Tag Archives: mystery cube

The news spirals out of control

news-spiralMany news stories that have been left untamed for far too long because of DASHmania:

  • This site has never seen quite so many different exit games, up and down the country, excited about the same thing as they have been about the forthcoming The Crystal Maze Live. Look for the crowdfunding campaign to start this weekend, with all the usual caveats about crowdfunding campaigns. This site became even more encouraged when a friend pointed out that @deanjrodgers, key within the critically acclaimed Time Run, will be producing the project.
  • Rather less far away, and also the result of a successful crowdfunding campaign, Enigma Escape of London has announced an opening date of 18th July and a handsome 25% discount if you book by midnight on 17th August. Well worth considering!
  • Some other sites in London are all flourishing: Agent November announced its largest corporate booking yet, with groups enjoying all three of its games in a single day, Mystery Cube has seen its hundredth group play and Mystery Squad has launched a second case, The Ghost of Lord Holland; this isn’t aimed at the usual sizes of groups but is, instead, aimed at groups of 20 to 40 who all want to play together.
  • In Edinburgh, Dr. Knox’s Enigma has three local competitors and all three have been extremely complimentary on Twitter about it; additionally, the game has earned coverage from STV.
  • Also in Edinburgh, an exciting-sounding special offer promotion has been announced between Escape and the local branch of the Hard Rock Cafe; £32/person (except Saturdays) gets you both entrance to one of Escape’s three games and a meal from the Hard Rock Cafe’s Gold Menu. Sounds like two parts of a very good night!

January 2015 Dealwatch: coupons and discounts to play exit games for less

"Special Price" stickerDealwatch is an occasional feature which, as the name suggests, looks out for special offers that exit games are promoting. The frequency of the feature depends more on the availability of deals than anything else. Some ground rules apply:

  • Do check voucher companies’ terms, conditions and guarantees and this site takes no responsibility for deals that fall through for whatever reason, which sadly has happened once;
  • Many of these deals only permit a limited number of vouchers to be purchased and then the deal will expire. It’s quite possible that deals may have expired between being published below and your attempt to use them;
  • This non-commercial site does not attract any commission for promoting these deals, or for you using them;
  • These deals are not exclusive in any manner.

As it happens, none of the discounts quoted this time do seem to rely on social buying services, but the principles apply nevertheless.

Mystery Cube of Wimbledon is the most recent new location to open; as is often the case, a location is most likely to offer discounts as, and just after, it opens. Booking using the code Mystery Cube will offer a 50% reduction for teams playing between 24th January, the presumptive opening date, and 7th February. The regular price is also one that might be more likely to be found in the provinces than in London at large.

Another recent opening took place at The Great Escape Game of Sheffield, and they too posted an opening offer to their Facebook page. As described on a linked story at TicketArena, a £20 discount is available for a limited time (though no clear limit is specified, but why wait?) for teams booking using the code GR8TA20.

One more recent opening still happened at The Escape Room of Manchester, who also have a limited-time opening offer with no deadline specified. The site has a total of five different rooms, some that will take teams of sizes two to five, and others that will take teams of up to six. You can get a 20% discount by booking using the code ESCAPE20; another one to take advantage of sooner rather than later.

Lastly, one site that’s not quite such a recent opening is Can You Escape of Edinburgh, though they have already climbed to number seven in the TripAdvisor attractions charts for the city, a list with three sites all now in the top nine. A recent Facebook announcement suggests that student teams who book a slot on a Thursday using the STU-295-ZMV code receive a 20% discount; “just make sure your team bring their student cards”. Facebook suggests this Thursday discount will be running until mid-February; perhaps it’ll last longer, perhaps not – best not wait to find out the hard way!

((Edited to add:)) Another deal that came a day too late but is far too good to ignore: Room Escape Adventures of London have released a Wowcher for their Trapped In A Room With A Zombie show, reducing the price of one of the twelve tickets for each show from £28 plus booking fee to just £14. More about this exciting development soon, hopefully! This deal will only be able until the end of Friday night; vouchers booked in this way can be used until the end of April.

As ever, if you know of other coupons, deals, vouchers or competitions, please send them through. If your site has a offer not listed above, please assume incompetence rather than ill-intent; get in touch and this site will happily spread the good news. (Alternatively, if you would prefer that this site does not list your coupon, or if the details of the offer are mangled, that’s fine too; again, please get in touch.)

Looking ahead to 2015: new exit games and new rooms

Red "Coming Soon!" ink stampThis site has already looked forward to puzzle events and puzzle competitions that it knows about for 2015, though even since then there have already been two additions to the calendar. So what developments are planned for 2015 on the exit room side of things?

NEW SITES

The Escape Room Manchester opens on 15th January, and bookings are still available for day one if you want to play Prison Break or The Secret Lab there; if you want to play Slaughter House, The Mummy or Room 13 then you’ll have to wait a day or two longer. As well as having five exciting-looking games to choose from, as previously discussed, the prospect of what the site might stage at its exclusive bar is an enticing one. The discount code ESCAPE20 will earn you 20% off your booking!

A little later, a holding page announces that a new business called Clue Finders is set to open on 22nd January, though no location has yet been made public. This site looks forward to further announcements and learning more when information becomes available. Additionally, a recent announcement that the official launch of the Breakout Games Aberdeen web site is imminent also tantalises; the location in Aberdeen has been posted as a teaser and this site eagerly anticipates finding out the specifics. As the announcement says, “There will be a launch offer to celebrate the new opening so keep a keen eye on the Facebook page for more information coming very soon“.

Slightly later still, this site has already looked forward to the launch of The Mystery Cube in Wimbledon. Bookings are not yet available but the statement on the site that “Cube Missions between 24th January – 7th February are half-price! Simply use the coupon code: MYSTERY CUBE” goes a long way towards setting people’s expectations. No connection with Phillip Schofield, but this site looks forward to giving the game a trial run.

NEW ROOMS

As previously announced, Breakout Manchester suggested about three weeks ago that they will be opening their fifth room, Infiltrate, in mid-January. As it stands, it’s already been quite heavily booked and the earliest that you can still book to play it is a single slot available on January 20th. The site also posted a job advertisement on Gumtree which hints at further developments to follow. It’s going to be an exciting year for them.

Clue HQ have recently leaked a series of teaser images leading up to a big announcement of their plans to launch a third room; it’s worth browsing around the in-character National Bank of Money site to get more of a feel for the world in which this game’s story is set, and this site’s interview with Clue HQ proprietor Stuart Rowlands reveals a little more. It’s clear that many people are eagerly awaiting this!

Tick Tock Unlock posted an exciting start-of-the-year message reflecting on the progress they have made in their first seven months or so of business. (It’s great to hear that they have attracted players from 6 to 91 years of age, for instance!) They would have a strong claim, by a number of metrics, to be the most successful single-room site in the country. The message concludes “(…)keep your eyes peeled as we will have some very exciting news to share shortly“; always great to read!

This site will be keeping an eye out for new games and new rooms and will take delight in bringing the news to you when it can. It’s always fun to be surprised when new games take off and turn out to have been running for a while already before the word got this way; who knows when that will happen next?

Coming soon to Wimbledon: Mystery Cube

Mystery Cube logoEscaping from an exit game within 60 minutes may sound easy, but can you do it… in the Mystery Cube?

Word reached this site today about a new game under construction, now taking bookings from January 24th, 2015. The site is located near Wimbledon; take Tramlink to Morden Road and it’s five minutes away in a south-easterly direction. (The map on the site acts as a pathfinder.) Games are attractively priced at £50 for a team of two to £70 for a team of five, not a great quantity to charge by exit game standards, particularly in London. (There’s also a half-price coupon code for the first fortnight, so consider making your response with unusual velocity.) Will this game cause a revolution in the field? We shall see.

When people enter the Mystery Cube its energy levels start to fluctuate and we can only keep it stable in space and time for one hour at a time. After that we cannot predict what will happen to the Mystery Cube – with you inside. Therefore you have only 60 minutes to complete your challenge inside the Mystery Cube and escape so good teamwork is essential.

It is not clear whether the game has anything to do with the nine lives – trial run – simplify structure of you-know-what, or whether it’s a more conventional exit game alluding for thematic purposes only. Either would be very cool. There’s nothing to suggest that you won’t face a barrage of puzzles delivered in a quick fire fashion, whereby your team will have to balance their focus between the competing challenges. Surely failure to finish in time will lead to your expulsion without honour through the usual aperture.

As a sidenote, TV music composer Nick Foster has made a cascade of possibly relevant tunes available on this playlist on his Soundcloud, if you can bear the intensity. If you can’t, or if you don’t get the references, go and enjoy the game once it opens and don’t let your unfamiliarity be a barrier!