Rock City Escape: Soup Du Jour (Amersfoort)

A game of two halves

Nuns disappear from the monastery. Nobody knows where they go or what is going on… At the same time, the popularity and reputation of the recently opened restaurant Le Monastère continues to grow. The famous chef Gaston Boucher, awarded a Michelin star for his excellent soup, does not want to share anything about this success and guards his secrets firmly.

In Soup du Jour you have reserved a table for a dinner in our prestigious restaurant, but you will soon discover that in the kitchen nothing is quite as it seems, and that the chef is not so friendly at all…

Break into Gastons’ private test kitchen, but beware: Gaston has a violent temper! If you’re caught it could be your head on the chopping block…

Our fourth game in the Netherlands was at Rock City Escape for Soup Du Jour, a game that was ranked number 133 in the 2023 TERPECAs (down from position 74 the previous year). We planned this trip to play as many of the Top 100 TERPECA games as possible so Soup Du Jour made the cut (as we planned it on the 2022 rankings).

We had hired a car for a couple of days so we could play games in the Netherlands that were not easily accessible by public transport, so after a very pleasant drive down from Amsterdam we arrived at the very imposing building where Rock City Escape were located. To say this building was big would be an understatement, at one point we had to send out a search party to find Liz as she got lost trying to find her way back from the toilets!

We were greeted at the entrance to the building by our host (dressed as a nun) and shown to the rather creepy reception area that was set up like a dining room. In my younger years I (Gord) was actually educated at a convent so this whole set up brought back some very old memories! After a little bit of time, and retrieving a very lost Liz, it was time to get down to business. We were shown through to a secondary waiting area where we could store any belongings and where we put on our nun’s habit – got to blend in after all.

IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN

One thing that the Dutch seem to do well is immersion. An escape room is not just a room full of puzzles, it’s about everything that goes with it to fully immerse you in the world they’ve created; the story, the sounds, the design and of course, the puzzles – all of these were in Soup Du Jour. We encountered a number of spaces in this game and as we did the ambient noises and sound track changed to change the tone of the game.

Arguably the experience started well before our countdown did. The briefings and touchpoints with the GM before the game were all in character and set the scene for what was to come. When we entered the first space it was certainly not a big area, but it soon opened up so we could all spread out a bit and each space we encountered helped to drive the narrative forward.

This is one of those experiences that sucks you in and lets you get comfortable in the light theme, then BOOM. Horror experience. Ok, there was no live actor (which for some reason we expected there would be), but they utilised technology and suspense to make you feel like someone was always just around the corner.

Later in the game you will find that you need to be a little more active to get between the spaces, so if your accessibility is limited it could be worth contacting Rock City Escape to see if there is a work around that would enable you to take part.

PUZZLES

Soup Du Jour had a bit of everything, and there seemed to be plenty to keep us going; searching, observation, teamwork, logic, communication etc.. and the game had a mixture of linear and non-linear puzzle paths. I must admit though, this felt like a game of two halves for us. We seemed to click with the puzzles in the first half and flew through them, but the second half just didn’t gel and caused more frustration than fun. It could be due to the fact that the second half seemed to be darker which made it harder to see things we needed, but it really dampened our experience.

From what I recall, the majority of the puzzles triggered some form of tech (and some of the tech was really cool), but there were also some good old fashioned padlocks too..

GM/CLUE SYSTEM

Our GM/Host, whose name I can’t remember, did a great job of keeping in character before our experience, but then we were able to have a ‘normal’ chat afterwards which was nice.

In the room itself if we needed help it would come over a speaker system from our host, or they used other subtle ways of pointing us in the right direction. Whether that be a subtle world over the speakers or using lighting cues to direct out attention to something that we may have missed.

ANYTHING ELSE

This game had some great moments, some cool tech, and some entertaining jump scares. But I’m not sure it’s the best that the Netherlands has to offer. We enjoyed the first half of the game, but ended up leaving feeling a bit flat thanks to the second half.

Success / Failure

Final Rating:

Team: 4 players (54 mins – 75 min game)

Address: Daam Fockemalaan 22, 3818 KG Amersfoort, Netherlands

Website: https://rockcityescape.nl/