The Best Brisbane Escape Rooms Reviewed

What is an escape room?

An escape room (or escape game) is a real life puzzle you and your team experience within a custom created room or other relevant space which presents a somewhat realistic situation which you need to escape from.

For example, at the start of an escape room you may find yourself locked in a prison cell, or held handcuffed to a wall in a psychopaths basement. Each story line is different. To escape you will need to find clues and useful tools which may be in plain sight or may be hidden in locked draws or other more secret and hard to find places.

You and your team must work together to progressively find clues and solve puzzles and ultimately conquer the bigger challenge by escaping the room or building holding you captive.

How the Best Escape Room is chosen

A great theme

The best escape rooms have a great theme. Everything within the room and the scenario presented must feel plausible and real in order to bring the theme to life.

Requires cooperation

The best escape rooms require multiple members of a team to cooperate together. You may have some players locked in one cell who must share tools and clues with other team members in a different cell. You may have a challenge which unexpectedly separates one or more members of the team into a sub room which contains essential clues and tools which only they can find. They must find a way to get those clues back to the rest of the team in order to escape from the sub room and for the team to be together to work on the rest of their escape. Having a strong cooperative element encourages team building and makes an escape room perfect for a family, friends, clubs or workmates.

Is realistic and immersive

The best escape rooms feels real. You logically know you are in an escape room, but just like a great suspenseful movie, at key times you get a sudden fright and scream or jump. The decor and artefacts around the room are realistic, and the story line matches everything you sense. The puzzles fit the story line. For example events are listed realistically in a calendar, and tools are found in a locker, and the clues and tools help you to solve realistic problems and puzzles. Puzzles which are basically paper based, or blatantly contrived will detract from the reality of the room and the overall experience.

Fully in-character staff

The appearance and enthusiasm of the staff can have a profound impact of an escape room. It is common for young staff to be playing the role of a prison guard or a psychopath much older and bigger than they are. However, with great wardrobe choices, lots of loud enthusiasm and some brilliant showmanship they can make their engagement with your team extra real. This engagement is often the first part of the escape room event you experience, and it is often what separates the good escape rooms, from the great ones.

Supportive staff (but not too supportive)

Staff are normally watching your team as you progress through the escape room challenge. It is common in an escape room for the team to need a clue to progress to the next step. There are moments when the team can ask for a clue, and there are also times when it is appropriate for the staff to offer a clue in order to improve the experience. Staff who know how to give a little prod in the right direction can improve the overall experience.

However, when staff give a clue too quickly, or give a clue which spoils a challenge, it can detract from the overall experience of escaping the room. When a team member is spending too much inspecting an air vent which is actually just an air vent, it is helpful for staff to say 'team, the air vent does not contain any clues'. Vaguely suggesting some of the items already obtained may need to be put together to find more information is also an appropriate nudge. However, a clue that details how two specific items need to be matched up to get the code to unlock a specific lock spoils the moment.

Cost is not a key factor

Here at 'Best..' we are all about finding the best of everything. Not the best value, just the best!

Unless the cost is prohibitively expensive, we do not consider the cost at all in our ratings. All ratings relate to the experience itself. Our view is that you are not doing an escape room every day, and if you were to do just one this year and you want it to create lasting memories for all team members, where is the best place to go to have that experience?