Unlock! Escape Adventures takes a similar approach, but works with a companion smartphone app. Collaboratively solving a tricky puzzle feels massively rewarding, and the game leads you from one challenge to the next at a pace that doesn’t get dull for a second.Įxit isn’t the only recent game to explore this theme. ![]() They are also brilliantly conceived: complex enough to be genuinely challenging, but never so difficult that they feel unfair. To escape, you’ll need to discover a set of hidden codes, each concealed behind a different puzzle.ĭescribing any of them would spoil the experience of solving them, but they revolve around decks of cards representing different locations and objects, and they rely heavily on logic, observation and lateral thinking. Exit: The Game traps players in one of three locations: an ancient Egyptian tomb creepy abandoned cabin or – as our group played – a sinister science lab. It can all feel like a full-scale theatrical production, but a new game aims to condense the experience into something that fits on your kitchen table. Many feature professionally designed sets, impressive props and even actors playing allies and antagonists for escapees to encounter on their adventures. Like a cut-rate version of The Crystal Maze, they see players locked in a room and forced to solve a series of fiendish puzzles in order to get out. Over the past couple of years, escape room games have become something of a craze. If you have any appreciation for story in games, though, this is a must-play.Įxit escape room game. There are a couple of other niggles including some anachronistic dialogue and Jack-The-Ripper-themed cases that get substantially darker than anything in the Holmes canon, which may put some players off (a previous set of cases has less disturbing subject matter). In fact, to get the most out of each case, I’d recommend treating it less as a game than as a kind of interactive whodunnit. ![]() To win, you’ll have to be ruthlessly efficient in your investigation, which means missing out on side-scenes, supporting characters and little touches that add immensely to the feel and flavour of the game. As you’d expect, it’s a real challenge, but it’s also Consulting Detective’s greatest weakness, because while the game goes to incredible lengths to create a rich, bustling Victorian metropolis, it punishes players for taking the time to explore it. ![]() You’ll win if you manage to arrive at the facts while following fewer leads than Holmes himself. Photograph: Owen Duffy/The GuardianĮventually, when you think you can solve the case, you’ll read a final scene where Holmes explains how he arrived at the solution. The game goes to impressive lengths to build a living Victorian London, including a set of newspapers with information that may or may not be useful to your inquiries. You’ll have flashes of inspiration when the disparate elements of a case suddenly slot together in your mind, and groan with frustration when it turns out you’ve been derailed by a well-placed red herring. You’ll visit underworld contacts in East End pubs, probe the upper echelons of Kensington society and uncover family scandals that powerful people would rather stayed hidden.Īs you examine crime scenes, track down witnesses and interview suspects you’ll build a web of information, uncovering hidden motives and spotting holes in alibis. Each casebook is divided into scenes featuring different encounters, like a Choose Your Own Adventure book on steroids. You’ll start by reading an introductory scene that describes a horrible crime or impenetrable mystery, and then you’ll be let loose to investigate however you see fit. Now released in an updated and expanded version, it casts players as Holmes’ agents, working together to scour the streets of London and crack a succession of baffling cases.Įach game revolves around a casebook, which contains information you’ll discover as you play. Over the years he has battled nazis, confronted malevolent alien gods and even collaborated on a case with Batman.īut for my money, the most exciting take on the genre-defining investigator is Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective, a tabletop mystery game first published in 1981. Photograph: Owen Duffy/The Guardianĭesigners: Gary Grady, Suzanne Goldberg and Jérôme Ropertįew characters in the history of fiction can have been reimagined as often as Sherlock Holmes. ![]() Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective tasks players with solving a series of mysteries in Victorian London.
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