Puzzlescape: Edgar The Explorer

Maybe a trigger warning for bug phobics would be good here, but as mild phobics ourselves it wasn’t too tricky to deal with that section.

There was an item/construct that we hadn’t seen before which was nice, but it was a variation on a theme.

Nudges were timely and gentle enough just to put you back on track which highlighted the excellent and attentive hosting.

We wouldn’t automatically recommend this for a beginner level room for 2, but maybe if there were a mix of experience then that would be fine.

The large number and wide puzzle range go from observational to skill in both low and high tech which would allow a wider range of experienced players to join in.

Definitely a positive, value for money experience, but challenging!

The individual puzzles were fine - nothing exceptional, but a fair variety and seemed solid enough. Unfortunately, the overall flow of the game was a mess. We ended up accidentally jumping over a puzzle early on and, from that moment onwards, everything kind of fell apart... On two separate occasions, we ended up solving electronic puzzles that made something happen in a room that we didn't yet have access to. We spent about 20 minutes following a series of puzzles that resulted in nothing more than an item that would have been the "intended" way to solve a puzzle that we had already solved via another method ages ago. And, due to an unfortunate GM oversight, when we entered the final area, the "big reveal" was, well, already in plain sight. They then tried to correct this error by remotely "unrevealing" the prize item again in front of us, and this made us even more confused as to what was going on.

We escaped, but our overall feeling at the end was one of confusion rather than success, and unfortunately can't really recommend this game based on our experience.

This was our first escape room so it's hard to judge fairly in retrospect, but we can say a few things for certain: We had a friendly and welcoming GM. It was a well-dressed set with good production values/set dressing; everything felt solid and nothing was incomplete. There was a storyline that tied things together nicely. The puzzles had a good variety and flowed well - however we found a huge difficulty spike in one puzzle in particular. This left us rushing the quite spectacular later parts of room which was a shame, and felt out of step with the other tasks we had - but perhaps we were just too inexperienced.

An spider/bug warning is needed for anybody with severe arachnophobia.