Portsmouth Escape Room — Attraction in Portsmouth

The only word to describe the host of our game is “unkind”. She embarrassed me in front of my colleagues and friends during our game in such a harsh and belittling way. To paint the picture, we are a group in our 30s to late 40s, not teenagers. One of the puzzles was a series of buttons that light up different colors when you press them. I noticed one was wiggly. Since everything in an escape room is a potential clue, I shimmied it and the button came right out pretty easily. I have never done an escape room, but I know things out of place are clues, things that are loose, things that seem odd, etc. It just seemed suspicious to me that 1 of the 5 were jiggly. Unfortunately, it was actually not a clue, and I caused that section of the game to not be playable (I disconnected a wire). The game host, who monitors us on camera, came in to our room and was incredibly aggressive and belittling. She shamed me in front of my peers, saying she watched me on camera “yank” it out and said “and I don’t know why anyone would even do that.” She implied to everyone I was lying when I said the green colored button was wiggly so I thought it came out (“no it wasn’t. I checked everything before you came in.”) She had us step out for 5 minutes so she could figure out how we could continue on with the game without that section. While we were waiting outside, my friends and coworkers came to me and agreed it was so uncalled for and felt she was trying to embarrass me. I wanted to leave, but I knew if I left, my group would want to leave too and I didn’t want to ruin their fun. When we started the game back up, I was afraid to even touch anything, and my group said it felt so awkward after and the fun was gone. People have bad days. I get it. But there are 1000 other ways to address a situation, without making someone feel absolutely belittled and embarrassed. It was an accident, and by no means intentional to destroy property or cheat. When the button came up, I saw it was superglued to the table, and was by no means secured. I believe her that she checked to make sure the buttons lite up before we came in, but in no way do we believe she wiggled each on to make sure it was secured to the chest. We were a group consisting of a doctor, a therapist, a software engineer, a pediatric EMT and 2 science teachers. In other words, responsible adults. We decided we would never go back if she was working that night because she was a “fun sponge” to put it lightly. I’m not putting her name in here because I believe people have bad days, and I don’t want to embarrass her publicly, but they just lost 6 possible repeat customers.

Edit to owners reply: The man you are referring to who said I ruined the game is my best friend and he was being COMPLETELY and obviously sarcastic. He thought her response was so uncalled for and was making fun of the fact that she acted like I ruined the entire game. My other friends were OBVIOUSLY SARCASTIC. If you were listening to the tape, you would hear they continuously say, multiple, multiple MULTIPLE times “that was just uncalled for”, “just forget it, she was probably having a bad day”, “it was so uncalled for,” “she said 2 other groups broke stuff earlier in the day so she was probably just having a bad day.” “That was so aggressive.” Etc etc. I am not asking for a refund. I did not “yank” the light, as she said. It was loose and I thought that was a clue. As I said in my review, I believe she did test the light, but did not jiggle them. I would also say your response is SUPER rude and defensive as well. I was not bashing your business, we ALL felt she handled it poorly and her tone was unprofessional. Coming in and saying “I don’t know why you would have done that in the first place” is belittling. I said it was loose, and she told me it wasn’t, but does that make sense? That I would just randomly rip a lit button off the chest? Why would I do that? If you think the way she spoke was her doing what was proper, professional, and reasonable, then you have a poor...

We've had a great time every time we've visited the Escape Room. The staff is friendly, the rooms range from pretty easy to fairly hard, and we all felt that the value was decent for what you get.

Our only complaint was one time when we had a group of 7 already (more than enough for any room), they put three strangers with our group for some reason. I am aware that all bookings were public by default as stated on their FAQ, but I'm not sure allowing 3 people to book the hardest room (which allows up to 10) by themselves on the hope that another group would fill it in is a great idea from a customer satisfaction POV, though it is undoubtedly a good business one. Given that their tag line when you google them is "Escape with Friends!" this doesn't seem like the best policy. The people we were paired with were nice, but we didn't know them and they us, so we felt like we were always overpowering them as we outnumbered them more than 2 to 1. This detracted from the experience a bit.

The other times we've gone it was just us, also a group of 7 in easier rooms (they have a max of 8) and we had an even better time. Maybe steering those smaller groups into rooms they can do themselves with 3, or in other groups of a more similar size so it's a more equitable experience would be better from a customer satisfaction standpoint.

Overall an enjoyable experience, just I'd like to see that one tweak.

Edit: I bumped up this review to a 5 after the response from the Escape room. Other businesses should take note; that's how you answer a review that had some critical elements in it. I appreciate the explanation. I've left in the original piece for context, but I'd say I believe them when they tell me it wasn't a strict "put more people in a room to make more money" scenario, but rather customer choice. I'll buy that. Wish I had a good idea to improve it, but c'est la vie. We'll just book smaller...

Company does a promo for gift certificates at a discounted rate about a month ago we buy them and now still have to pay extra money due to “Covid” prices... they should not be forcing us to pay extra considering they sold the gift vouchers for the price of the admission per person at the time. It should have been grandfathered in. They absolutely knew what they are doing and knew they were increasing prices way before they did the gift certificate promos. Poor business and customer service I will not return and give them any more business. “Covid” should not still be still used as a crutch for people we have been in this pandemic for a year or more, this is a sneaky ploy to make more money.

Response to the owner: you absolutely knew what you were doing, you run a deal for vouchers then conveniently raise the prices and blame Covid. It is not a “deal” it’s exactly the same price as you would pay regular so there was no incentive to buy the gift vouchers when they were on sale. I am not interested in even coming back to you as you run a crooked business.

2nd response: My boyfriend has the gift voucher that was purchased. Needless to say you got your money regardless because you ripped us off and we are not coming back but ultimately you suffer because you lost a lot of business considering I have spent a lot of money between my family and friends accounts...