CRITICAL REVIEW: THE ESCAPE

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You and your family drive down Grandview Avenue, home of many businesses, from Interstate 70 as your GPS says, “Your destination is on the left.” You see nothing, as do the other members of your family. You turn around in a gas station parking lot and head towards Interstate 70. You slowly drive by the destination, which is now on the right. The small building wedged in between the enormous buildings on both sides is your location: Breakout. You park in one of ten parking spots, and you start walking into the building.

Breakout Columbus was established in September 2019 and has seven different themed escape rooms, including Undercover Alley, Island Escape, and Operation: Casino. All ranging in difficulty and excitement throughout 34 locations across the world. Two of the most popular escape rooms are The Kidnapping and The Museum Heist.

The Kidnapping was my first escape room; I thoroughly enjoyed my experience. The objective of this room is to find hidden clues in a room within 60 minutes to escape from the kidnapper. In contrast, The Museum Heist (find the stolen artwork and escape within time) was lacking aspects that would make it onto the list of fun things to do in Columbus, Ohio.

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The Good

As soon as you sign in, the employee tells you to follow him to a random door, then he makes you put on a blindfold as he handcuffs you. Five minutes later, you find out you are handcuffed to a metal bed frame in a dark room.

The Kidnapping’s ambiance was interesting, as it was dark with only one lamp to see the brick walls, like the basement of a random person’s house that you were in for 60 minutes. The host allowed us to ask him for three extra clues as we approached puzzles we could not answer. The puzzles included but were not limited to: critical thinking, teamwork, patterns, mathematics, and logic.

The Kidnapping was a strenuous and exhausting time. However, the scariness and possibility of the reality of being kidnapped allowed me to put my common sense and critical thinking cap on as this could potentially happen in real life. As my six family members and I were handcuffed to the same bed, we had to figure out how to find the missing numbers of a puzzle, a key to working together; the scene felt like a movie or television show where someone gets kidnapped and murdered. Therefore, this made me enjoy the experience safely, as I hope for this to never happen again.

In the end, I believe that The Kidnapping escape room is within the threshold of terror and fun, which allows groups to have fun while trying to escape.

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The Bad

The Museum Heist was boring compared to The Kidnapping, but it was not the worst. The issue with this escape room was not the clues and the idea, but it was the theme. I chose this theme because of the group I was with, but it was kind of boring, making the experience, not as fun as the original: The Kidnapping.

The location of The Museum Heist can be described as a place where it was as bright as high noon, as it feels like I was at someone’s grandmother's house because of the antiques. The historical background of this escape room was challenging to my family, but if you like history, then this room was for you.

In addition, The host was not helpful throughout most of the 60 minutes. He was present, but we did not get three extra clues, like in The Kidnapping. Other than that, the host also did not speak to us until the 60 minutes were up.

The Museum Heist should have fewer clues but allow the same difficulty because it was hard to find several clues, specifically, clues between the 18th and 20th centuries. After asking the workers, they said that more than 75% of participants do not finish that escape room because of its historical background.

Although The Kidnapping can hold up to 10 people in its room, The Museum Heist can easily hold up to 40 people. With this statistic, some may opt to participate in The Museum Heist because of its larger space since people may feel claustrophobic.

A feeling within escape rooms and even life is: When you are having fun, 60 minutes feels like a breeze going 45 miles per hour. However, when you are not enjoying what you are doing, 60 minutes may feel like a snail trying to finish a race like my family and I felt recreating history while in The Museum Heist.

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Overall, I have had a great experience and a bad experience, just like everything else I may do like eating out or going to a concert. I recommend going to Breakout Columbus because with any escape room you can find out about every person within your group, whether it is about how they problem-solve or how stressed they get. You can enjoy the feeling of closeness, or you can feel that rath of an individual's anger, but no matter what, you are creating a new memory. If you are looking for a good, real-life session, I recommend The Kidnapping. If you and your family or friends are nerds for history, then I recommend The Museum Heist.

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Updated: Dec. 18, 2020, 7:30p.m. | Published: Dec. 18, 2020, 7:30p.m.

COLUMBUS, Ohio

By: AJ Hymiller