When 60 to Escape opens a new room, I always find out in the weirdest ways. They rarely advertise ahead of time that a new room is coming, and they quietly release new rooms to roll them out slowly. Because of this, my process for finding out about a new game is by crossing my fingers and checking out the booking page for all three of their locations, then doing a triple take when I see a new icon among the mix.
Last weekend, without any options for an escape room within an hour of home, I yet again took the gamble and checked out the page, expecting nothing. And like always, I did a triple take when I saw the logo for a new game, the Wild, Wilder West.
Everything proceeded normally until I booked, and I was met with another spectacular surprise.
What??? Two rooms in one? The good news was only getting better.
Interestingly, this wasn’t the first time I encountered a setup like this. The other is Escape.exe in Bethlehem, PA. Their second game, Neon Tokyo, allows players to choose a faction at the start of the game, and based on that choice, the game plays out completely differently in the Tokyo streets, with some shared locations but zero shared puzzles.
The setup works surprisingly well. Puzzles for the unchosen path are well concealed, even to the most intensely prying eyes, and you end up with two unique, fully satisfying games. I was very interested in 60 to Escape’s take on this style of game.
There were a few differences. Escape.exe doesn’t branch until you make the choice within the game itself. Wild, Wilder West gives you a different starting point for the game based on your pregame decision. Both approaches work well.
As always, 60 to Escape put together a winner with Wild, Wilder West. They may have even outdone themselves a little with regards to the flourish and presentation elements (e.g. in the intro, spotlights highlight different parts of the room to help frame the story of where you are and why). The props, puzzles, and clues all make perfect sense, and they’re fun to interact with. It’s a perfectly polished experience, and one I’d recommend to experienced and novice solvers alike.
We chose the “good guy” path this time and had a blast. I’m looking forward to coming back soon to play the other track. The elements we saw but didn’t use provided us a great teaser to get us excited about the other experience. It’s also wonderfully unique to be able to play as both the team that conducted the heist and the team that solved it.
I really hope we see this type of innovation more. So much time, thought, and money are poured into individual escape room games that it’s delightful to have more than one chance to visit the same space. I’m not sure if 60 to Escape is going to take this approach with every room they make moving forward, but any time they do it will be a welcome treat.
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