The City Adventurers headed to Brighton for a relaxing day by the sea. No sooner had we arrived than our help was needed to save the world (again). We raced to The Brunswick pub, just off the seafront, and were met by Dr Hazard, who explained the situation…..
“The Masternet 9000 (a rogue artificial intelligence) has staged a mutiny of the Bewilder Box Initiative. As per Dr. Wilder’s orders, you must journey deep into its cognitive training facility solving puzzles and utilising advanced field equipment to stop him before he escapes.”
Were we ready to use our minds and save humankind? Would our grey matter be up to the task? And while we were at it, could we determine if The Masternet is good or bad? There was only one way to find out…
Having booked in at the bar via a cute robot, Dr Hazard came bounding down the stairs to greet us. Her introduction to Bewilderbox indicated there may (or may not) have been an accident and now the fate of civilization rested in our hands. It seemed the Masternet 9000 had escaped its confinement. It would take the rouge AI exactly 60 minutes to upload itself into the mainframe and escape into the world wide web. Then who knew what it would do!
Swearing us to secrecy, Dr Hazard told us we needed to sort things out before anyone found out what had happened. We needed to work fast to complete challenges, break into the server rooms, and put a stop to the AI’s mischief. We would be assisted on our mission by D.A.V.E., another AI that could offer us clues and nudges if we needed it.
We stowed our coats and bags and headed inside the room to meet the rouge AI, played by Norman Lovett, aka Holly from Red Dwarf.
Inside the room
The game was played in a light, bright room, however we were also given a torch “just in case”. I personally feel this would be a good idea for all games, although in this particular case, the torch proved handy later on.
The futuristic sci-fi set design was impressive and the build quality excellent. There was a good use of space with plenty of room to move around.
Puzzles
Despite being about computers and AI the game was very tactile. Something we, as a team, love. Rather than constantly using screens, the tech was more hidden. Yes, there were times we used screens, but that was in keeping with the story.
Talking of story, we loved the strong narrative that flowed through the game and the interactions with the Masternet 9000.
There were plenty of well designed puzzles, including logic, codebreaking, translating, sound etc, with clear and logical signposting. We noticed there were no padlocks in the game and only one key.
There was also a cute solution to one puzzle that caused a laugh.
The room involved a lot of searching for components to solve puzzles and was fairly non-linear to play. As a team of two, we were kept busy all the time.
The End
The finale was very tense as it offered a choice of endings. This was a twist we had not seen in an escape room before.
Even though the game had been building to this moment, we had been so immersed in solving the puzzles one of us had not been thinking about the final outcome of our endeavors. With little time to decide, we were faced with one of the hardest decisions we had ever had to make in an escape room. Well, for one of us it was a hard decision. The other one gave a persuasive argument and swung the vote.
Having locked in our answer, a video played and showed the outcome of our choice. Luckily, it seemed we made the right decision.
We completed our mission in 58 minutes with lots of nudges along the way. A fun adventure. Highly recommended.
Book your adventure at Bewilder Box at Judgement D.A.V.E. in Brighton.
Please note, we weren’t charged for our experience but this has not affected the contents of our review.
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