The Basement
Sylmar, California
The Basement: A dark, dank basement. A deranged serial
killer who likes to play games. An hour to escape. You’ve done this before. You
know the drill.
So this was it. We had finally made it. After years of
hearing about the allegedly BEST escape room in the world, we finally had the
chance to play it. Prior to this day we had several missed opportunities to
play owing mostly to the fact that they require a certain minimum number of
players for optimal game play. Everywhere we have visited people have asked us:
Have you played the basement? Now we could finally say: “YES!”
Much to our disappointment, however, we felt, in our humble
opinion, that the Basement has been much exaggerated and definitely overhyped. Our
theory on this is that many so-called escape room review bloggers have never
actually played the games they recommend but only pass on what they have
“heard” from others (most of whom are first-time escape room players). But to
give credit where credit is due, let’s start with the positive.
Pros: The set design was cool! Not the best of the best, but
still pretty darned cool. The dark lighting and added effects created the
spooky ambience befitting of its reputation. The fear factor was definitely
heightened in the minutes waiting before the start of the game and the whole
group was mentally prepared to be scared silly by the trailers and overview
videos. The game master was likewise instrumental to creating a sense of terror
and preparing us for the feeling that we were really about to be locked away
fighting for our lives.
Cons: It wasn’t scary. Wait, maybe that should go in the
pros? Yes, that is definitely a pro. Let me repeat: IT IS NOT SCARY. For those
of you who HATE HAUNTED HOUSES (you know who you are), you can breathe a sigh
of relief. I personally love haunted houses (though usually not in combination
with escape rooms) but this was definitely not a haunted house in any way.
There was a surprise sound or spooky element here and there but nothing
terrifying at all. So never fear, my fretful friends who may have steered away
from this place based on the promos. The reason why we have placed this fact in
the cons section, however, is based on the fact that their entire advertising
campaign and hype is focused on being a terrifying experience. It was, in fact,
not terrifying.
With that out of the way, now we can evaluate it as a normal
escape room. As you know we love puzzles (like all escape room fanatics) and focus
mostly on looking at quality of puzzles, logic of puzzles, and game flow. The Basement suffered on all these accounts.
First, the puzzles were not all aligned to the theme of the room. Some were
random and most were not puzzles at all but merely objects or codes to find.
Finding objects in a dark and dirty (faux dirt) room with only one flashlight
between twelve people is nearly impossible. The logic of a few of the puzzzles
was questionable. Game flow was severely complicated by the sheer number of
players packed into the room. Twelve people? Communication is nearly
impossible. Twelve people and a linear,
one puzzle at a time room? Definitely impossible. We did not escape. We were
close, we were told. But we did not escape. This was not for want of trying or
lack of experience but due to the fact that twelve people were crammed into a dark
room with 1-2 flashlights and very well-hidden codes and objects. Reduce the
number of people and provide us proper lighting and then we will be able to see
well enough and communicate well enough to easily solve the simple puzzles in
this room.
Our recommendation? Play it to say you’ve played it but we
found it mostly just overhped and overcrowded. The large number of people in
the room made for an unenjoyable escape room experience especially when
compared to the vast majority of other escape room companies out there.
Southern California has so many other AMAZING escape rooms – give some of those
a try.
