May 25, 2018 – St. Louis Escape looks scary from the outside. You enter through an unadorned staircase adjacent to a loading dock. The entrance is well-labeled, thankfully, and that gives you the confidence to keep you moving forward, though you reach for your cell phone to make sure you can call for help if you run into any trouble. And then you enter the lobby and find all your concerns were for naught, as St. Louis Escape actually has a really spacious and comfy lobby which gives you plenty to do (puzzles, games, pinball) while you wait for your appointment.
My stop at St. Louis Escape marked the first escape room on my big Memorial Day trek across the midwest. After leaving the Chicago area, I headed to St. Louis, after which the plan was to visit Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and South Dakota before heading home. My poor 2008 Suzuki SX4 gave me only about 25 miles per gallon, and with a ten gallon tank, I felt like I was always stopping.
After dodging the holiday traffic and making my way to St. Louis, I headed straight for the room. Soon enough I was on my way, and partnered with a small group, we started on the Subway game.
The attention to detail in the room was very impressive. Players start out on a train, then need to stop and work their way through the train tunnels to search for and remove an explosive device. As someone who commuted on Chicago transit daily for several years, I appreciated the set design here. Nothing in the train looked out of place, yet most details were critical for the room’s many puzzles.
The set design continued to impress throughout the game. One of the things I appreciated most was the variety. Each different phase of the game felt distinct, and it was a nice reward when the team was able to progress onward to a new section.
The variety of environments also led to a good variety of puzzles. One of my teammates was concerned about her logic skills, but she jumped right into a few of the action-oriented challenges and made valuable contributions. One of the biggest challenges for the team was also probably one of the simplest- noticing an important detail hidden in plain sight. There was something for everyone and I appreciated the mix.
Though it took my group a while to get through the first few puzzles of the room, we made good time on the rest of it and solved with plenty of time left on the clock.
The previous year I ventured to St. Louis with my dad and we solved two of the other rooms at St. Louis Escape (Cellar, Haunted Hotel). The rooms at St. Louis Escape are among the most technologically advanced I’ve solved, particularly the Haunted Hotel which uses a few elements I’ve seen in no more than a handful of other escape rooms (chiefly regarding animatronic characters you can interact with). It’s an impressive facility and it’s clear the people at St. Louis Escape invested a lot to make the experience feel right.
With the first state of the Memorial Day weekend journey wrapped up, I was one for one and called it a night. I’m eagerly anticipating a return visit to St. Louis to check out both the other rooms at St. Louis Escape and also a few others in the area I’ve penciled in as must-dos for one reason or another. Next time I’ll do more than just one!
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