Escape Room Review: Escape From the Magic Show

Company: Real Escape Game / SCRAP
Room: Escape from the Magic Show
Date Played: 4/23/16
Player Count: 5 (2 + 3 strangers)

Success:  No, failure!

Premise: You're at a magic show, but then there's a magic bomb and you're tied to a bunch of strangers. So defuse the bomb, or you're doomed to live in the El Rey theater forever!

Immersion: Well, it was kind of a magic show, in that there was someone doing magic tricks on stage at the beginning and end of the event. And the group of strangers that we were paired with claimed that they thought they were there to attend a real magic show and that they didn't know there was a game, which is just what someone would say if it had been a real magic show. So I guess that was pretty realistic.

Highlights: The scant few physical things there were to do, like unlocking a couple of locks. 

Lowlights: Most of the puzzles had to fit on a small cocktail table and be replicated for two dozen groups, which means most of them were like doing an activity workbook for kids. The event cost more than going to a regular escape room. The random strangers we met were kind of a drag. Plus they blew up our bomb, so now we have to live in the El Rey forever.

And Finally:   We were pretty excited about the idea of one of this company's other games, The Time Travel Lab, until we actually played this one, which was pretty disappointing. I've heard they're doing Escape the Bank Vault in Long Beach later this year, but I think we'll skip it.

Out of 3 escape rooms played, Escape From the Magic Show is a distant #3. 

How to book this room yourself: You probably can't. This was a limited engagement event. It's for the best. But you could visit http://realescapegame.com for permanent games and upcoming special events.

#2,286: Star Trek Beyond

The Purge - ★★★☆☆
There are two kinds of movie I used to skip in the theater: big broad blockbuster comedies and a lot of horror stuff. Except, when I end up watching them later, it turns out that I like the horror stuff. Sometimes just to admire the economy of it.

Plus, the premise of this one makes me laugh.

The Infiltrator - ★★★☆☆
Felt to me like a throwback to the kind of movie made in the time this movie takes place. Like a 70s movie about the 70s, made last year. I thought it was pretty tense, just waiting for the shoe to drop. Cranston has a streak going of doing movies with unusual structure. I wonder if he insists on it.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier - ★★☆☆☆
I was oddly eager to see what is supposedly the worst movie in the series. It didn't seem all that different from Beyond, really. I like how the transporter isn't made of, like, tiny complicated circuit boards and electronics. It seems to be run on gears and pipes and things you need a huge wrench to fix.

I hope they get Ricky Gervais to play Sybok in the remake.

Star Trek Beyond - ★★½☆☆
A little bit boring, but possibly the movie in the reboot series that is most like the original series. Less galaxy-spanning wild action and more talking to people in goofy makeup in small rooms. More broken technology things. More sciencey stuff that doesn't make sense in our world OR theirs. And a thing at the end that's supposed to be really awesome that is really silly.

Escape Room Reviews: The Bunker

Company: Room Escape Live
Room: The Bunker
Date Played: 11/1/15
Player Count: 4

Success:  Success! With a hint or two.

Premise: Some military guy launched a nuke and then killed himself, so go through his office and find a way to stop it!  (Not strictly an escape, you could walk out at any time, but that won’t stop the missile launch!)

Immersion: Sufficient. I mean, it doesn't make any sense that this guy would have so many padlocks in his office. How would he get anything done? On a scale of '1 - Office Park' to '10 - Actual office in a missile silo' I'd say this gets a '6 - Set of a Game Show,' which was great.

Highlights: The main prop and all the things it gets used for is a lot of fun. There are a couple of multi-step puzzles that also stood out. This room always had plenty of stuff for the four of us to be searching or doing. So much so that we had to debrief after to make sure we all knew what all had transpired. We solved the dexterity puzzle (we're learning that there's always a dexterity puzzle!) that the minder told us most people don't solve. (Apparently they use a hint instead.) 

Lowlights: Kind of a lot of the same kind of regular locks. We got hung up in the beginning on a searching failure. 

And Finally:   We had a great time in this room, and we reached the very cinematic conclusion. However, our minder didn't stop the soundtrack, so the bomb still went off while we were taking victory photos and chatting, which was a good laugh. Not every object in the room was part of the game, but it felt like everything was 'in-bounds' and explorable. Fun gadgets, clear objectives, cool set. You would need a minimum of two people to physically accomplish the tasks in this game, but our foursome kept plenty busy.

Out of 2 escape rooms played, The Bunker is #1!

How to book this room yourself: Visit http://losangeles.roomescapelive.com/reservation/index/game/bunker

DDMTA Big News Drops!

You want your big news? I've got your big news!

Diani & Devine Meet the Apocalypse has been selected as one of the ten flagship films of the 2016 Austin Film Festival! This is where the movie will – at last! – be hatched unto the world!

Here's an Entertainment Weekly story about it, and please enjoy yesterday's post for the official trailer!

DDMTA Trailer Drops!

So like I sometimes talk about, Diani and Devine Meet The Apocalypse is this movie I helped to produce, and it's actually good, and it's actually coming out soon. Here's the full trailer. 

Find out more at DDMTA.com!  It's a good time to find out more because BIG SECRET NEWS is coming tomorrow!