In early 2020, before the pandemic lockdowns, I went to The Escape Game in Austin, Texas with my brother and three of our friends/colleagues. It was incredible. The Escape Game is a large escape room chain. Since then, I have been to a couple other The Escape Game locations, and I've now learned that it wasn't just that room in Austin that was so good. All of their rooms are amazing. On this trip, we did Gold Rush. To this day, it is in my top three favorite rooms.
All of the rooms at The Escape Game are very large with three or four big areas. Their lobbies are usually very small and underwhelming, but they have cool merch.
If you get a chance to do a room at The Escape Game, do it. They're all good, and in my opinion, a few of them are among the best rooms in the country.
My tips for their rooms:
Pay very close attention to details. Search everywhere for clues. The rooms are so well designed that the puzzles blend in with the incredible decor. In a few of their rooms, we just totally missed very important clues because they just looked like they were part of the immersive environment.
Sometimes you will have to go through a small opening to get into a new area, but when you get to the new area, look for a door to open that will let you back into the previous area so that you don't have to crawl/climb back and forth.
Look for symbols that will connect puzzles/clues to locks. Recognizing which puzzles and clues go with which locks will help you solve the puzzles.
Gold Rush
Mike's Difficulty Rating: 3 (out of 5)
Their Difficulty Rating: 7 (out of 10)
There are so many cool elements in this room that I'm hesitant to write about them because I don't want to ruin the surprise...so I won't. This room is just incredibly fun.
We had some beginners in the group, and we got out in about 55 minutes with three hints.
