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Review: Robin of Lockskey - Escapologic, Nottingham

Room Story - from Escapologic

Your team are students at a prestigious university under the tutelage of the eccentric history professor, Dr. John Little. Last he told you, he was close to finding the true location of Robin Hoods grave.

show more.... He believed Robin was buried here, under the old car park.

Unfortunately a building company recently purchased the land and they want to fill it in with concrete, unknowingly destroying one of the greatest finds in British history.

The professor was found trespassing on the site, looking for evidence of the grave and has been arrested. The task has been left to you.

The work is set to be started after the builders return from lunch in one hour.

Go down into the site, find Robins grave, bring evidence back up to the surface and stop them destroying history!

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Key Stats

Room NameRobin of Lockskey
VenueEscapologic
LocationNottingham, UK
Date16/12/2017
Escape Time36:00
Team Size3
My Recommended Team Size2 - 3

Review

This is the final review in my small selection of reviews that I’ve had on my outstanding list for nearly a year, so it feels nice to have finally caught up! Since we played this game, it has been closed by Escapologic. When I last visited Escapologic in April 2018, I talked to the team there and they told me they had plans to refurbish and extend Robin of Lockskey and bring it back at some point in the future. At the time of writing, it’s not on their website and I don’t know if this is still the case.

In the game, you head underground to find the missing grave of Robin Hood. It’s a very apt theme for a Nottingham escape room company. Escapologic have taken a very small space and somehow managed to fit an escape room in it. What they’ve done is extremely clever, but the size of the space also means that the experience just isn’t long enough. We escaped in 36 minutes and were very surprised to walk out of the exit.

To get down to the room, you don your hard hat and head down a retractable staircase into the cave like space below. When you’re down there everything is exposed brick, stone and rusty metal – very authentic feeling. We began exploring and quickly uncovered all the spaces in the room. Once we’d done this, there’s one central multi-parted puzzle that you spend most of your time on in the game to reach Robin’s grave. It's a really impressive physical puzzle – think Indiana Jones/Tomb Raider style.

Once we’d accessed Robin’s grave and retrieved an item of jewellery, we’d completed the game and headed to the exit! What Escapologic have done with a really small space is very clever and well executed, however, there just aren’t enough puzzles in there and you are out far too quickly. It’s obvious that they’ve recognised this as they closed the game. If they succeed in extending it, this could be a brilliant game.

The team were Daniel, Chris and Craig.

Ratings

Overall A beautifully themed room and clever use of a really small space, but it was just too short. 
Difficulty There aren’t many puzzles in here and it’s a very small space, so we found it very easy. 
Fun What we played was fun, but there just wasn’t enough of it. 
Puzzles There were some really nice and ‘grand’ puzzles in this room, but there were too few. 
Immersion The immersion is fantastic. They’ve managed to make a small hole in the ground feel like a realistic underground tomb. 
Surprises There are a few hidden spaces in the game, but other than that, it’s not a game big on surprises.