The Panic Room – The Gilman Hotel

The Panic Room – The Gilman Hotel.
Location: Gravesend
Game Date 23/08/2017.
Team: Amy & Ian

THIS GAME HAS NOW CLOSED

Theme:
“A private investigator had been looking into the disappearance of important occult artifacts in a derelict coastal town. You lose contact with him so head there yourselves but by the time you arrive night has fallen so you find lodgings in The Gilman Hotel.

This is the same hotel where he had been staying, you head to your room and start to investigate but it seems the locals are on to you. Find out what happened, solve the mystery and reveal the secrets of this strange coastal town…

A lovingly crafted Lovecraftian Escape Room! Authentic, immersive and an amazing tense experience!”

Gilman Hotel, oh how gorgeous you are. I have a love for old, creepy hotels and Gilman delivered on every aspect, with it’s dark wood and overbearing atmosphere. It was spot on. The theming was perfect, and completely immersive. Added to that twists and turns within the game’s story and one of the best openings to a game this is a lesson in how to create a fully realised immersive experience.

Game Play:
Gilman is a hard, scary game. One that saw me screaming and running about like a woman possessed for a great deal of it, leading to us getting completely immersed in the story and trying to rob the joint whilst staying out of earshot of the terrifying hotel owner!
The puzzles are all perfectly in theme to the story. There are a wealth of puzzles again, with searching, word, logic, codebreaking and physical puzzles to contend with.
The flow was superb, and although disrupted by the horror aspect in the room, it was easy to pick the game back up and carry on.
The beauty in the horror aspect is that it turns your brain to putty. This does create a lot of tension and increases the difficulty somewhat, but that is part of the joy and fun of this room! It’s not an easy by any means either way!
You’re also tasked with collecting artefacts throughout the game, you can escape without collecting them all, but dare you risk your successful escape with extra searching and puzzling (I can tell you we didn’t collect all, and we didn’t stay to find them, our brains were mush!)
Enthusiasts, this is doable in small groups… and if you’re brave… a 2. But beware, the tension might cause failure…
Newbies…. take on this difficult room if you dare, the theming, story and attention to detail are worth it whether you escape or not!

Clue System:
Clues were delivered via a screen

Game Host:
Our game host was fabulous, fun and friendly and really helped us out delivering hints and clues when needed! (and we needed a few!)

Did we escape?
Yes! In 52 minutes… I suppose we had enough time to go find the rest of the artefacts, but the game had me and I just wanted to escape!

Website: https://www.thepanicroom.net/
Price:
2 Players £40
3 Players £57
4 Players £70
5 Players £80
6 Players £87.50
7 Players £95
8 Players £100