Escape 60′ Jardins: Os Piratas de Montserrat [Review]

Location: Escape 60‘ Jardins, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: December 2017 (2 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 6.5; Difficulty: 6; Atmosphere: 7.5; Fun: 8.5

Requirements:

• Fluent Portuguese, English of Spanish
• 2-8 players

It was just another pirate day on board Captain Ghost’s ship, the Montserrat. But while we were doing our rounds (as the good mates we are), we noticed El Pancho docked Montserrat unexpectedly at an unknown island. Was this Brazilian game going to be another treasure hunt?

Nope. In Piratas de Montserrat, your not-amigo El Pancho actually snitches your team to the Dutch Navy, and players have one hour to get all valuables out the ship and run before they are executed! Trapspringer was not there to play this time, so escaping was on the hands of me and my gamer/escaper sister!

Escape Hotel: A Loira do Banheiro [Review]

Location: Escape Hotel, Pinheiros district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 6.5; Difficulty: 6; Atmosphere: 9; Fun: 8

Requirements:

• 3-7 players
• Fluent Portuguese (English version available in August 2016)

Many cultures have a version of the Bloody Mary urban legend. You know how it goes: Kids like to scare themselves and dare each other to stay in a dimly lit room / bathroom, stare into the mirror, call out the name of a ghost and wait for it to appear. In Brazil, this tradition has gone through several alterations to become The Blonde in the Bathroom (A Loira Do Banheiro in Portuguese). The principles are largely the same as willing participants have to perform specific actions to invoke the presence of a school girl who died in the school bathrooms.

In this creation from Escape Hotel, players have one hour to investigate the case of a missing high school student. Sure enough there were stranger things afoot, however, I sure didn’t expect the scares that came from The Blonde in the Bathroom!

Escape Hotel: O Templo [Review]

Location: Escape Hotel, Pinheiros district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 8; Difficulty: 7; Atmosphere: 8; Fun: 8.5

Requirements:

• 3-7 players
• Fluent Portuguese or English (for hints)
• Basic Math

You and your team of archaeologists found the ruins of an ancient temple. Legends say that uncountable treasures are inside, as well as the bones of many adventurers who tried to retrieve it in the past. A curse will be unleashed in 60 minutes, so you better get that gold out quickly!

The Temple (O Templo in Portuguese) was the second room we played at Escape Hotel, and the setting is impressive. The tall, heavily-decorated room transports you very quickly into the jungle setting. One of the owners of Escape Hotel specialised in cinematography, and the benefits of that are visible in this beautiful and fun game.

Escape Hotel: Cena do Crime [Review]

Location: Escape Hotel, Pinheiros district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 7.5; Difficulty: 7; Atmosphere: 8.5; Fun: 8.5

Requirements:

• 3-7 players

“Yup, many people enter here thinking it is actually a hotel”, said Patricia, one of the owners of Escape Hotel in Sao Paulo. It is easy to see why people get confused: the venue’s entrance resembles a hotel façade and even has a space for drop-off and taxis. Once inside, players talk to the receptionist at a concierge who will take them to the escape room they booked. The entire waiting area looks like the lobby of a legit fancy hotel – except that you book the rooms here per hour, and not to sleep.

This first impression of Escape Hotel was very good and the smooth transition from a hotel lobby area to the escape room helped create the atmosphere for the room we booked: Cena do Crime (“Crime Scene” in English). We almost expected a bellboy to bring our luggage!

A person was murdered inside the hotel and the family hired you to investigate in parallel with the police. But you will only have access to the crime scene for one hour, so hurry up!

Escape Travel Guide to Sao Paulo, Brazil (2016)

When you ask most people in the world that aren’t from Latin America what they think of Brazil, the response is usually along the lines of parties, crime and jungle, somewhat like this Simpson’s episode. Truth is though, Brazil is the size of Australia and you can find many types of terrain and people within it. Sao Paulo, in particular, is a booming megacity of 11 million with a truly diverse makeup. For example, did you know that it has a Japanese population of around 2 million making it the biggest Japanese city outside Japan? The country has an incredibly diverse society with a rich source of culture and unique style of creativity.

For those who love escape rooms, a small but highly creative escape room industry is emerging from Sao Paulo. With the Olympics underway in Rio de Janeiro, we thought this would be an appropriate time to introduce Sao Paulo’s escape room scene, given that is only 1 hour flight away from Rio. If you are over in Brazil for the Olympics or are headed there in the near future, why not take a look at the escape rooms in Sao Paulo?

Puzzle Room Brazil: Inverse of the Universe [Review]

Location: Puzzle Room Brazil, Praça da Árvore district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 8.5; Difficulty: 6.5; Atmosphere: 8; Fun: 8.5

Requirements:

• Fluent English or Portuguese
• 2-6 players
• At least one player with good eyesight

 

Inverse of the Universe  (Inverso do Universo in Portuguese), has a simple but effective premise – in this escape room, everything is upside down! Players have 60 minutes to break through nine planetary gates to restore everything to normal and turn the world back to the right way up.

Looking at puzzles from a different angle is absolutely necessary and literal in this place!

Escape Room SP: B Side [Review]

Location: Escape Room SP, Vila Mariana district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Failed, but we got SO close!

Creativity: 6.5; Difficulty: 7.5; Atmosphere: 6.5; Fun: 8

Requirements:

• Fluent English or Portuguese
• 4-10 players

 

You are called to inspect the lab of a scientist who has gone missing. Apparently, he was very fond of travelling. Or were all those maps and postcards related to his research? Looks like he was making tests with light – and trying to reach the speed of light by different means. It does not take long for you to put two and two together and realise that your fellow scientist is not only lost “somwhere” but is also lost “sometime”.

As a Tardis is not available, you do have a hard task ahead! You only have one hour to find where and when he is!

Escape Room SP: Atelier [Review]

Location: Escape Room SP, Vila Mariana district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (4 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 8; Difficulty: 9.5; Atmosphere: 7.5; Fun: 8

Requirements:

• Fluent English or Portuguese
• 4-10 players
• At least one team member not colour blind

Your investigation team has received information on an art forger operational in São Paulo and the leads have pointed to his/her Atelier. You do not know the identity of this forger or if the pictures in the Atelier are original or fakes. There is, however, a big scheme and a lot of money involved, so you better start investigating!

A police team is heading to the airport, which closes in one hour after the international flights depart. That’s the time you have to find the information to identify the forger and the proof to convict him/her. Otherwise, this person will get away to an unknown destination.

If you like art, this escape room is for you – real information about paintings and painters is used in abundance in Atelier. Put your inner artist to work!

Escape Room SP: Harbinger [Review]

Location: Escape Room SP, Vila Mariana district, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (2 players). Failed to stop the Eldritch gods!

Creativity: 7.5; Difficulty: 6; Atmosphere: 10; Fun: 9

Requirements:

• Fluent English (planned for Aug 2016) or Portuguese
• 4-6 investigators

It is 1920 and players of Harbinger are assailed by a collective nightmare and united by a disconcerting letter from a stranger named William Briden. The unhinged prose of the letter speaks of unnerving discoveries and hints at something dark being unleashed on the poor Briden, who seems to be in a shaken state of mind. Players of this escape room must investigate the mystery behind Briden’s disappearance and prevent an unspeakable horror in less than one hour.

After finding out about how Escape Room SP created an escape room based in the Cthulhu mythos, I was extremely excited and keen to try this rooom. Why?  For readers not familiar with the Cthulhu setting, it was the creation of legendary horror author H.P. Lovecraft whose stories have influenced many horror authors including Stephen King,  Bently Littleand and others like Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman.  Lovecraft stories typically revolve around discovery of ancient forbidden knowledge which reveals cosmic horrors of the universe to unprepared minds – the path of knowledge is paved with madness. It is a terrifying setting where the unknown and the unexplainable are best left undisturbed.

With that in mind, Pa and I took on the roles of classic Lovecraftian investigators to satisfy my insatiable curiosity behind this room. I had to know!

Escape 60′ Vila Olímpia: Assassin’s Creed [Review]

Location: Escape 60‘ Vila Olímpia, São Paulo (SP), Brazil

Date completed: June 2016 (3 players). Succeeded escaping!

Creativity: 6; Difficulty: 5.5; Atmosphere: 7.5; Fun: 7.5

Requirements:

• Either fluent English, Portuguese or Spanish
• 4-10 players
• Basic Maths

In this officially produced Assassin’s Creed spin off, players assume the mantle of being descendants of the secretive Assassins, which are locked in a battle through history against the Templars. As prospective members of this group, players must prove their worth and escape from the room, set within a created memory,  within 60 minutes as a test of their viability. Failure will result in them being stuck in this memory (presumably created within the Animus/Helix for those familiar with this series of games).

Returning back to Brazil for a short time, I (Trapspringer) was intrigued with the idea of an escape room set in one of the most successful gaming franchises in recent years. We decided to embrace our inner Assassin and gave this room a go. Let’s make it clear from the start that no people were killed and no parkour/freerunning was necessary.