Escape the Room Boston — Attraction in Boston

If I could give this a lower rating, I would. Mostly due to the GM. The absolute worst GM I have ever experienced in well over a hundred escape rooms. I had heard that the company had gone downhill, but this is far worse than I could have ever imagined. The GM was a cross between arrogant and indifferent. I could blame some of it on just poor staffing levels as he seemed to be doing both GM for this and another room (which we could hear when they finished) plus covering the front desk, but it was definitely more than that. It was general lack of caring or customer service. We spent 15-20 minutes literally yelling to get their attention only to with only a few minutes left to get responses that showed they definitely were not paying attention.

When the GM came in after we failed the game on the last puzzle (a math puzzle that wasn't clicking after 20 minutes of trying and with nothing to write down on). We complained and their response was "I did tell you that hints were at my discretion." I have had frustration in escape rooms before, but this was aggravation of being ignored and them frankly not caring or even implying it was on purpose when he genuinely was not likely paying attention and perhaps was annoyed by us trying to get their attention.

We asked them to explain the last puzzle and then pointed to the clue of a clock and asked us what time it read, we told them and they insulted us stating we obviously don’t know how to read an analog clock (which we had not only done through the entire game multiple times), but after they insisted it read a different time, they did the math wrong and eventually admitted we stated the correct time. It took them several minutes of explaining and changing the explanation before it semi-made sense but it was convoluted.

The game itself was alright but had many quirks. Like pulling down things higher than in most escape rooms and felt like you’re breaking something for an early puzzle. But more annoying is there is a fast-cycling screen at the beginning of the first room in a dark area that felt almost seizure inducing. It gave me a headache and made me stick to my stomach to even look near, and it served no purpose for it to do that or be that bright. When doing puzzles near it, it made it harder to see things, and did most things squinting or with my eyes closed when near it.

There is also a object painted red in the second room right next to a lock labeled as not part of the game, so it took some time to realize that the red didn’t mean it was in play. There was also a hard to notice door which we were delayed noticing it opened. Some other parts of the room were a little warn and it seems some parts of the puzzles were removed. There is a shelf for 8 objects of which we only found three, and they lead to conflicting answers (one combination says it is something while another said it wasn’t which isn’t very helpful as far as clues go), so you just need to guess or hope, but more likely just feel like you are missing something that isn’t there. There are multiple things that won’t stay in place like the final puzzle in the first room needs to be held until it triggers.

Over all the puzzles were decent but some were a mixed bag and very vague. Though how we were treated by the GM means I will not be back to Escape the Room in Boston until it is under new ownership. A good GM can make or break a game and this one took a borderline decent game and turned it to not just a frustrating experience but an aggravating one that made me leave angry. There are far better companies in Boston to spend your money on. I would sooner light mine or fire than to return to another game here, which is sad as I have enjoyed several of their past rooms. It was however that bad of an experience. We had done two other rooms prior to this on in the same day and didn’t experience any of these issues down the street at...

I did the apartment escape room and had a great time. Joe, our (proctor?) was extremely funny with his use of the soundboard and gave hints that seemed to only give away the information we needed (not too much)(maybe this was just a coincidence though). I will say, to anyone who wants a bit of a tip, listen carefully to the words and wording of the rules.

As a difficulty gauge, I did it with 3 people (out of a maximum of 8) and got halfway with ~7 hints (I do not remember the exact amount).

SPOILERS:

This would definitely be a 5 star place if there wasn’t information hidden under the rug in the bathroom and if the book puzzle came sooner so the books would not be as likely to be randomized (or they would be randomized to a lesser extent) and/or players would be more likely to remember the original positions. Another problem that I had with the book puzzle is the row and column labels on the puzzle card found in the bathroom. These figures do help orient the puzzle piece but also point towards the chessboard and are, apart from orienting the puzzle piece, useless. Also, the chessboard puzzle was very misleading with the word “checkm8” as part of the tablet background - although I do get that it helps people understand that the rook square should be expressed using only letters, but there has to be a better way to do this.

One more thing to note - this wasn’t a problem for me but could potentially be a problem for someone else: The tablet has a timeout if too many passwords are put in. While putting random solutions in is not how puzzles are solved, there are many solutions that are plausible that can be derived from the tablet lockscreen (Like I said, this wasn’t a problem for me, and I got extremely misled by the tablet lockscreen).

I say “I” here because I am writing this by myself, but my partners did express similar frustrations when we...

Copying here because indeed deleted my review

Where do I even begin with this dump? First off, the location on west street is so out of the way combined with the 0 signage and it's no wonder why so many people end up late. And when you get inside it's the most lifeless and depressing lobby area. First off, when I left there was 0 chairs and some the ceiling panels were missing so you had entire cables dangling from the ceiling. Now if you try working here you should be aware that most escape rooms follow a "no business means no hours" scheduling system so expect on call shifts. Some of which are so sudden you'll get one that's "hey can you do a double? We open in fifteen minutes by the way." and you get 0 time to prepare. I swear the GM had no idea how to run anything and care more so about doing less work rather than actually making sure the employees were able to pick up the slack. Times where it was just me and one other person doing a week of doubles because she "needed" to go on vacation yet didn't even think about scheduling the two employees who haven't received a shift in over a month. On one hand you get a lot of time to work by yourself and I guess there's downtime, when you're not also dealing with constantly needing to do phone calls, make reservations, send company emails, all while running both games at the same time AND doing reports on them. Half the time you can't get a minute to reset a room, and the days that are usually quiet? Welp too bad you'll never be scheduled for them. Speaking of, god forbid you need a change in schedule for anything and the GM doesn't laugh at you and say "hey it might not work out" and that was the final straw. Guess what? It didn't work out and it won't for the majority of anyone who applies there. Trust me, I've been in most the escape rooms around Boston and this has got to be the...