The Great Escape Room Tampa — Attraction in Tampa

Meh. The room was alright, but the overall experience was kinda mediocre.

This was our first time playing at The Great Escape Room in Tampa, but it wasn't our first escape room. We had each previously participated in somewhere between 5 to 10 other rooms that were part of other businesses. Comparatively, this one was...just okay.

Regarding the staff and business: The staff members were pretty friendly, and they were thorough enough with the explanation that we weren't completely lost. One jarring aspect of the experience were that we had to share the room with strangers--this wasn't something that was stated clearly and up-front when we booked our reservation. We had a group of four, and we fully expected to have the room to ourselves. I can understand the business concept--fill as many openings as possible so that you can efficiently capitalize on each available time slot--but this is something that NEEDS to be stated up-front. We were completely blindsided. Thankfully, we were only accompanied by another pair of people who ended up being friendly, but in my opinion, they seemed to be on a date, and I'll bet they were blindsided, too. They had the smaller group, and hopefully didn't feel any intimidation from us--we tried to make it a comfortable experience for them. Our experience, thankfully, seemed to go smoothly--but I'll bet that's not the case for every group. Additionally, playing with strangers severely hindered the communication within our own group, because we had to carefully dance around with our wording in order to make sure we were being inclusive.

Regarding the room itself: We enjoyed the theme--we played in the Haunted Hotel room--but it felt like a particularly difficult room. In order to complete this room, you need what felt like a ridiculously astute sense of observation and a heavily presumptuous nature. There were a few too many situations where you would receive a tool or item that would assist you down the road, and so we ended up going on a few too many wild goose chases. We ended up not completing the room, which is a bummer...but the problem was, when we were out of time, we were told the solution and found that we really weren't even close to completion. Some of the things we were told were so vague and some of the puzzles we had solved (and had yet to solve) were so contrived and convoluted that myself and my three partners agreed that we would've ended up struggling to finish if the allotted time were doubled. I do have to say that I appreciated some of the practicality of the of the puzzles and tools, but in the end, it was a bit too much. If you're going to try this room, I recommend that you reserve it with a group of 8, and try to have a good mix of partners who think and observe things in different ways. (There was a hint system, but when we all try to play together, we don't like to abuse it. We like to keep the hint count to three or fewer. We probably could've reasonably used the hint button 6-8 times--I mean really, who wants to play a room like that?)

Are we going to return to The Great Escape Room? ...No, probably not. There are seven separate rooms, so if we find ourselves short on experiences, mayyybe we'll return...? But ultimately, certain aspects of the experience (paired with strangers, extreme difficulty) threw us off a bit too much. We don't want to spend our money if we'll be risking it on playing another convoluted room with random people.

If you've never been here before, it's worth a try. Maybe you'll have a better experience than we did. We could've just been naïve, but it did put us off. You might enjoy it, or you might come to the same conclusion as we did--that it's...

was honestly disappointed. Room set up was immersive and I did love the decor… but this facility seems alittle disorganized from the get go… The most frustrating part was that the mechanisms for solving puzzles didn’t work right away… so things would pop open way after we completed a puzzle… we were totally unsure what puzzles unlocked what mechanisms because of the massively late timing.... and it also made us question if we did the puzzles right. (Which turns out we did - but the reward was super late in timing…) Probably the most frustrating part was that we beat one of the rooms for colosseum… but nothing happened. The door didn’t unlock. We waited for a solid 2 minutes (not even exaggerating and if management wants to look into that part, I suggest you do) with nothing to do because we solved all the puzzles in the room… which honestly really irritated me. After (again, no joke - 2 minutes of silence) our game master basically just came on the intercom and said ope you didn’t beat this room and unlocked the door. I wanted to know what we were missing if we didn’t “beat that room” so after we did beat the coliseum in full, we asked the person who rushed us out if we had completed all the puzzles in the second room and explained what we completed, just to be sure…. He said we did finish all the puzzles….. 🙄 so……..

In addition, the very last mechanism of the game to get out also didn’t work and we heard someone from the other side say “oh it didn’t fall”…….. and then you could tell they moved it themselves….

I’ve played about 100 escape rooms. This one is pretty and the decor is cool.. but the mechanisms need to be refreshed or the game master needs to pay better attention. This was the worst timing I’ve ever seen on an escape room. Id be more forgiving if it was one or two…. But for a 120 minute adventure, there were MULTIPLE times where this was an issue and a disappointment… And honestly that is incredibly disappointing because it was expensive to book as a private experience. It was also insane how rushed we were at the completion. I’ve always had game masters ask us if we have any questions or at least talk about the game for a second…. We were rushed out so fast and were asked if we wanted a picture and then he just left us lol. Like i had to initiate my one question about the room we “didn’t complete” (even though we did)… and when you pay this kind of money for an experience, that’s just bonkers to me.

Honestly I wouldn’t recommend the coliseum room to enthusiasts unless they fix all the timing errors. I would however recommend it to novice escape players and people who just want a date night who haven’t done too many rooms.

If you’re in the area, imo make the drive over to Exit Games and play Servants of Sleight or Pins and Needles instead… or play the Intense ones not far.

Edit : They reached out and offered us a comped new experience. Though this is appreciated, we declined as we have no intention of going back - even if for free. But it was a nice message from them and a nice...

UPDATE #2: 5 stars for experience and customer service. After having an issue the second time we went, we came back for a third time and the experience was amazing (again)!! Nick was a fantastic guide and helped us a lot through our room, without making anything too obvious of course. He really made the experience that much better! Original Review: This was our first time at an escape room and this one was great! Shelby was our host and she helped us throughout the colosseum escape room. It was detailed, themed perfectly and had such intricate puzzles. Though we ran out of time on one puzzle, we were still able to continue to the next ones to finish the other rooms. That was really cool!! The one downside is that there wasn't a timer available so you couldn't actively see how much time left you had in each room. (I'm not sure if that is specific to the colosseum room or if that's the case with every room). They have a lot of different options here which is great, definitely a good time! UPDATE!! Your experience greatly depends on which room you go to and which employee you get to help you during your escape!! We had gone back to do a second escape challenge here and got a new employee working our room and it wasn't as good. Definitely keep in mind your experience can...