How escape rooms mimic life
As owner of Locktopia Houston, I get to be the game master in the control room and observe all different kinds of groups tackle the challenges of our escape rooms.
I have noticed a few universal truths about how our rooms can reflect how the players tackle real life issues.
It makes sense.
Escape rooms are designed to throw problems at you. How you deal with that says a great deal about how you might act with a real life challenge.
Think about out, in an escape room, you are thrown in a situation with very little information on how to do it, and you no map to how to get it right, AND you only have a limited time to be successful.
This sounds like every day in the real world where we have no instruction manual.
If you have previously played another escape room (or been in a similar situation) you might think you have a leg up, but sometimes making the assumption you know how to do something, means you might miss the simple solution right in front of you.
You over complicate it because you think you know better.
We’ve seen people who walk away from a puzzle because they can’t figure it out, yet they HAVE to get by that puzzle to get the next thing. Or worse, they are SO close and then give up and walk away, when all they had to do was move one egg, or hit that last switch on the left corner.
Other times, I have been blown away with someone’s creative logic and wondered, “why didn’t we do it that way?” Of course, we have also seen people get frustrated trying the same thing over and over again making us want to tell them to take a step back and get a different perspective.
So some helpful hints from the control room (and life maybe) – if you have tried the same thing over and over and can’t get it to work, ask someone in the group if they think you are doing to the correct thing.
If you’re in our game room, and you ask us, “should I continue trying it like this,” we will give you a yes or no answer, probably without charging you a clue.
We want you to succeed.
If we say no, get someone else in your group to look at it with a fresh eye. It might be way more simple than you think.
