Escape Newcastle: Demon Barber

Oh dear.

First room - tiny. No way this is suitable for a group of 6. 

Puzzles - some 'ok' but nothing unique / interesting. A lot of them lacked any proper 'feedback' so we often felt like something was missing.

GM - rabbit in the headlights. Dismissive of issues we raised with her. 

Broken / damaged game - Escape don't appear to have anyone to maintain their games. When something is broken or damaged it just gets left in that state for ages. 

Lightbulb had blown - left in place, not changed.

One of the most absurd 'things' I've ever come across in an escape room puzzle was their 'knock knock' puzzle. You are required to copy the bell chimes and knock on a part of a wall. The part you're aiming for is badly worn away - wonder why ? There is visible damage to parts of the wall - in particular a hole in the wooden plaque that has the clue / info about what you need to do for the knocking puzzle.

And it gets weirder... in that room (second larger room) you'll find a ROLLING PIN. A solid 'real' rolling pin. Which is fair enough because it is in keeping with the theme of the game (Sweeny Todd...pies etc)... 

BUT

We found out - via a random clue - that we needed to use the rolling pin to knock on the wall REALLY HARD...!!?? 

No wonder there's damage all over the place!! If you're asking groups to do this stupid thing then (in my book) you are literally asking for trouble. Absolutely baffling use of a prop... If I were 'them' I'd change the puzzle, fix the holes, re-paint the wall, use yacht varnish etc... then require groups to just 'knock' gently... and as a GM just deactivate the mag lock above manually. The current setup is utterly pointless.

The other puzzles in that second room weren't much better. They each seemed to be just slightly off being 'good'. 

There is also NO mention of a crawl space - and we happened to have a heavily pregnant member with us - who managed the crawl but quickly found out that she needn't have bothered as the doorway was then opened up between the two rooms...

Escape have no microphones in their games. The GMs ALWAYS tell you that they can't hear you, that they are watching you and will give you clues when THEY think it is needed.... which irritates the heck out of many groups.

So... we ask not to be given any clues unless WE ASK for them. To get CCTV installed that have microphones built-in is not expensive, given the size of the company... it would make the job of the GMs so much more efficient / comfortable. I always feel that escape's GMs are struggling and don't really care about their job.

We left with a negative feeling. Our GM didn't care enough to ensure we would come back, leave a positive review etc... 

Such a shame that this sort of company operates in this manner. Rake in the money, don't care about customer satisfaction AND the well-being of the staff... 

Poor. 

Very unlikely to return to do any other games remaining. 

Go to Just In Tyne Escape instead...!

We've been waiting for this to open as we love their games. 

It didn't disappoint, its a fab game. 

We finished it in 23 mins which is a bit quicker than we would have liked, our average is about 40 mins. No-one else has done it that fast though so don't let it put you off, it was just an anomaly! 

Stuart kindly let us do some axe throwing to make up for the quick escape. 

We find the staff at this venue to be so nice, its a great place to go and the rooms are good.