Location: Chester
Game Date: 19/05/2022
Team: Amy & Ian
Duration: 60
Theme:
“You are survivors of a zombie apocalypse and for many years, an elite group known as ‘The Network’ have been living in the underground, tasked with keeping the generators running and powering ‘Safe Zones’ around London. The generators have stopped working and communications with The Network have been lost. You have no choice but to form a team of volunteers and journey down to the station to investigate. Good luck, the fate of humanity is in your hands.”
Dead End takes place in the same space as “Disturbed” and it’s hard to believe it’s the same area, it is a complete transformation!
The set looked great, dingy… abandoned with a fantastic sense of foreboding. The attention to detail in the set was excellent, with all bases covered, the room had the level of detail that when in place makes the set more immersive and is not necessarily noticed, but you do notice it when it’s not there. Tremendous set, and a big space. Dim lighting was used, but this was not detrimental to the gameplay, and was used purely in a thematic sense. (plus there were plenty of good bright torches provided!)
The immersion was excellent, and we found ourselves lost in the game from the moment we set foot through the door.
A real LEAP up in standard for Breakout (and the Chester rooms are all very good anyways) but if this is the direction they’re taking, I’m very, very excited to see what they come up with in the future, this did not feel like a typical Breakout Franchise room, this room has the stamp of independent design on it.
The room is large enough for the max team of 5 players.
Game Play:
A fairly open game, that had a fantastic mix of puzzles, word, logic, searching, observation, communication, teamwork and some light physical puzzles.
Each and every puzzle was perfectly on theme and fitted into the overall story of the room very well. Nothing was out of place or the scope of the story.
The puzzles themselves were excellent, with each and every single one having the most wonderful ah-ha moments due to the clear, faultless logic behind them. These are the types of puzzles that are never tedious and the joy of solving them kept us engaged and enthusiastic for the next puzzle and moment in the game.
The flow was just perfect, with the game being fairly open there is enough to bounce around in and it was always clear what related to what due to the absence of any red-herring (just wonderful!)
Signposting was a dream, with some excellent pointers baked into the story of the game, this led to some slick signposting and encouraged us to really get into the room and look around thoroughly, helping us later on in the game.
An incredibly skillfully designed game, packed with fun puzzles, tension and a great storyline. Thoroughly pleasing (and on a personal note, re-ignited the fire to play games for both myself and Ian since it had died down a bit in the last couple of months due to some expensive, yet very sub-par experiences)
Clue System:
Clues were delivered via
Game Host:
Paul was our game host, and he was fantastic again, we got to chat for a little while after the game and his passion for this room was shining through, and quite rightly so, it’s a room he should most certainly be proud of!
Did we escape?
Yes, in 28 Minutes!
Website: https://breakoutchester.com
Price: off-peak/peak
2 Players £40/44
3 Players £51/60
4 Players £64/72
5 Players £75/85
Brit of an Escape Habit 