Lucardo – Espionage

Summary
I’d heard a lot of good things about Lucardo and so when I knew I’d have a Saturday evening free in Manchester it was top of my to-do list. Espionage is a World War II themed room with very little linearity and mostly straightforward puzzles, great for beginners.

Review
Espionage is rated as the least difficult of Lucardo’s five rooms. A new subset of Team Judge was playing, with a total of two games’ worth of experience between everyone other than me, so it seemed a sensible choice. I had hoped to play The Dream on recommendation, but as we booked so late it wasn’t available.
Continue reading “Lucardo – Espionage”

Escape Room Manchester – Slaughter House

Summary
Quite samey, this dark room depended a lot on searching for items. Not enough torches provided. Puzzles quite pedestrian. And did we say dark?

Review
This was the second room Team Judge played on the same day. Dropping from a difficulty rating of 5 to 4, we expected a bit of a step down in difficulty. In practice, it was similarly challenging but in a different way.

Our host Alice was very pleasant and practiced and she explained the room’s procedure in very brief for us. The room’s back story is the slightly hackneyed “you wake up in ____ with no real clue of why you’re here and you’d better get out in an hour”, and that was good for what it was. Alice was also obliging in turning down the background sound for a team member with a hearing issue.
Continue reading “Escape Room Manchester – Slaughter House”

Escape Room Manchester – Secret Lab

Summary
A small number of tough puzzles rather than a large number of straightforward puzzles or a mixture in difficulty awaits you at Secret Lab. Can you rise to the challenge?

Review
A bit of bumbling at the start of this, with the hosts unable to open up the front door because it was a bank holiday and apparently someone from the nightclub that’s colocated with them had padlocked a door which was usually left open. We eventually crowded in through an emergency exit after a host came around to the main door to see us looking nonplussed.

As venues go, The Escape Room Manchester is well-equipped and very pleasant. The waiting area was one of the best I’ve found, and they were also happy to store several members’ large items of luggage whilst we went off to the city centre afterwards for a couple of hours.
Continue reading “Escape Room Manchester – Secret Lab”