Mystique: Time Machine (Budapest)

Steampunk Time Travel-y fun!

Doctor Clarence Guinan Donnolly, is a professor from a little town. After several years of hard work, the professor finally managed to build his time machine but during setup phase he stopped the time by accident. Your task is to restart the time before it’s too late and the Town remains the prisoner of time forever.

Mystique is one of those companies in Budapest that has more than one venue, and a large number of escape rooms. We had already played Cube and Pirate Bay, so next up in our day of six Mystique games was Time Machine.

Having already played Cube and Pirate Bay at Mystique, our third room of the seven we had lined up was Time Machine. Time Machine games are rather common, and I can understand why, as often they give you a chance to visit lots of cool sets in one game – winning!

At time of writing, Mystique has a ridiculous number of games that are spread out over two or three venues in Budapest – so make sure you go to the correct venue. As we had already played a couple of games here, we knew what to do and between games we went back to the main reception area and chilled in their lobby for a while.

The lobby at this Mystique venue is in a basement, but has plenty of seating, vending machines, toilets, and lots of posters for their experiences to tempt you into booking even more! After a short wait, our host for Time Machine arrived and escorted us to a different part of the venue from where we found the other games, and then showed us into the time machine. Here we received the briefings and then we were on our own to try and restart the time machine.

IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN

So in writing this review, I’ve come across a new term; vertically dynamic. That means that even though this game essentially takes place on one floor, there is a clever use of height that creates additional spaces you need to explore. Thanks to the use of ladders, steps, and over clever design features, the vertical is indeed dynamic – so factor that in if accessibility is a concern of yours.

We’ve been in many time machines on our escape room journey, and all of them are unique in their own way. This Time Machine has a very steampunk vibe about it, kinda Jules Verne-esque which was pretty cool. Lots of gears/cogs/pipes, and big physical props to admire, as well as one cool show-stealing prop.

The space in this ‘vertically dynamic’ game was used really well and as a team of four, we had plenty of space to move around without getting in each others’ way. Mystique states that eight people can play this game, and in terms of space I think they can, but for gameplay I think eight is always too many.

PUZZLES

This is another game that Mystique have lovingly referred to as a ‘generation three’ game. I’m not a fan of labelling games by generation, but many people like it as it helps them understand better what they may be in for. In this context, it basically means that it is a tech heavy game, with very few (if any) padlocks.

So what that means for the gameplay and puzzles is that there are a lot of physical triggers. This thing goes in that spot, this dial needs to be at this position, etc.. And only by meeting all of the criteria does the puzzle trigger. More to go wrong, but can add to a more ‘magical’ experience for many players. For the record, nothing went wrong in our game.

The puzzles all felt diegetic and what we were doing was directly related to the mission of fixing the time machine; searching, observation, teamwork, logic, pattern recognition, and that type of thing. For the most part this game was linear, with one puzzle leading on to the next, which did cause the inevitable moments where team members were standing around waiting for other players to complete the puzzle.

The puzzles were fair and made sense, with decent signposting and satisfying solutions. But, there was one puzzle that I think had an element of ambiguity about it and arguably had a bit of a logic leap to solve it.

GM/CLUE SYSTEM

Like most of the games we played at this venue, clues were delivered via walkie-talkie, so not the most immersive of clue systems, but it’s tried-and-tested, and generally works ok. If we needed help we simply had to ask over the walkie-talkie and our GM would have hopefully chimed in to get us back on track.

We had a mixed experience with hosts at this venue, some were lovely, some not so much. So I think it’s very much luck of the draw as to which one you get, and what mood they’re in on that day.

ANYTHING ELSE

The Time Machine is not even remotely horror themed, and because of the tactileness of some of the puzzles, I think this would be a great family-friendly game that everyone could get their teeth into. This game kept us going for longer than most of the other games at the venue, so I’m not sure if that’s because it was harder or we were tired, but it was a good challenge.

Success/Failed

Final Rating:

Team: 4 players – 44:42 taken

Address: Mystique Room, 1055 Budapest, Szent Istvan Korut 9

Website: https://www.mystiqueroom.hu/en