Breakout Games — Attraction in Virginia Beach

We showed up early and everything seemed to be going great. Our host Alex was very fun and had us pumped. Once we started the game we started to notice a lot of problems. None of the locks were working because they were jammed and Alex's answered as that is sometimes they're tough but if you keep working through it you'll get it. We did so and we finally were able to open one of the locks after a few minutes of having the right code just the lock was jammed. Then we got stuck on one issue and I'm not going to say what it is because I don't want anyone to know the secrets of what the codes are but we needed a black light. The black light that was in the room had no button and after telling Alex and waiting for her to respond for a few while we were sitting in the room clueless her solution was to use our cell phone light. I asked the smart question and said don't we need a black light to find The numbers written on some of these items. After using our light we were like we cannot see this and a new black light was brought to us and it worked. We were able to find the code. After something pops out of the top of the volcano we realized that there was something else missing and I guess they had ran out of balls. After asking because obviously Alex wasn't watching she told us that one of them is missing and gave us the number that was supposed to be on it. I mean come on now We have spent close to 10 minutes of worthless time because of items that aren't working and we had a party of six. Then on top of that we got to the last few things that needed to be open and we're rocking and rolling when another female came in and said our time was up. I explained to them hey we lost about 10 minutes of time alone just waiting on all the items to be brought in or help to be told to us. She said that unfortunately they have another party ready for this and our time was up. I gave her a chance to try to fix it and she said unfortunately there was nothing she could do and I told her I was going to leave a bad review. In total for six guests it was $167 and some change. This is a complete riff off for items that don't work and you can imagine how frustrated you would be and the people in your party would be when all of the items needed are broken missing and staff is obviously not watching through the cameras to see that there are issues. The lady that came in the door at the end was the most frustrating because she didn't care to hear any of our problems. This is our third time and will be our last time. Take it for me, don't waste your money until they get all these items fixed and all the staff is retrained. I'm not saying Alex is a bad person I'm just saying that she could have fixed all these issues instead of telling us to use our cell phone lights and letting us know ahead of time when we got to the next step that they were missing items so we didn't have to keep looking for nothing. A total of about 10 minutes was wasted and can be seen in the video...... Breakout Games, it's been fun but I'm an American and when something's not right we try to say something about it and if nothing's going to be done about it, you've lost our business. Mr Spark, I think you need to visit your location and imagine how disappointed my...

Today we had a missed opportunity at an optimal experience with Breakout Games. Myself and my husband are seasoned escape room goers. We are familiar with how clues, locks, and in general- the rooms work.

We brought my daughter for her 15th birthday, along with 3 of her friends. We chose The Kidnapping at 11:30. To start, our game master did not ask if it was any of our first times, though they did hear me giving instructions to several of the kids, as though it was their first time. I feel as though this is a key component as to the experience we had. They gave us all rules of the room/game (no need to climb on things, rip things off the wall, etc), however they failed to mention the possibility to verify a proper code before entering it into a safe - that only allowed for a max of 3 attempts. This was also a key component to solving the room for these kids.

In the room, we made work of solving one clue to get to another, until we came to a code panel located near 3 pipes in the wall. We input the proper code and a sound indication movement of the pipes, a release/unlocking of sorts. We fumbled with the pipes for over 5 minutes, wondering how it would move us forward in our endeavor to escape. After several minutes passed, our game master finally piped in to ask if the middle pipe had “dropped” fully. We responded “no,” and they recommended typing in the code to the panel once again to fully release the pipe. This did the trick, and I mentioned, out loud, that that mishap cost us valuable time in the room.

Towards the end of the room, we were rushing to escape, an important factor in making my daughter’s birthday celebration grand. With minutes to spare, we improperly tried our 3rd and final attempt into the safe that would give us the final clue. We were locked out and therefore lost the game.

I feel as though it was important to mention 1) that we could ask for verification on the code before the final attempt, 2) further attention to the pipe mishap in the middle of the game, and 3) more time added to our clock to account for this delay.

Had we been given, at minimum 5 more minutes after that mistake, we may not have rushed to try the wrong code on our final attempt. Which also could’ve been avoided re: 1).

It was a disappointment to our daughter that we did not escape the room, especially given how close we were.

I hope in the future that your staff is able to fine-tune the features of the room to either make sure they are functioning at optimum levels and/or pay close attention to any mishaps happening in the room they are leading.

We will return to Breakout Games for future games, because we really do enjoy the themes, games, puzzles, etc it has to offer.. but at almost $200 for a party of 6 to do a room, we expected more attention to detail that we sadly did not...

Three of us did the Kidnapping 2 escape room last Tuesday and all seemed to be going well until right before the last puzzle, when a projector is revealed, our helper comes over the intercom and just says "That's broken." We are just standing in a dark room with desktop screen being projected onto one of the walls. Instead of trying to fix it or offering some sort of alternative so that we could finish properly, our helper just comes and knocks on the door and says, "You're done." We had to prompt her to even explain what the last puzzle of the room would have been and even then, it was just a quick description of a video that would have played and allowed us to solve the last puzzle. No details, just a hand quickly guiding out the door.

The projector clearly wasn't broken, as we could see desktop. I'm curious as to why the video couldn't play. 2. If this was just a part of the room that's been broken, we should have been warned about it prior to booking, ie "The room ends with a massive anticlimax because our electronics aren't working." Sh*t happens, we get it, but when you charge almost 50 bucks each for an experience, you need to have some sort of backup plan. 3. Since we weren't able to finish our room, we should have been offered a discount or an invite back to finish the room off properly at a later time instead of just being rushed out with little to no explanation. I've been to many escape rooms, but have never been made to feel like so little a priority than when I visited...