Escape Boats: SOS (Dublin)

Lot’s of fun!

The original, legendary Escape Boat game. You and your team are trapped on an abandoned, crippled boat. Your mission is to gather information, repair the boat and escape – before it’s too late! Solve the puzzles, uncover mysteries, gather clues – and enjoy Ireland’s top rated escape room experience.

When we received an invitation to a wedding off the coast of Galway, my very first thought was, “Can we fit in a trip to Escape Boats along the way?” And wouldn’t you know it, there are no direct flights to Galway from Bristol, thus, our only option was to fly into Dublin, which meant that the answer to that question was, yes. Yes we can fit in Escape Boats, and we can fit in all of their games in both cities! So that’s exactly what we did.

Escape Boats are often brought up when we see anyone asking for recommendations for games in Dublin, so we were eager to check them out. I’ll admit, I did not have overly high expectations – I was just hoping for good, solid, and fun games – but once we were onboard, my expectations were completely blown out of the water, so to speak.

Our time onboard the Dublin Escape Boats boat, the Zorg Ella, began bright and early with a lovely and friendly welcome from our host, Marta. Originally, the plan had been to play the games in order of creation, beginning with SOS, but once we arrived, it was decided that we would head into Convicts first. Luckily, we emerged from Convicts with plenty of time to avoid being shipped off to Australia, and decided to head straight into SOS. Since we’d already had a health and safety overview for the previous game, we were able to skip a good chunk of that ahead of the second game, and it wasn’t long before the action was underway, and it was time to make our escape from the “sinking” ship.

IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN

It would be a waste of an exceptional venue, like a boat, to not make use of the structures that are already in place – and Escape Boats have definitely not wanted this opportunity, taking full advantage of their barge and everything it has to offer. In other words, the set feels real because it is real. But it’s also unexpectedly spacious. I was shocked that the Zorg Ella housed not one, but two games, and SOS in particular never felt cramped or claustrophobic (with the exception of one space), despite the fact that some spaces were actually quite narrow. The ambient noises of the boat combined with an excellent use of special effects to make the space even more immersive than it already was thanks to the setting.

While SOS isn’t particularly story-driven, there was definitely a narrative, driving the action forward, and helping to pace the game. A pace, which in fact, ramped up to 11 at the climax of the game, putting some very real pressure on the situation with moments of theatricality that were totally unexpected, and so surprising, that I became so fully immersed in what I was doing, to the point that in the back of my mind, I was wondering if the things happening were actually intended to happen.

PUZZLES

I felt like we were flying through SOS, in part because the puzzles just made sense to me. Gordon might disagree, particularly with regards to the second half of the game, but for me, the challenges just seemed to click. Logic, observation, searching, codes – the usual sorts of escape room style puzzles one might expect to find in an escape room made an appearance. But not necessarily in the expected ways.

SOS was full of more tactile and tangible challenges, that while still following an escape room style logic, helped to make the game feel more “real” than simply barring the way with padlocks (not that there’s anything wrong with that). This feeling was also helped along by the fact that the puzzles were not only fair and logical, but also made sense within the context of the game, helping some elements to just become the next most logical thing to do, rather than a “puzzle” to solve.

GM/CLUE SYSTEM

Marta was a lovely and friendly host, and her enthusiasm was just so infectious. We enjoyed chatting with her before, between and after playing through the games on board the Escape Boat. Since Marta was our GM for both of the games at Escape Boats, she already had a good idea of how we behave as players, and knew just when to give us a nudge using the tried and true intercom system (and in one instance, I’m particularly grateful she chimed in when she did!), but we gave her a pretty easy ride in SOS as we didn’t require much help at all.

ANYTHING ELSE

Of the two games aboard the Zorg Ella, SOS was my favourite, combining an immersive set with great puzzles, and some excellent physical story telling. What’s perhaps most impressive about SOS is that it is the first game built by Escape Boats, but I honestly couldn’t come up with any ways in which more experience with building games would have helped them to make something better than they already have.

Success / Failure

Final Rating:

Team: 2 players – escaped in around 32 mins

Address: Charlotte Quay Dock, Grand Canal Dock, Dublin 4, D04 PX26, Ireland

Website: https://escapeboats.ie

*Disclaimer: we weren’t charged for these tickets, but this has not influenced our review*