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Salisbury Escape Rooms
Fisherton Street, Salisbury SP2 7SU
Review by Luke Graham | Game provided courtesy of Salisbury Escape Rooms. Images © Dorset View
Imagine you find yourself locked in a room and the only way to get out is to solve a series of fiendishly clever puzzles. What would you do? Would you buckle under pressure or rise to the occasion?
An unlikely situation, yes, but if you play an escape game, then you can find out how you’d react in real life, in a safe, fun environment.
If you’ve never heard of an escape game before, they’re a mix between a real-life video game, a TV show like ‘The Crystal Maze’, and an immersive theatre experience. You are ‘locked’ into a room (though not really, you can choose to leave at any time) usually themed around a historical or fictional setting, and you are given one hour to escape the room by completing puzzles and challenges. A games master is on hand to guide you through the experience, offering clues and time checks.
I fell in love with escape games ever since playing my first one in 2015. I’ve played games based on time travel, being shrunk to the size of a mouse and escaping a bank vault. So, I was delighted to be invited to play Salisbury Escape Rooms’ latest game ‘A Case of Murder and Marigolds’.
In the game, you are tasked with figuring out who murdered the late botanist Dr Seymour McGuffin and how he was killed by exploring three rooms in his estate.
First, Salisbury Escape Rooms’ production design is brilliant. All the props, game pieces, and set design were top notch and fit the theme of the story, which helped make the game feel more authentic and immersive. Everything worked well, especially the high-end locks and clever bits of electronics and theatrics.
Second, the game itself is also excellent. It is designed so that you gradually unlock three rooms but keep needing to move in between each room to find the clues needed to crack codes, which creates a bit of frantic fun.
There’s also a great mix of types of puzzles, from logic-based riddles to visual challenges, to tests of skill and dexterity. Having this variety means the game will appeal to a wider range of puzzle solver.
I especially loved the sense of humour in the game, with plenty of references to one of my favourite musicals, ‘Little Shop of Horrors’.
We solved the game in 53 minutes and 27 seconds, which was not bad for a team of two, though well off the record of around 33 minutes. The game can be completed in groups of two to six, making it an excellent date night experience or a fun group activity.
Salisbury Escape Rooms has been in the town for around 10 years but was only recently taken over by the current owner Maisie Anderson. Maisie has six years’ experience as a games master and helped design several games before, but ‘A Case of Murder and Marigolds’ is the first game she has designed and built all by herself. It’s a fantastic debut. She was also super enthusiastic and happy to tell us lots of behind-the-scenes details about the game after we solved it.
As a games master, Maisie was excellent, making us feel welcome. When guiding us through the game, Maisie knew when to give us time checks to add on the pressure, and when we asked for help, instead of simply giving us the answer, she gave great clues that pointed us in the right direction. She was also very accommodating and understanding, especially after we had a last-minute issue getting to our game slot.
Whether or not you’ve played escape games before, Salisbury Escape Rooms provides an excellent and entertaining experience. And even if being locked in a room does not sound like your cup of tea, you could get gift vouchers for the amateur sleuth in your life.
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