Christina and I planned for a weekend in Detroit and beyond, but it was our stop on the way in Jackson, MI, that ended up being one of the highlights of our trip.
We didn’t know much about EpIQ Escapes, but it had the winning exacta of being directly on our route and having good reviews on Google, so we were up for an adventure. We called and Savanah was very helpful with getting us set up with a room at right about the time we were scheduled to pass through Jackson.
Right off the bat we appreciated that the owners of EpIQ, Savanah, Sheridan, and Shane, were traveling puzzle enthusiasts much akin to ourselves, and their lobby has a US map with pins marking all the different locations visited along with the victory photos. We anticipated we were in for a well-designed game when we saw how passionate the ownership was about escape room games.
The room we played that evening was called Escape the 90s, which had a hilarious setup involving 90s staples like Napster, Titanic, and Y2K fever. The room works for both players who grew up in the 90s, who will recognize the authenticity of the design, as well as younger players who will marvel at seeing current icons like Leonardo DiCaprio, Usher, and Justin Timberlake when they looked like they were fourteen.
The puzzles were very well designed. Some of my favorite puzzles were the simplest, as the EpIQ team found ways to turn common items into unexpected puzzle components. There was a lot to interact with in the room and the game rewarded searching high and low and considering all options.
Christina and I remarked afterwards about just how much puzzle content the team was able to pack into the room and how much there was for us to both work on. The room was incredibly rewarding at each stage, up to and including finding the final piece to solve the room’s challenge (which I wont spoil) and escaping the room. Though the two of us were able to make it through, there was plenty to work on and search at all times and it would have been a good room to have a few extra sets of eyes in.
We were lucky enough to have all three owners present at the time of our visit and chatted with them at length about memorable escape room experiences. We could have talked for hours but we still had further to drive before calling it a night.
That’s not the end of our story with EpIQ, though. Given how much we enjoyed our experience, we were crossing our fingers that they’d have an opening in one of their other rooms during our return trip back to Chicago. Sunday afternoon after grabbing a bubble tea in Ann Arbor, we were thrilled to find out that we could try EpIQ Escape’s Game Show room. We sped a little on our way back.
Upon opening the door to the Game Show room, we were struck by how vibrant, how FUN, the room was. The game show concept was thematically well-realized, with every part of the room covered in puzzles and contraptions related to the core concept of the game show – sweets and desserts. The colors were vivid and really helped us feel we were doing something out of the ordinary.
If you’re familiar with shows like The Price is Right, where contestants can play a gauntlet of different types of games en route to winning prizes, then the setup of the Game Show room will immediately feel familiar. The challenges in the room can be tackled simultaneously, but each was challenging and Christina and I often opted to stick together to make sure we were executing each appropriately. As with the 90s room, large groups would have plenty to work on.
All the puzzles felt unique and fit right in with the core theme. The team at EpIQ built a lot of content not just for the puzzles but also for the story/theming, including a frenetic animated mascot called Candi Caine. It was a very well-designed experience, not just as a collection of puzzles but also as an overall narrative.
On our way home, we didn’t have as much time to chat with the owners, but we still really appreciated the experience they provided us. For a challenging, interactive experience, the team’s rooms are top notch and their passion for their work really shows. It’s encounters like this that remind us why we love escape rooms so much.
As we hit the road for our remaining four hours of driving, Christina and I couldn’t stop talking about how much fun we had and how the enthusiasm the EpIQ team has for escape rooms is contagious. If the two of us ever do launch an escape room of our own, we’ll have to thank the team at EpIQ and other passionate owners for inspiring us and showing that passion really does carry over into the final product the customer experiences.
Leave a Reply