Atherton Escape Rooms – Train Waiting Room

Atherton Escape Rooms – Train Waiting Room.
Location: Atherton
Game Date 15/06/2017.
Team: Amy & Ian

Theme:
“You have missed your connecting train in a remote station in the dead of night. The waiting room door becomes mysteriously locked. Using all your skills & with clues to hand, can you escape the room to get your next connection before the final whistle blows. Not all is at it seems!”

Theming in the room was of a good standard, and to a very good finish, there was a fair amount of immersion, and attention to detail,  but the room could have done with having some ambient sound which would have upped the immersion. The use of the real brick wall in the ticket room was a lovely touch!
The room is spacious, and uncluttered which leaves little to search, and just enough to set the theme. There was not a massive amount of story, but there wasn’t need for it after reading the blurb it was that we were trapped in the waiting room and had to get out!

Game Play:
A strictly linear game, which compromised mainly of observational puzzles, with a couple of word and “key for a key” moments thrown in. Enthusiasts, be aware… you may overcomplicate things in this room!
The flow was a bit stop-start… I don’t know if this was down to our lack of observation or the room itself, we would open something… get something out and then be thinking… where do we go now, there seemed to be no obvious direction… in that it IS a linear game but almost feels open  (I suppose there are open elements later in the game) as the clues don’t strictly lead on to the next, you’re more likely to get something you need for later in the game than the next puzzle for the next lock.
With that being said, the puzzles were logical, and mainly on theme (except for one, which is a lovely fun puzzle but not sure why the piece would be in a train station…as it was, at the basic level a jigsaw) as it happened, the “jigsaw” puzzle turned out to be my favourite of the hour!
I have read a few other reviews on the final puzzle in this room, and whilst I agree that it could get very, very confusing and frustrating with the elements coming together. The actual puzzle itself was a lot simpler than I expected it to be and we cracked it with ease. (One case where we DIDN’T over complicate)
Enthusiasts, take a small team to keep the difficulty up… Newbies, 4 or 5 would be fine!

Clue System:
Atherton’s clue system is a bit of a different one, there is a screen in the room where clues are delivered and you get 3 “clues” throughout the hour… You can also get nudges in the right direction at the Game Host’s discretion.
This makes me wonder, why have the 3 “clues” at all… just getting hints at the game hosts discretion would be perfect (I may be a bit biased as this is my favourite way of hinting and I am not a fan of “Self Cluing”)
It’s not a bad system, it works. I just prefer the “free hints” method

Game Host:
Hayley was our game host and she was lovely, so so friendly, warm and welcoming and ran our game really well, giving us great nudges along the way! We stayed and chatted for quite a while after the games, we could have talked forever!

Did we escape?
Yes, in 49 minutes!

Website: https://www.athertonescaperooms.co.uk/
Price:
2 Players £36
3 Players £51
4 Players £64
5 Players £70
6 Players £70