Is a team building room escape is a good choice for us?

With in-person events having a comeback stronger than Agatha Christie-style murder mystery movies, you may be looking at one. Doing a team building room escape activity for your group can sometimes be a great idea! (BTW we use “escape room” and “room escape” interchangeably, since they mean the same thing. We will point out that if you find yourself distressed by words that aren’t lined up in the order you’re used to, you may not have fun solving puzzles in an escape room.)

Room escapes are a wildly popular hobby, and there are tons of great ones no matter where you are: we love this web site as a place to learn more. But there are a lot of different types of groups out there, and a lot of kinds of meetings. The key question is, does a team building room escape make sense for your group? Or are you setting yourself up for an inescapably epic fail? Here are some questions worth asking yourself.

• Is it the right fit, given your agenda?

Team building games should be a change of pace. So if you’ve got a hard-core indoor agenda, and you’ll be spending two days with Death by Power Point, going into an escape room might not feel like the fun respite that would give the group a breath of fresh air. Especially since many rooms have themes like “bunker,” “jail cell,” “space ship” or other contained area. You might be on the verge of giving your players claustrophobia!

• Does solving puzzles sound fun?

We’re calling you out, engineers. Everyone else, you may or may not view “puzzles” and “recreational fun” as synonyms. Many sales groups prefer to play something with a more competitive flavor to it, rather than the collective victory shared by teams in an escape room, or shared blame if the time runs out.

• Are there accessibility concerns?

Some folks are upset by gore: some rooms are horror-themed. Also, accessibility issues factor in: some rooms require you to crawl through a small space or even go down a slide. If your goal is to bring the group together, don’t pick something that will isolate or rule out some participants. You may need to make a different choice based on the attributes of your participants. Most room escapes have websites that give you advisories about, e.g., flashing lights, gore, crawlspaces, etc. Make sure the whole group is made aware of any advisories. Then, the only surprises in the room escape will be fun ones!

• Can the escape room accommodate your group size?

All escape games have an upper limit on how many people can participate. You should take those seriously: the designers know their job. You don’t want to be packed in like sardines while trying to scour a bookshelf of Goodwill castoff hardbacks with a black light flashlight. Some storefront room escapes have multiple rooms, or can accommodate your group in shifts. Check ahead and find out if your RSVPs make the escape a good fit or not.

Are you ready for us to give away the answers? Our mobile room escape program “Countdown” can accommodate any size group, has no gore and no jump scares (sorry Halloween nerds) and no accessibility issues. Plus, we bring it to you! If this sounds like the right fit, check it out here and get a quote to begin your escape!