by DreadLock Escape Rooms (website)
Waterside Resort, Old Coach Road, PL30 5JJ
2-8 players
Languages: EN
60 minutes
Last month, we received a letter from Santa, warning us that some of his naughty elves had gone AWOL and appeared to be heading to DreadLock...
These elves really don't like school, or anything to do with school, so they plotted to make a few 'elf-improvements' to 'DETENTION'.
What Santa didn't realise, was that they stole a load of his presents when they left! It's your job to find the 16 missing gifts, so that we can return them (and these pesky elves) to the North Pole!
Overall rating
based on ratings from 5 users
combined with 2 pro reviews
Your review
Player reviews
Admittedly it's not *too* difficult to make an immersive school classroom, but so many little touches in this room filled us with nostalgia and made us smile. The room is fairly linear but flowed well, with the majority of puzzles designed to tackle combination locks (but this was by no means a bad thing for us). All puzzles were logical, there was a good number of them, and the room and its components were in great condition. Our host was lovely and we liked the approach towards hint-giving. Definitely worth a visit if you are in the area, and we'll be back to try other rooms!
Brilliant room with some really original puzzles. 5 and 8 year olds loved it and really got stuck in with there being plenty for them to do. Perfect balance of nudges and leaving us to it too. We will be back to play more rooms next time we are down this way.
Reviews by escape room review sites
Overview
Spreading our wings down to Cornwall, we were recommended to visit DreadLock by other escape rooms owners in Devon and we are glad we did. We booked all 3 rooms and took on Detention second.
The location was easily signposted at the back of a holiday park and has plenty of parking onsite. We were greeted by one of the owners and received our brief in the small waiting area. There are refreshments available and a small selection of games.
We really enjoyed finishing Let the Games Begin and we headed straight into Detention, yes you guessed it, is based in school for those of you who haven’t done your homework. We were walked into the room by our host and we all had to sit down in the school chairs and we were left to watch the brief on the TV in the room by the teacher.
Room impression
The room wasn’t high tech by any means and it didn’t have to be. It was very reminiscent of a UK classroom with school chairs and tables, lockers and whiteboards. Everything was decorated to a good standard and nothing was showing any signs of wear and tear. As you move through the game, you will find things that will bring back memories of your childhood. A very well thought out room. As the previous room we did, everything was on one level and had no accessibility issues.
Puzzles
The room had a nice variety of puzzles to complete. The game had a feeling of it being mostly linear but as we often split into two pairs, there was plenty for all of us to do and we all came together when we needed too. There were a fair number ion padlocks in this room but we don’t mind that at all and with lockers being based in the room, it would seem strange not to have them scattered everywhere. Some of our teams History and Geography skills were put to the test and with me being the only fan of maths, I did my bit as well.
We didn’t really struggle on any of the puzzles in this room but one seemed to take a bit of time where there was noting else for some of us to do and we had to watch half of the team try and complete this particular task and that ate a bit of time.
Game Master Clues
There is a TV in the room where the timer is showing throughout. We really seemed to find out grove in this room and enjoyed it immensely. The puzzles flowed for us but we did come stuck at one point, not being able to find something. When we did have to ask for help, we all had to sit at the tables and raise our hands, a very nice touch indeed. Once we received our hint, it was simply a case of us not looking hard enough in a certain area, highly frustrating on our part.
Round Up
This room was definitely more challenging than the previous room we had just completed, Let the Games Begin. We all really enjoyed this game thoroughly and had a great time, even though we were in detention. The owners rightly market towards families being based on a holiday park but the games we had done up until this point at DreadLock, were enjoyable and did challenge us. A cracking venue with people that genuinely want you to have a nice time and to obviously escape.