Da Vinci's Lost Workshop

Da Vinci's Lost Workshop: We entered Da Vinci's secret workshop seeking the truth about his mysterious final invention. Pros: The owners and game masters here really go above and beyond to make your experience fun and memorable from the moment you walk in the door. They remain largely in character throughout the experience and help generate enthusiasm even before the game officially begins. Once we entered the room we found ourselves surrounded by a neat, orderly, and well-designed set that included no unnecessary props or red herrings to distract us from our task. We quickly discovered the game was multilinear and our team of five split up to begin working on different puzzles. The mix of mechanical, word, and symbol puzzles kept us busy down to the very last seconds of the game. In the final pinch, the game master intervened to provide us with a crucial hint that helped us cross the finish line with less than a minute to spare. It was a close call, but we were ecstatic to finish this very challenging room. Cons: We honestly loved every minute of our experience at the Grand Detectives Society. We applaud the owners and employees for the effort and love they have devoted to their business. Our only advice to future players is to assemble your finest puzzle-solving team and bring your A-game because this room poses quite the challenge!

When you first step in, the story begins. Our GM was already in character and already knew our names. I’m out interactions with our host was the highlight of this room. It is a beginner room and the puzzles were pretty simple and I’ve seen them before. There was a pretty cool reveal!

This room was alright. I give them props on the mechanics and creativity on most of their puzzles. It had a DaVinci-esque feel to it. However, if you’re going with immersion, then don’t do it 75% of the way, at least make the effort to get to 90% while maintaining the story. The GM also was too focused on making jokes instead of clear, concise hints (when we asked). The mechanisms throughout saved face for the most part. The last puzzle was broken and even the GM was confused on the solution. Wasn’t terrible, but wasn’t great either. Felt like we were being rushed in and out as well.

This is such a cute game! I’m not sure why people aren’t talking about this company, but they should be. Both rooms are a delight to play, and the staff is so much fun to interact with.

One of the most memorable experiences in an escape game I ever had in SoCal. The pregame and postgame are just as immersive as the ingame. The design of this room seemed modest at first then you get a surprise that makes everything just so cool. Puzzles are very unique and mechanical in ways not common in other games.