Have you ever been to an escape room? I never had, I know they’re insanely popular but the thought conjures claustrophobic feelings of elevator failure: walls closing in, gasping for air – all that fun stuff…
Thankfully the team at Secret Squirrel Productions, activation specialists and the creators of one of our favourite events Underground Cinema, came up with an abridged escape room (20 minutes). It is based on the upcoming Call of Duty 3, Black Ops and was held from 12pm-12am over a week at Federation Square. The event was free and allocations were taken out in minutes, I couldn’t even get a ticket. Mercifully walk-ins were accepted.
Each group entered the escape room, a re-fashioned shipping container in groups of five. We were given a short intro and set free to solve clues and ultimately escape from the zombie hordes (there were zombies). The room itself had been decked out into a pretty neat burlesque-esque wonderland, the first clue was a cryptic diary which led to the next, the next and the next until we finally made it into a second room. I learned that I’m not that great at solving clues and my dreams of being a CSI detective were ably dashed.
The second room was covered in blood. By this stage, the zombies were pounding against the room and we were fiddling with locks and codes to try and break free. The fear of our team mates was palpable and oh-so-entertaining.
If you want a taste of interactivity join them at the upcoming Underground Cinema, Hope 2.0.
– Rukmal
