sounded right in my wheelhouse.

The actual room, however, was a big disappointment. The decor was all very cheap-looking and made only a very superficial effort to look like the under-arena cells it purported to be. Although I’m not a big fan of unnecessary darkness in escape rooms, I think a bit of flickering-torches-in-the-shadows atmospheric lack-of-lighting would have helped here.

The puzzles were mostly based around very anachronistic padlocks, and there wasn’t much of a story. Probably the biggest disappointment though, came at the end - there wasn’t an obvious ‘you’ve done it!’ moment, and when we opened the door there wasn’t anyone there to meet us. The problem was that the people in the neighbouring room had finished just before us, and there was only one GM between the two rooms.

Having said all that, if you go in expecting a bunch of puzzles without being worried about immersion, then this room is fun enough (the two newbies we had with us certainly enjoyed it).

Scotus0 expert rated this:Rated between 25 and 25 out of 5
Played: 02/04/2017 Team size: 6 Time taken: 60:00 Outcome: Failed 🙁

Second Room, First Failure 😖

I’m in the process of moving my reviews from my blog to this site, where I hope more people will read them! My visit to this room was a couple of years ago, hence its shortness.

Story

We were prisoners locked up and waiting to be thrown into the gladiators’ arena, unless we could escape before the guards return.

Puzzles

We barely got through half of them, which was disappointing. Some of the props and clues were worn-down, making them difficult to use.

Mise-en-scène

In the first half, I felt immersed by the cell’s walls, metal bars and the sound of gladiators’ swords clashing above. After this, some of the props looked cheap and bargain-shop-ish, taking me out of the game.

Final Comments

Attempting a five-star room was maybe too much for a group who had only done one before, but I feel like we were left without clues a few too many times.

Anonymous rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Played: 2018 Team size: 2 Outcome: Successful escape!

We escaped this room in February 2018 just my partner and I and escaped in a bit more than 30 minutes. The room was a bit easy for us and there were not that many puzzles. We may have cheated in the first area of the escape room without realising, which probably indicates that the puzzle was not correctly built as we managed to skip it by mistake. Good for a team of 2!

Arjay Henshall expert rated this:Rated between 35 and 35 out of 5
Played: 17 May 2021 Team size: 3 Time taken: 54 Outcome: Successful escape!
great hostingquite difficult
Exotic Turtle experienced rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Played: 17/05/2021 Team size: 3 Time taken: 50 Outcome: Successful escape!
story-drivengreat hosting
matt_keds expert rated this:Rated between 35 and 35 out of 5
Played: 19 Dec 2021 Team size: 2 Time taken: 48 Outcome: Successful escape!
great hostingfamily friendlyfunquite easy

#23

A fun room with an enjoyable theme, we don’t normally like SPOILERS— being split up at the start, but it didn’t last too long. Possibly because one of the puzzles hadn’t been reset properly, this didn’t bother us too much though. A few tired props here and there, and the monitor stuck out like a sore thumb against the set decoration, but it was still good fun, and had a few quirks.

grogu42 experienced rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Gemma Victoria rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Played: Sep 21 Team size: 2 Outcome: Successful escape!
clevergreat hostingquite easy

I loved the premise of this game and it started off in a different way which make it even more exciting.

I can imagine it would be a challenge for a bigger group.

thehermit experienced rated this:Rated between 35 and 35 out of 5
Outcome: Successful escape!
originalfamily friendly

Played ampitheater with a team of four, with two people being experienced in two people never playing before, which became quite frustrating as we were split up like that. 

Overall we really enjoyed the game but did find a few puzzles frustrating, you can clearly see that this is one of escapisms older games as their newer games have a much higher standard of quality.

Daniella Johnson rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Played: 28 Jul 2017 Team size: 4 Time taken: 58.34

Didn't care for the game. The first part of the game was good, however the rest of the game was a little lacklustre for me.

The Monkey expert rated this:Rated between 25 and 25 out of 5
Outcome: Successful escape!
quite difficult

I can imagine this game being better for enthusiasts than first timers. I played this in my early escape room days along with my wife who had never played. It just wasn't enjoyable due to the separation. Theming was brilliant however

shona panks experienced rated this:Rated between 25 and 25 out of 5
Outcome: Successful escape!
quite difficult

This was my second room and as a 2 the separating element really bothered me. I had no idea what to do or look for and it ruined it for me. I hope if I return to Chester, and it’s still open, I could enjoy it more

roberts0502 experienced rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Played: 19 Aug 2022 Team size: 2 Time taken: 59:09 Outcome: Successful escape!
family friendlydecentplain
MerseyMarauders expert rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Team size: 3 Outcome: Successful escape!
originalgreat hostingplain
Jess_keds expert rated this:Rated between 30 and 30 out of 5
Outcome: Successful escape!
family friendlyquite easy
Mynameisntjeff rated this:Rated between 40 and 40 out of 5
Played: Team size: 6 Time taken: Outcome: Successful escape!

Reviews by escape room review sites

A review of four games we played in mid-2017 at Escapism and Breakout in Chester and Clue HQ Warrington. Dungeon of Doom and Teleporter were both solid games while Amphitheatre and Disturbed paled in comparison.
A decent Roman adventure in the heart of Chester. Click the link to read our full review!

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