Special Ops: Mysterious Market

This was a great experience! The production, effects, staff are all top notch. The room is well themed, the puzzles are interesting and challenging in a way that makes sense both as a puzzle and for the story. This room was on the darker side, but flashlights were provided, so that helps. In general, games at this company are on the easier side, but also have great special effects, and unique puzzles. Mostly Gen2 type room and great for a mixed experience group. We had three newbies in our group and we escaped with plenty of time. Everyone had a blast!

I wish it had more puzzles but it was a blast 😉

After doing the rest of the escape games rooms, we felt this one was the weakest of the bunch. It was fairly short in comparison and not as many unique puzzles. Good story

Embark as a secret agent on a mission to save the world! This game was a cool mix of mechanical and high-tech puzzles. I’m a sucker for math-based puzzles and loved the inclusion of one. While the darkness fits the theme, I’m not a fan of the artificial difficulty that it creates, as it limits accessibility to promote the atmosphere when there are ways to do that while maximizing accessibility. GM Gwen was awesome, and a heads up that The Escape Game only offers public bookings, so you might get put with others. I loved aspects of this room, but it falls short for me in how it’s all weaved together.

So fun!

Calling all agents! If you’re looking for a high tech, medium skill-level room, this is the one for you. We had an enjoyable time in this room, and Special Ops was specific to the Irvine location as the Orange location does not have Special Ops. The set design was great in the marketplace! My favorite part was definitely how much detail went into it. From the tiles to the ceiling, you felt like you were immersed in another country. This escape room had a strong start from the moment you walked through the doors to the market, however; I wish that the other part of this room was cohesive with the set design which felt underwhelming when completing the second set of tasks for this game. But overall, still had a great time completing. I played with 2 other players and we were able to escape, but I would recommend a team of 2-4 (depending on your skill level) because this room relied on a lot of high tech puzzles. Personally, I enjoy the basic lock and key and mechanical puzzles, but the rest of my group liked how high tech it was because it really made them feel like an agent. 2-4 players is a good number also because of the physical space so that each person is able to collaborate and complete the tasks in an efficient manner, otherwise you may be on top of each other.

it was a very high production experience, my favorite was the very beginning. i loved the theming

Super fun beginning and while it has an engaging end I do think it kinda falls off versus the start (and you want to build up the room as you go through). Has one of my favorite room reveals of all time that is done just perfectly, just think the ending room needs some tweaks in its puzzles. While fun it is pretty straight forward and feels less exciting and more pure analysis. Still a very good room, and one of the (if not the) best "The Escape Game" rooms.

Several rooms, with a decent amount of scavenging and puzzle solving. There was plenty for several people to work on, and puzzles were intuitive and satisfying to solve!