Fun from the start
Only for the brave! Your team will need to conquer their fears. You will need to use all of your skills and teamwork to make it out with your lives. This scary and gruesome experience will test you to the max! Can your team survive?
*Since we played, Tricky Escapes have been rebranded to Cluetopia
Our second room at Tricky Escapes, having just escaped Magic & Mystery (with the fastest ever time for a team of two) was promising to be quite a change of pace as we were set to take on The Damned. This was Tricky Escape’s newest addition so we were excited to see how they may have upped their game.
We later found out The Damned actually takes place in an extension that they built just for it so it has much more space than their other rooms. So much space that they’ve even created a secondary waiting area specifically for this room. As venues grow it’s nice to see them take some time to get the basics right, like plenty of seating.
Our GM (and owner), Glenn took us to this secondary waiting area and proceeded to give us the usual health and safety talk. With a bit of a difference though, he explained that sometimes they will include a live actor and asked if we were ok with that. We had no problems with it as it was a horror room after all, but I’d imagine if you were a bit sheepish they would probably agree to not include the live actor.
With the formalities out of the way it was time to start the room, and what a start…
PUZZLES
From the moment you start this room you are being tested and every puzzle is designed to challenge you in different ways, there is a little bit of searching involved but it’s definitely not a search heavy room, and there are a lot of decent puzzles to keep you going.
We found the room to be non-linear meaning we could split up and work on different things at the same time, I actually missed a few puzzles as Liz had solved them by the time I finished what I was working on (fortunately she explained them at the end).
Observation is key to this room and you’ll need to make sure you look at and challenge everything. Even the live actor was integrated into one puzzle to add a bit of fun (not in a scary way, just an unexpected way) and it gave me a laugh.
I hate it when you’re in a room and one of the puzzles requires you to use Pi to fifteen decimal places using only your memory, fortunately they are kind at Tricky Escapes and give you a digital notepad to jot things down on (and you don’t need to know Pi).
IMMERSION/ROOM DESIGN
Often you’ll be in a serial killers house and there will be padlocks and puzzles that feel rather out of place in their surroundings – surely if you’re a serial killer you’d want easy access to your collection of body parts, right? The Damned gets around that by making this a test of your intelligence to see if you are worthy of living, so everything in the room actually fits.
The room started strong and was a nice twist that we hadn’t seen before that meant the fun was there right from the off. The strong theming continued through the room and there was a good flow as you progressed through the killer’s lair. Ok one section lost its surprise as the live actor appeared from somewhere where we otherwise wouldn’t have known there was a passageway, but that’s very minor.
They’ve done a good job of getting the balance of light and darkness in here, at no point is it so dark that you get frustrated but equally the gloomy lighting really adds to the story.
I particularly enjoyed the ending as it felt like you had finished but then there was one more thing you had to do before you could exit, perhaps not so enjoyable if you’re low on time though.
GM/CLUE SYSTEM
There was a nicely integrated TV in the room which showed how long you had left and how many clues you had remaining (they were limited to three). As we didn’t actually need any clues we can only assume they would have been delivered as a message on this screen, and going on our experience in their other room, they would have been delivered promptly.
ANYTHING ELSE
The Damned has firmly staked out its place as a horror room, but with friendly owners you can probably tone this down if you’re not a fan of jump scares and live actors. Ignoring the horror bits, it’s a solid room with flowing puzzles and fun from the very start to the end.
Success / Failure
Final Rating:
Operation | |
Puzzles | |
Room Design | |
GM/Clues | |
Excitement |
Team: 2 players – escaped in 28:53 a new (non-testing) record, with no clues
Address: 175 Old Rd, Clacton-on-Sea CO15 3AU
Website: https://cluetopia.uk/
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