The Only 2 Ways Of Doing It In Doubles!

Many Escape Rooms offer different ways of enjoying the rooms as they have more than one room on site. When being a group (by group I mean 4 or more) there are so many ways of doing things....but one of my favourite has got to be doing it in doubles! But how you ask? The answer is so obvious!

SPLITTING UP INTO TWO TEAMS...

1. ...and each team goes into a DIFFERENT puzzle escape room. Who will make it out first? But SORE LOSER ALERT! These come up with so many reasons for them having won themselves. I say this because I always come up with a million reasons myself! But despite this, it is still such a hoot and a great way of adding some competitiveness to an escape room. I've tried this out in so many ways. Couple vs couple. Girls vs boys. Family vs family. Office vs office. The list is practically endless. Being in the same group as someone you don't know as well also adds to the excitement and what a great way of increasing time together to get to know one another better (or at least feel more comfy).

2. ...and each team goes into the SAME puzzle escape room. A number of escape rooms are now offering the same room at the same site. So you can literally challenge your mates to see who manages to escape first without the sore loser excuses! Sort of! Again...guilty!

Bookescaperooms.com has many rooms available for such competition. The Robbery which is the perfect adventure for wannabe-thieves. Your aim in this game is to rob a highly secured vault and, obviously, escape the room. At this same address, in Warsaw Poland, there also is Time Machine, where you travel through time and space to gather as much information as you can to escape. If you find a third group, challenge them to try Laboratory, which tests your creativity, perception, intuition and science skills. Or else if you're in London check out Chain Reaction where the bunker that was your lifeline has become the very thing that can kill you so you must find a way out before it's too late. Your adversaries can compete in Prison Break in which you must break out of a jail cell which you find yourself in after a night out. Are you up for the challenge?

For the even more competitive (option 2) we suggest Introduction To A Secret Society in Lisbon where you must infiltrate a secret society and take part in its initiation rites. You can here compete with not only one but TWO other groups! 

If you read One Article about Travelling with Teenagers, Read This One!

Travelling on your own or in a couple is quite different to travelling with children. More so when they reach the dreaded teenage years where nothing you come up with is fun for them. Everything changes - how much time you spend at an attraction, even the attractions visited, to the music you play in the car whilst driving, to the eye-rolling, grumpy and sullen looks on their faces, avoiding eye contact, the incessant complaining or the "Are we there yet?" chorus.  Many times they are busy watching a show or listening to songs or speaking to friends on their tablets or mobiles, making earphones their best friend throughout the vacation. This obviously completely defeats the purpose of quality family time. Many times, parents give up on the thought of going on vacation with their teenage children as it can be quite, well, difficult. After all, for adolescents, parents are not the favourite travelling companion.The thought of a "fun" vacation seems like an impossible feat.

What teenagers need are fun and exciting things to do during the vacation. Many times the reason behind the whole vacation is getting closer as a family and spending quality time together. The best way to achieve this is to find activities that promote team work. That's where puzzle escape rooms come in. They're just perfect on all accounts.

Keep Calm and GO TEAM!

It's rather hard, if not impossible, to escape a puzzle escape room if there's little or no communication. Puzzle escape rooms will make you want to share what you've discovered no matter how grumpy or "hormone-fueled" the kids are. You all know your goal and as soon as you enter a room, you all work as a team to achieve it. 

Puzzle escape rooms help you provide enough energy to entice everyone in the family, no matter the age. What a great way to prise them away from their gadgets, because, let's be honest, there's no way they're going to travel without them! They're going to forget about them as soon as they start playing, I can guarantee it! 

At the end of the day, family vacations are where so many memories are made and trust me, they won't forget this!

Have you ever gone to a puzzle escape room with an adolescent, how did it go?

5 Worst Ways to Escape Puzzle Rooms

At bookecaperooms.com nothing gets us going quite as much as a good puzzle room. Each time we figure out the right combination or decipher a code, our heart begins to race a little bit faster, so that by the end of the game we can barely keep it in our chests! We are sure that you, as many of our fans out there, feel the same way.

We want to make it a little bit easier for your to win your next puzzle room and aim to be the fastest team, so we got in touch with some of our partners around the world who design and run their escape rooms so that they can share some tips & tricks which can help you.

So here you have it, the 5 Worst Ways to Escape Puzzle Rooms.

1. The team from Quest Mission says you should not keep the goal in mind. After all, the journey is more important than the destination. Escaping is not the goal of the game. They just call it an escape room to tease you! At the end of the day it is important to keep in mind that you are not going there to enjoy yourself!

2. Do not work as a team, wise words from the teams at Hidden Rooms and Rimini Escape. Whenever has working as a team been of any help? There's no I in team, but there is an M and an E! Discussing, of any sort, is not recommended! Do not share your ideas, discoveries and findings at any point. If you find something and do not know what to use it for the best thing to do is hide it where the others won't find it. That way you can get back to it later, maybe you will find some other clue to help you solve it. In the meantime, give your team mates other puzzles, preferably ones that you have already solved. That way, they won't be busy getting in your way.

3. The same advice is given by the One Hour Left team who suggest that if you get stuck, you shouldn't speak up. Do not show any weakness, that is why escape rooms are not recommended for couples or groups of friends. It is you against every one else and the game is more fun with a group of strangers. Asking for help? Shameful! Just shameful!

4. Do not be curious. The SOBBA Quest team have seen what happens to cats when they get curious and they do not recommend it! Being curious and motivated will lead to others feeling the same way and that could have undesired effects in an escape room where time is running out.

5. The team at Escape Room Live DC suggests that when you find a clue you focus on it and forget about your surroundings, in a sort of, watched kettle always boils kind of way! The people at Hidden Rooms agree and suggest you don't search for more clues when you get stuck. They also suggested getting a Master's degree in theoretical physics, or, at the very least, rely on Sheldon Cooper to figure out the puzzles for you.

We hope you enjoyed reading these suggestions from some of the top puzzle escape rooms. Remember, the advice given was all in code, we wouldn't want anyone to misinterpret the instructions after all.

Do you have any useful advice for completing puzzle rooms? Add them in the comments below, but remember to do it in code too.

The Insider's Guide to My First Time

I had no idea what I was doing...we are locked in a room and we have to find our way out and escape....in an hour! All I can see are a bunch of locked cabinets. How is that supposed to help? After a few minutes, though I must admit it felt like longer, we realize that one cupboard is unlocked. We open it. Speakers! Maybe this was the one that was supposed to be locked. After all, why would there be speakers?

Ah! Perhaps there's a reason for this. We tried asking the game master to share his clues, but alas, he was quite reluctant to speak! As time goes by, we start understanding a bit more what we must do and how every little piece in the room links to something else. It's just finding the link that's the hard and tricky part.

Put your detective hats on and start working, I told myself.

At a point in time we made our way into a room and realize that to complete this puzzle we need something from the previous room. I try to open the door! It's locked! A heated argument pursues with the stress of the time inching ever closer to zero. "Put some force into it! It wasn't locked a second ago!" After what seems like an eternity, Mr. Game Master reopens the door for us to get the missing link to the puzzle.

We make it out of the puzzle escape room with one minute to spare. What a rush! You can actually feel my heart racing!

We finally get to meet Mr. Game Master, the man behind the screens, who told us that not many players actually manage to finish and escape the room within the 60 minutes. Our success feels even sweeter since this was our first time in an escape room. Though surely, not our last.

This made me wonder...did you succeed on your first time? Or did you need just one or two more minutes? Share your experience with the group.

Remember, do not reveal any puzzle details!

5 Myths About Puzzle Escape Rooms

For many of you who have accepted the challenge of puzzle escape rooms and succeeded, or came tantalizingly close to, you know that few activities offer the same level of fun and excitement. Puzzle escape rooms truly are one of the best unique attractions when going abroad or when you are looking for a fun night out with friends.

We have asked many of you for your thoughts and we thank those who sent in their answers about puzzle escape rooms (if we didn't ask you for your opinion then you are probably not on our list, click here to fix this right now!)

The team at bookescaperooms.com was surprised with a few common myths or misconceptions some people have about puzzle escape rooms and we are at hand to clarify them:

• Puzzle escape rooms are scary - Wrong!

Rooms are themed to specific scenarios. There are rooms decorated to look like an office in New York 1930s, others that look like a pirate ship, others yet that look like a boardroom. Whilst there are a few rooms which offer a more terrific scanario, such as a jail or mortuary, the aim is to set the mood, not to scare you.

• Puzzle rooms are claustrophobic - Wrong!

Generally speaking all rooms have open spaces and fit up to 6 to 8 people comfortably. Puzzles are well spaced out and you won't be stepping onto each other's feet to get around. If you feel comfortable on a plane for an hour's flight, then you will definitely be at ease in an escape room. What's more, the room is constantly monitored so in case of any danger the door can be opened immediately.

• Seen one escape room, seen them all - Wrong!

Our puzzle escape room operators prides themselves of creating unique and innovative puzzles, ciphers, assemblies and challenges. They represent some of the best and most creative escape rooms in the world. No two are ever quite the same, no matter where in the world you go.

• You need to be an Indiana Jones to win - Wrong!

Puzzle games make you the protagonist of your own mystery story. That being said, you don't need to be a detective mastermind to succeed. All you need is common sense, logic and intuition. The puzzles can get challenging and the stress of the countdown doesn't help, but if you stay calm and reason things out, no puzzle is impossible to solve.

• Hard to book online - Well...

As things stand it can be challenging to find the right escape room in the city you wish. However that is all about to change with bookescaperooms.com as players will be able to find and book some of the best puzzle escape rooms around the world in just two clicks. What's more, players receive a special discount and those who join our Enigma Members Club also get unique promotions.

Is anything keeping you from trying a puzzle escape room?

Let's start from the beginning: What are Puzzle Escape (or Exit) Rooms?

In our word, they are FUN!

In more detail however, Puzzle Escape Rooms are the translation of a very popular video game into a real life game, primarily intended for adults.

The game is played in one or more rooms. Each room is decorated to a particular theme, examples include WW2, a jail, a space ship, etc. The room(s) is full of furniture and other objects, each of which could be a clue or a puzzle that would help the team to escape the room.

The puzzles are increasingly clever and can include anything from code deciphering, working out calculations, assembling many objects in a particular shape and the list is endless. More modern themed puzzle escape rooms also use touch screens and automated components to make the game more exciting and fun.

You might think that puzzles, such as crossword puzzles, could be boring, and you might be right. However, the puzzles used in these games are highly engaging, require a team effort and use so many props that you cannot possibly get bored. Props include golf clubs, torches, mirrors, boats, solar panels, etc.

To add to the intensity of the game excitement there is also a time limit, normally 60 minutes but sometimes this could change. Sounds like a lot of time? Well, it isn't! In fact, with so many puzzles and games to complete in this time, only a small percentage of elite gamers can proudly boast that they escaped the room within the time limit. Many others, do not make it. 

So the question you need to ask yourself is, AM I CLEVER ENOUGH TO ESCAPE THE ROOM?

bookescaperooms.com has made the process of finding and booking your escape rooms easy. All you need to do is log on and search for the city that you are in. There are escape rooms is almost all major cities in the world.

Have you ever been to an escape room? Tell us your experience and if you escaped on time or not. We'd love to hear from you.