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Escape rooms have become an inescapable phenomenon, with more than 60 iterations of these immersive, locked-room puzzles sprinkled across the Bay Area and thousands more across the nation. There are scary imprisoned-with-zombies versions for thrill seekers, steampunk adventures for the historically inclined and whimsical, family-friendly rooms, too.
Playing is simple: Book a game, gather your cleverest friends and enter an elaborately decked-out room — or series of rooms — and decipher your way back out. What these games all have in common are marvelously perplexing, elaborately crafted puzzles.
Here’s just a sampling of the Bay Area’s best.
The Escape Game, San Francisco
The year is 1955. You’ve been wrongfully accused of a crime, and sentenced to life in a dank, dreary, Alcatraz-like prison cell. It all seems utterly hopeless — unless you can find a way to bust outta the joint with the help of another inmate. Welcome to “Prison Break,” the most intensely challenging of five games at this highly entertaining venue.
If doing time in the slammer doesn’t sound all that arresting, you can participate in a daring art heist, hunt for gold, or even head to Morocco on a crucial special-ops mission. And then there’s something that feels more like homework — a game called “The Playground” that challenges players to ace some tricky assignments before earning a final report card.
Each room here is high on eye-pleasing production values and adrenaline rushes are common.
Details: The hour-long games are priced at $42 per player. Capacity for “The Playground” is four to 12 players; other games can be played by two to eight players, ages 13 and up. (Younger players are allowed, but some of the content may be too difficult for them.) The Escape Game is located at 150 Kearny St., San Francisco; theescapegame.com/sanfrancisco
Beat the Room, Vacaville
The emphasis is on family-friendly entertainment at this four-room venue. Among the adventures in store is a trip across the pond to 221B Baker Street, where Sherlock Holmes mysteriously has gone missing while investigating the Bridge Street murders. Your mission? Track down the iconic sleuth — but time, of course, is of the essence.
Other experiences include an initiation process administered by a powerful secret society, a potentially ominous brush with prohibition-era mobsters and a bit of risky plundering aboard Black Bart’s pirate ship, where — if you mess up — you just might have to walk the plank. Yo ho, yo ho, where’s Jack Sparrow when you need him?
Details: Prices range from $29 to $35 per person. Each room is designed for two to eight people, ages 14 and up. (The age restriction does not apply if an entire room is booked for a private experience.) Beat the Room is located at 814 Alamo Drive, Vacaville; www.beattheroom.com
Palace Games, San Francisco
It’s only fitting that the three escape rooms at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts began with Harry Houdini. The famous escape artist was among the attractions at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition when it opened in 1915 — and Houdini designed a mysterious puzzle room here to stump his brilliant friends, Thomas Edison and Theodore Roosevelt among them.
Now you, too, can try to out-puzzle the master. Palace Games’ Great Houdini, Roosevelt and Edison escape rooms — ranked the top escape rooms in the nation — offer elaborately decorated rooms flush with secret panels, hidden passages, fiendish puzzles and some crazy technical wizardry. It’s two hours of awesome.
Details: These games are booked by the room ($400, for four to 10 players). Wear sneakers and comfortable clothes; long pants are strongly advised for the Roosevelt room. Reserve your adventure at palace-games.com; find the entrance at 3362 Palace Drive, which loops behind the Palace of Fine Arts, in San Francisco.
Off the Couch, Santa Clara
There are currently three escape rooms at this Santa Clara destination, two of which — Conspiracy and Inheritance — each take about an hour to complete. But budget twice that time for Excalibur, which is the rare two-hour escape room.
Conspiracy is the perfect choice for the conspiracy theorist in your life, the one who is sure that the government is up to no good and that the next door neighbor only pretends to work at Apple, but is really a foreign spy. Inheritance, on the other hand, presents the opportunity to unravel puzzle after puzzle, in order to find the treasures left behind by Nikola Tesla. Finally, there’s Excalibur, which takes thrill-seekers on a magical mystery tour through Camelot in an effort to find out what happened to the Knights of the Round Table.
And in March, Off the Couch plans to open a 14,000-square-foot escape room dubbed Pandorum, which sets the game 100 years in the future and is expected to take — gulp! — eight hours for guests to complete.
Details: Prices vary. A spin through Conspiracy, for example, costs $90 for two guests ($45 per person) or $180 for six guests ($30 per person). Bookings are private, so you won’t be escaping with strangers. Wear comfortable clothes; pants are advised for Excalibur. Book your room at offthecouchgames.com; play at1220 Memorex Drive, Suite 300, in Santa Clara.
Omescape San Jose
There are five hour-long escape games for you to try here. Newcomers (as well as feline fans) might want to start with Kingdom of Cats, which Omescape lists as a three out of a possible five on the difficulty scale. Plus, it’s got a really fun story line with the humans (i.e. you) trying to win a tournament designed to find the wisest cat in the land.
If you want to move up a notch on the difficulty scale, try Pandemic Zero and see if you can make your way through a secret lab to find the antidote to a super virus that could wipe out the human race. There’s also Sorcerer’s Sanctum, which offers a spellbinding trip through a house of great magicians.
Details: Some games are best played by two ($80), others can accommodate anywhere up to 11 people ($330). Wear comfortable shoes and clothes. Book your room at omescape.us. Locations include 625 Wool Creek Drive, Suite E in San Jose; 5327 Jacuzzi Street, Suite 3H in Richmond; and 1135 E Arques Ave in Sunnyvale.
StemChef’s Candy Lab, Danville
Crave some education with your escape room? That’s the idea behind this small, kid-focused escape room in Blackhawk Plaza. Inside the bright, one-roomer, kiddos find themselves locked in a pastel-hued candy lab with a mission. It could be stepping in for an absent candy maker and using clues and tinkering to solve puzzles and create the ultimate dessert (chocolate mousse, anyone?). Or perhaps the season-o-meter is broken and temperatures have stagnated, with leaves still on the trees, and it’s your mission to make the right candy concoction to slip out of fall and into winter.
Heavy on science and critical thinking perfect for the 8-and-older set, the 60-to-80 minute adventure also features some history, geography and team-building collaborative skills, which makes it great for drop-off birthday parties, too. Best part? The science theme changes monthly so kids can savor a variety of yummy scientific flavors.
Details: Ages 8 to 13. $35 per child. No adults. Not recommended for children under 7. Check website for a version geared toward ages 4-7, coming soon. CandyLab Escape Room is located at 3457 Blackhawk Plaza, between Stella’s and Santa’s Workshop, in Danville; www.stemchef.com
Red Door Escape Room, Concord
You’re playing the ultimate poker game. You’ve got $1 million in chips on the line and an opportunity to unlock bonus bucks, so it’s easy to get greedy and forget to notice the peculiar lockers. Welcome to “Cash Me If You Can,” one of the most difficult escape rooms at Concord’s Red Door Escape Room.
Those looking to collaborate on a creative challenge may prefer “The Warrior’s Way,” where the mission is to be chosen as one of The Master’s pupils inside his legendary dojo. All you have to do is split into two groups and demonstrate your aikido worth. Don’t have much time? Opt for “Last Stop,” where you and your team of private investigators must solve a murder case — ID the victim and determine time of death, murder weapon, motive and suspect — all in 25 minutes or less; otherwise, the feds will take the case away from you.
Details: Red Door features four 90-minute escape rooms organized by level of difficulty, time commitment and number of participants (two to eight, ages 14 and up). Most games are $33 per person; “Last Stop” is $17. Red Door is located at 2075 Diamond Blvd., Suite HA-275, Concord; www.reddoorescapressenterprise.com