If a game does lend itself to (eg) multiple similar combo locks, then give us some signposting to correlate the solution back to the relevant lock. Get the key to open the lock to get the key to open the lock to get the key to… Getting a 4-digit code and scrambling your team to start dialling it into several otherwise unremarkable padlocks was fun… five years ago. But a room full of locks has been done now, and all too often it’s been done badly.

The second game I ever played was like an explosion in a padlock factory and I was in hog heaven. I’m almost loath to include this as I love padlocks. Let’s see some characters, revelations, love interests, plot twists let’s have an interactive movie experience! Surely this is a shoo-in for crime scene games, murder-mystery scenarios and the like? “You’re in a room, you have 60 minutes to escape” just doesn’t cut it anymore. I want to play games which tell a story, where the story drives the game forwards. Time was that an escape room was “here’s a bunch of puzzles, solve them, win” with some tenuous bookending to explain why you’re in a prison / laboratory / cheese shop / whatever. In no particular order: LACK OF NARRATIVE

This is supposed to be looking forwards rather than critical and I hope it’s taken in the spirit it’s intended. Whilst everyone else was out celebrating New Year’s Eve I was sat at home with Covid, so I accidentally wrote a thing. ⭐ Things Escape Rooms Need To Stop Doing in 2022 ⭐ What do you think about this list? Anything you think should be added? Let us know in the comments.

He first posted this on the UK Escape Room Enthusiasts group, but we thought it was too good to be lost in Facebook so we asked Alan if he would be happy for us to post this on our our site – fortunately he said yes! This post is written by Alan Coo, someone well known and well respected (well we think so) in the escape room community. This post is a bit of a first for Review The Room, it’s the first post that we’ve published that has actually been written by a guest blogger.

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