Dark and Dungeon-y
The Spanish Inquisition has been established and is commanded by the cruel and fanatical Fray Tomás de Torquemada, he persecutes the accused with an iron fist…
Heresy, witchcraft, sodomy, adultery and fornication are crimes prosecuted by the Inquisition.
You have been captured by the authorities. What are the crimes you have committed? You know it well!Hooded, you are led to the Dungeon. At dawn you will be brought before the Tribunal of the Holy Office…in the meantime Your destiny is in the hands of a sadistic executioner, who will not hesitate to test your resistance.
From the beginning you will find yourself immersed in a dark medieval dungeon, surrounded by instruments of torture and in an environment loaded with the souls of those who succumbed to pain …
Will the fear overcome you? Will you remain motionless?
Our second game at Run Rabbit, having just played Haunted House was Medieval Dungeon. Although these games are both located in the same building, they have different entrances. So between our games, we popped outside to give the GMs time to get ready, and then not long later, the door opened and we entered a darkened room.
In the darkened hallway we were interrogated, insulted, and notified of our crimes. It would appear that our games master was judge, jury and executioner, as before too long we were given our blindfolds and then escorted to our cells.
When booking Medieval Dungeon we were given three options for the game: Investigator, Thriller, or Horror. We obviously chose horror as we assumed it would have the best mix of puzzle and excitement. As it turns out, I’m not sure I would class this as a horror game, but it was still fun.
Both games at Run Rabbit were new to Liz and I, but to our teammates, they were oddly familiar – especially Medieval Dungeon. It would appear that this game is the same as the game of the same name at The Chamber in Prague.
IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN
Medieval Dungeon peaked in the TERPECAs at number 120 back in 2022 but has since mostly faded into obscurity. I can see why it was once popular though, the set design is really quite good and the hosting added to the immersion.
This was a split start, with at least two of the team shut in cells and two others physically restrained. Great for feeling like you were locked in a dungeon, but if there was an emergency, I’m sure how quickly one could escape.
There were ambient noises at all times, a live actor to interact with at times, and the usual sort of props and things one would expect to see in a dungeon of this type. Generally though, most of what we found felt era-appropriate and nothing (like modern padlocks) stood out to us.
From memory, this felt like quite an accessible game. There was one area that needed crawling but I believe this could be bypassed if needed. A couple of areas may have been narrow, but no area felt small. Always worth checking with the venue accessibility is a concern.
PUZZLES
If you’ve ever played a split start game, it will come as no surprise that communication is one of the key puzzle types that you’ll encounter in the dungeon. Other than that: spatial awareness, teamwork, searching, observation, pattern recognition, role playing, and logic were all present.
The puzzles were really rather tactile, but also well made as nothing seemed to show too much wear and tear. As I mentioned earlier, the puzzles generally resulted in a physical trigger, tech, or giving a key or code for a padlock. Any padlocks that were present felt custom and certainly no modern shiny three or four digit padlocks here!
GM/CLUE SYSTEM
We didn’t properly meet our GM until after our game, but I can assure you that he was much more pleasant than his alter ego of the jailer!
Calim was great at playing his role of the jailer, and managed to perfectly deliver his insults with a little humour added in (at our expense) too. After the game, we had a lovely chat and a proper catch up.
Of course it would have been weird if the person who locked us up was also trying to help us escape, so clues came from the disembodied voice of a friendly prisoner in another cell.
I can’t recall ever actually asking or needing help, but that’s just testament to the fact that the puzzles were fair and made sense.
ANYTHING ELSE
If you played Medieval Dungeon at The Chamber in Prague, then maybe don’t play this. If you haven’t played, then this is a fun game, with good design and decent puzzles. It won’t blow you away, but it should still give you a good time.
Success/Failed
Final Rating:
Operation Puzzles Room Design GM/Clues Excitement
Team: 4 Players
Address: C. de Jesús i Maria, 10, Extramurs, 46008 València, Valencia, Spain
Website: https://runrabbit.es/
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