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◣ VENUE FACT SHEET
🏢 COMPANY: Trapped Puzzle Rooms • Website • Audio Escape Adventures
🏘️ ADDRESS, BRANCH 1: 561 Snelling Ave S, St Paul, MN 55116 • Google Map
🏘️ ADDRESS, BRANCH 2: 708 N 1st St, Minneapolis, MN 55401 • Google Map
🗾 COUNTRY: United States
◣ GAME INFO & BOOKING
🕹️ GAME: Prehistoric Park (Audio Led Escape Room) • Booking/Pricing
⏲️ DURATION: 90 Minutes 💬 DIFFICULTY: N/A (Company) • Moderately Challenging (Mattster's Team of 6)
◣ AUDIO LED: SPECIFICATIONS
🖥️ PLATFORM: Discord (Multimedia Chat Room/Channel)
🔊 MEDIA INVOLVED: Audio, Still Images
◣ PREMISE & OBJECTIVES
It’s your lucky day. You have been randomly selected to be the first visitors to Prehistoric Park! Boarding a private helicopter, you head off on the all-expense paid vacation of your dreams... After all, what could possibly go wrong on an island filled with dinosaurs?
► TL;DR: REVIEW SUMMARY ◄
😺 THE GOOD:
Trapped Puzzle Rooms spared no expanse in creating an exciting "Jurassic Park" inspired narrative, with unusual situational puzzles to boot, in an excellently hosted audio led escape game, featuring my long time obsession--dinosaurs! So much goodness in one sentence.
🙀 THE NOT SO GOOD:
Honestly? As far as an audio led escape room goes, this is pretty great! The graphic designer can and probably will further improve their craft over time, but this is more of an encouragement than true criticism.
🤝 BEST FIT FOR:
Creative minds who are open to, or familiar with, the concept of an audio led escape room. A general love for the fossil reptiles or the film franchise helps, but not required. Ideal for groups of 4 to 6, because a diverse, outside the box thinking benefits game progression.
► A ROUND OF APPLAUSE! ◄
needs a thorough scrubbing in the shower after a trip to the park... Yuck!
🎖️ "PREHISTORIC PARK" OFFICIALLY JOINS THE "RECOMMENDED" RANK! 🎖️
◣ THE REVIEW
A LITTLE EXPOSITION
🦖 Mattster. Loves. Dinosaurs. 🦕
When "Jurassic Park" came out in the 1990s, it created a huge wave of dino craze one simply could not ignore. Whether it be movie commercials, licensed toys and trading cards, or products from every other brand jumping on the cash-in wagon, these huge lizards were EVERYWHERE.
The passion or borderline obsession for these fascinating creatures spawned back then never once left my being. Even to this very day, I still literally *run* to the skeleton displays of prehistoric giants in natural history museum, much like I would 20 something years ago.
And today, it's exactly that same kid at heart that selected "Prehistoric Park" from Trapped Puzzle Rooms's 3 available audio adventure options without any hesitation.
SIMILAR FATE
There's little pretense that this audio led escape game is a homage to the Spielberg classic. From the logo to synopsis, logic safely predicts your once in life time visit to the nature park will surely go awry. But still, they had me at "all expense paid trip". Free means "YAS, PLEASE!".
Stepping into the majestic Visitor's Center, I could almost hear the beautiful theme from the motion picture, invoking a sense of wonder and amazement. I can hardly wait to see a Brachiosaurus do a hind leg stand...
...AND THINGS IMMEDIATELY WENT TO A BIG PILE OF [POOP].
"Welcome to Prehistoric Park!"
The way "Prehistoric Park" plunged its players right into the midst of chaos without wasting even minutes of transient idyll made my jaw drop (yes, that happened). Some other colossal jaw exhaled onto us a sense of urgency, and we were immediately immersed in a surprisingly effective atmosphere of impending doom... We held on to our butts, because this was do or die!
The ensuing 90 minutes was a curious and amusing fight for survival as we wandered and explored every inch of the Center for a possible chance of rescue. Danger could lurk at any corner, but humor was most certainly present in every room. (More on that later.)
TIME TO SWITCH GEARS
Accompanying the compelling narrative was a list of "puzzles" to be solved, if we were to get out of this alive without ending in a T Rex's stomach.
Having done many escape rooms recently, I subconsciously expected a certain type of challenge format, and when PP remodeled the puzzles to better fit the storytelling, my brain's processing HQ came to a "Uh uh uh!" halt at first. These puzzles felt different and delightfully difficult!
I was glad that Trapped pushed my noggin's reset button and encouraged me to think outside of the box. Admittedly, should an enthusiast do too many puzzle games too frequently, they get repetitive, but PP managed to stand out from the crowd like a 38-foot gentle herbivore.
While a number of riddles were escape room puzzle like, the most enjoyable, most memorable, and most laughter unleashing steps of our adventure were ones best achievable by audio led escape games. No longer confined to a physical set, literally anything and everything is possible. If I could audibly utter it out of my lips, it happened.
And if you know me at all, I'd say a lot of things.
Having the freedom to be as creative as we wanted to be, both the game designers and the participants can go nuts. You'll be doing things you definitely can't do in a brick and mortar escape room venue... nor would you want to! At one point, we couldn't believe the ridiculous suggestion that I frivolously threw around turned out to be the exact solution that we needed.
We were floored, as in ROFLMAO kind of floor.
THE REMAINING PIECES
Other game components worthy of mention were our lovely game master, the many graphic files, and the hosting platform, Discord.
Firstly, Kaylene was a highly trained, well oiled machine of a game host. This experience would've turned out completely different had someone else operated. In a genre like audio led escape game, so dependent on constructing a mental picture only through verbal descriptions and still images, the game host is a make or break role.
Kaylene possessed excellent showmanship, knowing exactly how to move things along in a sensible pace while not sacrificing any passing opportunities to foster a continually fun and hilarious environment. I tend to steer my audio games in a ludicrous direction for comedic effects, and this gm was able to ping back our every move with equal playfulness. Clever girl.
The visual aspect of PP was also commendable as the company provided an all original, no stock image experience. While I wouldn't say these are the best graphics I've ever seen, they looked cute, vibrant, and detailed, and I most definitely can't do any better.
Notably, dinosaurs like the T Rex and Utahraptor received their research updates, and their once scaly bodies in the 90s now rock luxurious coats of feathers. Incorporating what science had uncovered between then and now made the dino nerd in me gush with appreciation.
For me, it was just not as good as Zoom when it came time for video conferencing. I love seeing my teammates' faces, so Zoom takes the win. In its defense, however, Discord provided a better chat and share interface, learning curve was low, and overall experience was smooth.
