Room Story - from Trapped In
The date is 2250, The Spaceship Lumina is on a research mission in the far reaches of space. A cosmic storm has caused complete engine failure, you are now powerless and drifting towards the edge of a black hole. The situation is critical. You have 60 minutes to locate and install the backup power source and restart the ships engines before you are sucked past the point of no return.
Key Stats
Review
This was our first visit to Trapped In. It’s situated in a converted office building behind the main street in Bury Town Centre. Conveniently, there’s a car park right next door so it was easy to get to and easy to find. There are a couple of large signs outside the building so you really can’t miss it.
The waiting area is filled with a lot of table based puzzle games, so there are things to keep you entertained whilst waiting for your room. There only appeared to be one host working, so we entered the room a few minutes late as the host had been dealing with another group before us. This wasn’t a huge problem, but we did wonder how good the hosting would be when he was covering two rooms simultaneously. Thankfully, it was very well hosted – we received clues relevant to our progress when requested and some free hints along the way.
Upon entering the room, the friendly host gave us a quick briefing on the room story and the aim of the game, highlighting the key central aim that allowed you to measure your progress through the game. And with that, he started the digital timer on the wall leaving us to stare at all the buttons, switches, levers and controls and wonder where to begin...
Our first impressions of the room were excellent. The theming really is top notch and there’s a really high build quality – it looks and feels like a spaceship. We could also see that there was no chance of us getting bored with lots to see and interact with in the room. We started with something that stood out to us as the most obvious and unusual thing in the room and that sent us down a linear path that enabled us to get access to all areas of the room. The game is non-linear, but has some key sequences that require a set of linear actions to achieve the aim. So whilst the game was non-linear, it felt quite linear at times!
There were a few things in the room that we got stuck into straight away and a few that we only gave a few seconds notice to and left until later on. These bits we left started to build up and we started to slow down towards the end of the game. They actually proved frustratingly simple in the end and we kicked ourselves for failing to pay them proper attention earlier in the game. A few hints helped us get back on track.
With about 15 minutes left, we still had quite a few puzzles to solve and amazingly managed to power our way through them in about 10 minutes to reach the final conclusion of the game. It was a brilliant and high paced ending to the game, leading to us dashing around the room, shouting random words like “GROK” and interacting with nearly every part of the game. The tension was unbearable as we rushed around the room completing the required sequence of activities to stop our spaceship from being sucked into the blackhole.
Extremely disappointingly and frustratingly, we completed the game entirely and managed to escape. But when we looked at the final time on the clock, we’d gone 15 seconds over the 60 minutes which unfortunately counts as failure. Whilst this is “officially” failure, we were really proud of our efforts considering the fact it was a very challenging game with lots of puzzles to complete – it’s definitely not one for beginners!
Ratings
The date is 2250, The Spaceship Lumina is on a research mission in the far reaches of space. A cosmic storm has caused complete engine failure, you are now powerless and drifting towards the edge of a black hole. The situation is critical. You have 60 minutes to locate and install the backup power source and restart the ships engines before you are sucked past the point of no return.
Key Stats
| Room Name | Interstellar |
| Venue | Trapped In |
| Location | Bury, UK |
| Date | 2018/02/18 |
| Escape Time | 60:15 - Technically a loss |
| Team Size | 3 |
| My Recommended Team Size | 3 - 5 |
Review
This was our first visit to Trapped In. It’s situated in a converted office building behind the main street in Bury Town Centre. Conveniently, there’s a car park right next door so it was easy to get to and easy to find. There are a couple of large signs outside the building so you really can’t miss it.
The waiting area is filled with a lot of table based puzzle games, so there are things to keep you entertained whilst waiting for your room. There only appeared to be one host working, so we entered the room a few minutes late as the host had been dealing with another group before us. This wasn’t a huge problem, but we did wonder how good the hosting would be when he was covering two rooms simultaneously. Thankfully, it was very well hosted – we received clues relevant to our progress when requested and some free hints along the way.
Upon entering the room, the friendly host gave us a quick briefing on the room story and the aim of the game, highlighting the key central aim that allowed you to measure your progress through the game. And with that, he started the digital timer on the wall leaving us to stare at all the buttons, switches, levers and controls and wonder where to begin...
Our first impressions of the room were excellent. The theming really is top notch and there’s a really high build quality – it looks and feels like a spaceship. We could also see that there was no chance of us getting bored with lots to see and interact with in the room. We started with something that stood out to us as the most obvious and unusual thing in the room and that sent us down a linear path that enabled us to get access to all areas of the room. The game is non-linear, but has some key sequences that require a set of linear actions to achieve the aim. So whilst the game was non-linear, it felt quite linear at times!
There were a few things in the room that we got stuck into straight away and a few that we only gave a few seconds notice to and left until later on. These bits we left started to build up and we started to slow down towards the end of the game. They actually proved frustratingly simple in the end and we kicked ourselves for failing to pay them proper attention earlier in the game. A few hints helped us get back on track.
With about 15 minutes left, we still had quite a few puzzles to solve and amazingly managed to power our way through them in about 10 minutes to reach the final conclusion of the game. It was a brilliant and high paced ending to the game, leading to us dashing around the room, shouting random words like “GROK” and interacting with nearly every part of the game. The tension was unbearable as we rushed around the room completing the required sequence of activities to stop our spaceship from being sucked into the blackhole.
Extremely disappointingly and frustratingly, we completed the game entirely and managed to escape. But when we looked at the final time on the clock, we’d gone 15 seconds over the 60 minutes which unfortunately counts as failure. Whilst this is “officially” failure, we were really proud of our efforts considering the fact it was a very challenging game with lots of puzzles to complete – it’s definitely not one for beginners!
 |
| The team were Beth, Becky and Daniel. |
| Overall |  | An immersive and exciting game, filled with physical puzzles and finished off with a high paced final dash around the room. Highly recommended. |
| Difficulty |  | It’s not a game for beginners. There’s a lot to do in the 60 minutes. We needed about 5 hints during the game. |
| Fun | | We had a lot of fun, there was so much to interact with in the room – lots of buttons, levers and controls. There were also some very funny parts to the room. |
| Puzzles | | There are a real variety of puzzles in the room, with some physical puzzles we’d never experienced in an escape room before. All the puzzles are automated and work seamlessly. |
| Immersion | | The theming is excellent, you really feel like you’re on-board a spaceship. The room feels very well built. |
| Surprises |  | The ending of the game was a huge surprise! |