{"id":116363,"date":"2024-08-03T10:01:00","date_gmt":"2024-08-03T14:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/roomescapeartist.com\/?p=116363"},"modified":"2025-04-29T17:23:35","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T21:23:35","slug":"what-weve-learned-from-online-escape-rooms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/roomescapeartist.com\/2024\/08\/03\/what-weve-learned-from-online-escape-rooms\/","title":{"rendered":"What We’ve Learned from Online Escape Rooms"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Constraints lead to creativity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the world shut down in March 2020, escape room creators all around the world were forced to discover new ways to share their experiential art from afar and keep their businesses afloat. What resulted were hundreds, if not thousands, of online escape rooms that experimented with new formats and new technology, and which were accessible to players anywhere. Some of these games were scrappy approximations of an in-person escape room; others were polished masterpieces that were only possible in this new format.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By most counts, the heyday of online escape rooms has passed. The REA Hivemind went from reviewing over a hundred live-hosted online escape rooms in 2020 and 2021 to a mere handful in the subsequent years. TERPECA<\/a> also eliminated the Top Online Rooms category back in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many \u2014 but not all \u2014 of our favorite live experiences in this genre now exist only in our memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of note, Headlocked Escape Rooms will stop running their Golden Lock Award-winning games at the end of August 2024. So if you haven\u2019t played The Keeper & the Fungus Among Us<\/em><\/a> or Rise of the Fungi<\/em><\/a> (the newer prequel!), book them today<\/a>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"image
The Keeper & the Fungus Among Us<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Even though we may no longer have to play online escape rooms, there are a number of reasons why we may still want to. There is much to be learned from the evolution of online escape rooms over the past 4 years, and I believe that many such experiences will continue to provide unique value in the right contexts and for the right audiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

A Taxonomy of Online Escape Rooms<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Online escape rooms span multiple different formats. Some games attempt to reproduce something close to a real-life escape room experience while others lean into other types of puzzle-driven gameplay. Some are hosted by a live in-character host (often referred to as an \u201cavatar\u201d) who is physically present on an escape room set. Other games are playable on-demand without any live human facilitation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The
Pursuit of the Assassin Artist<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Most online escape rooms fit into the following categories. I’ve linked one example in each.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/td>Hosted<\/td>Unhosted<\/td><\/tr>
Adaptation of an existing physical escape room<\/td>Emergency Exit\u2019s The Beast<\/em><\/a><\/td>Next Level Escape\u2019s Temporal Tangle<\/em><\/a><\/td><\/tr>
Newly created physical escape room<\/td>Omescape\u2019s Pursuit of the Assassin Artist<\/em><\/a><\/td>Marvo Mysteries’ M.A.R.V.O Archives<\/em><\/a><\/td><\/tr>
Newly created digital escape room<\/td>Meridian Adventure Co’s The Traveler\u2019s Guide to Little Sodaburg<\/em><\/a><\/td>Wolf Escape Rooms\u2019 Hallows Hill<\/em><\/a><\/td><\/tr>
Newly created audio escape room<\/td>Trapped Puzzle Rooms\u2019 Audio Escape Adventures<\/a><\/td>Rusty Lake Untold: The Lab<\/a><\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Some of these newer styles necessitated the development of more refined supporting tech. Buzzshot, an existing escape room software platform, created Telescape<\/a>, which started as a streamlined inventory system but soon became a fully-fledged virtual escape room engine utilized by a majority of the top experiences in this era.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Illustrated
The Traveler\u2019s Guide to Little Sodaburg<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Some other related categories of at-home escape rooms also grew rapidly during the pandemic:<\/p>\n\n\n\n