Breakout Cardiff: Vacancy (Cardiff)

Challenge and check everything in this room

Exhausted after a long journey, you place your bag down on the freshly made bed, ready to relax. Suddenly, an ominous sixty minute countdown begins. No matter what you try, the door will not open. Welcome to the Crimson Lake Motel. You check in, but you NEVER check out…

We were in Cardiff for the day for no other reason than to do Escape Rooms, seven to be precise. The operation at Breakout Cardiff seems pretty slick with premises in a prime location and a large comfortable waiting area.

We were shown a video which gave the health and safety details and then were given the intro to the room before going in. Once nice touch to keep this on theme was that you wrote your team name, date, and current time in a ‘guest book’ before you enter.

The first room you enter is not a big room, and as there were five of us it felt a bit cramped. We pulled everything apart to find out where to start and found some easy wins, then we ground to a halt and needed a clue. Upon receiving our clue we kicked ourselves for how stupid we were to miss it.

The flow to this room was a bit off and as a team of five we found there were quite a few times where some of us were standing around just watching others solving things.

It’s not a bad room and there are definitely better in Cardiff, but if you need a room to do then this isn’t a decent contender.

PUZZLES

The puzzles were a mixed bag, some were very simple and just took a little bit of observation, one was so simple we kicked ourselves for not getting it sooner and one felt far too complex and went on for too long.

IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN

Arguably a hotel room is an easy room to decorate for so it seems weird to discuss immersion. But in the simplest form it was immersive, it felt like a dated and slightly creepy hotel room, but it did what it was supposed to. No wow factors, and nothing surprising or exciting, but it worked.

GM/CLUE SYSTEM

Clues were delivered via screens in the room and were timely when requested. I guess to keep the immersion they could have done something more creative, but I’d prefer a decent room with simple clue system over a poor room with the best clue system.

ANYTHING ELSE

We only got a chance to do the one room here but I’m sure when we’re back in Cardiff we’ll be sure to try out some of their other rooms.

Success / Failure

Final Rating:

Team: 5 people

Address: Unit 9a, The Brewery Quarter, Caroline Street, Cardiff, CF10 1FG

Website: https://breakoutcardiff.com