NWA Escape Room — Attraction in Bentonville

First time to do an escape room here—we chose “Clue Me In.” Our crowd of five ranged from amateurs to very experienced escape roomers.

Right off, when we drove up to NWA Escape Room, there was no billboard sign on the strip mall tower, so I wasn’t certain we were in the right place. Then we spotted the sign on the storefront and knew we’d found it. As we walked in, I felt like we were walking into an insurance office. There were sparse indications of it being an escape room. Disappointing but I was hopeful that the atmosphere in the room would make up for it.

Our guide was very friendly and informative, getting us set up to start. And she was helpful throughout (which, was good, because we had some issues in the room).

Now, this being “Clue” themed, we’re anticipating the room to feel like a mansion. However, that’s definitely not what it felt like. To quote one of my teammates, “It was giving me tiny house vibes.” Similar to the lobby, it was sparsely decorated, beige walls, and with fairly shabby décor (not at all the “mansion ambience” we’d been expecting, given the name and escape room description). We had no issues as we began, and several clues were quickly found and the first padlocks opened. But we soon ran into our first issue. We figured out what we felt was the code for the safe, we put it in, but nothing happened. Naturally, we assumed we’d used the wrong code, so we kept looking. After a few minutes, our guide came in and asked if we needed advice. We said yes, and as she guided us, we discovered that we had, in fact, input the correct code in the safe. The issue, however, was that the safe’s battery was out of juice. So, the guide went and got the key and unlocked the safe for us. This delay cost us at least five minutes.

The next issue we had was with a uv flashlight which would help us find the next clue. Unfortunately, it took us a few minutes to get the flashlight to work, and then it was very dim (which was even further complicated by the brightness of the countdown timer that we could not turn off). Before we found the clue we were looking for, the flashlight completely shut off. So we had to find our guide and ask for a new uv flashlight. These complications with the flashlight cost us a few minutes. We did, at last, solve the crime and escape with five minutes to spare.

There were a number of red herrings (which go along nicely with the “Clue” theme) that misled us as to what the clues were or what we should be looking for. The puzzles and clues were on-par with beginner room. However, one of the clues involving a deck of cards had a tiny flaw—nothing which should prevent any normally intelligent person from discovering the solution—but it was surprising to see that this flaw had been made.

Overall, we were disappointed with this escape room. Our expectations (a mansion-type atmosphere, properly working props) were not met. It was disappointing to pay over $120 and not get a satisfying escape room experience.

Interestingly, we were speaking to friends a couple days later and discovered that they had been the very next people to do that very same room. They did not have any issues with the safe or the flashlight. But they did feel the same way we did about the room’s...

Spent 155 dollars, on the 3 musketeers room, just to waste what seemed like 30 mins in the dark, unable to see anything, in a hallway meant to house 4 to 8 people, but really only fits 2. Side note for anyone wanting to go into this room. There are 2 doors. One that used to be part of a room but no longer is, this one has an actual door handle, and the other is actually a built in door on the wall, hidden behind a candle holder. Don't waste your time on the wrong door. The clues are not very detailed either. I really would not recommend this escape room. It is way too small to fit up to 8 people. It's not really worth the money. Tulsa has some great escape rooms if you're looking for an actual fun and interactive escape room. The only thing positive about it was that the staff were nice.

Response to owner- I'm not sure if your recorded time is correct. As we started with one hour and by time, we actually made it into the final room. We only had around 22 mins left. Nevertheless, it is poor form to waste people's money by advising a large group of people to enter a pitch black hallway, with very little space and zero clues, that leads directly to a door that didn't even open to anywhere (it was part of the original construction in that building) and expect them to look for a hidden door. I would not really call this "part of the puzzle." Logically speaking, individuals would automatically go to the obvious door with the door handle. Especially since the previous room provided keys and no clues as to what to do next. Not to mention you could not see anything. I understand escape rooms are meant to be difficult, and that is part of the fun. But this escape room is poorly designed and just a waste of money. Please do not worry, though. My small clue on this review will not magically increase the percentage of people able to complete the escape room. The clues provided are equally difficult to follow, and your very low percentage rate of less than 15% completion will likely...

So disappointed! We have done several escape rooms at other venues, and just tried this business again after a 3+ year break, hoping they’d gotten significantly better than our first attempt back at their Bentonville location (where we did Al Capone I think, and NONE of the hints made sense and the room was basically a utility closet). Well we were wrong…

When we arrived at the Fayetteville location last night, the business wasn’t even open (which gave weird/abandoned vibes). The employee arrived about 20 minutes before our 8pm reservation and went inside to turn lights on and to do a rush job of getting everything ready. We did the King’s Ring room last night and no joke found the ring in approximately 3 minutes (not exaggerating). So the employee had to come reset the room for us, and the rest of our time in there was basically pointless since we had already located the ring accidentally.

My biggest complaints-

-as mentioned above, the room was not properly set up so we found the ring in under 5 minutes..

-it was never very clear what tasks are actually supposed to be done, the map is unreadable and the hints were subpar.

-There are no cool features, memorable decor, or hidden second rooms, honestly this was a very bland experience.

-having the business not already open, and just opening up for reservations, felt awkward as a customer

-having your employee enter the room every 10-15 minutes is so awful and uncomfortable for your customers, please invest in a mic system or even a walkie talkie or something so they don’t have to physically be in the room to give hints!!

I generously gave 2 stars because we still had a fun time because of who we are as people, but I cannot recommend this business. It feels like the creators of NWA Escape Room have never heard of or done an escape room on their own before creating this business,...