Rocky Mountain Zephyr

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The Golden Puzzle Room is a 20-minute drive just west of downtown Denver in Lakewood, Colorado. It is convenient to the 6th Avenue Highway, located in an office building just off the main road. The entrance was well-marked and there was plenty of parking in the building’s free lot. Despite being inside a multi-story office building, signage made Golden Puzzle Room easy to find on the second floor, accessible by stairs or elevator.

The reception area was clean and well-maintained. There are a few chairs, a side table with a few puzzles to play while waiting and samples of the types of locks you’ll encounter during the games. For larger groups, this area may be tight if you have to wait. There is a decent-sized reception room in the back with tables, chairs and a full kitchen that our host said is popular with birthday parties and corporate groups.

When it was time to start the game, our game host gave us an overview of room safety and made sure we knew how to operate each kind of lock contained in the room. We also received a clipboard with paper and a pencil for taking notes as well as a laminated sheet with pictures of each type of lock and a description on how to operate. For a timer, we were given an hourglass or could walkie-talkie for an updated time. We then learned that the Rocky Mountain Zephyr is a train and that we were the only passengers aboard. It was speeding toward the end of the track and we had 60 minutes to stop the train before it crashed.

The game began with us hunting for clues in an old-time style passenger train car. As a group of 4 players, one of whom was on crutches, we found it to be a good use of small space. The props were all in good shape and everything worked as intended. The clues and puzzles were straightforward and largely discovered in a linear fashion. There is an above-average range of difficulty and style and a good balance of individual and multi-part solutions, as well as those requiring teamwork. The enthusiastic scavengers in our group particularly found this game to be a lot of fun. We were impressed by some very creative and unique puzzles in this game.

The immersion in the game was average. We felt like we were on a train for some of the experience, though the ambiance could certainly be more train-like. Though the set design and time period remain on theme throughout, the majority of the clues and puzzles are disconnected from the narrative. The solutions to each puzzle move players further along toward stopping the train before dying a horrible death, but they do little to advance the story. Ultimately, this is a puzzle room rather than a true escape room. Players hoping to learn how they came to find themselves on an empty runaway train will not have their curiosity about the story satisfied.

The set design and wide array of puzzles are the main factors in this room’s overall fun and are why we believe this is an above average experience. As a whole, because of the linear nature of the clues that have all players focused on the same solution, we thought the game was best played with 3-4 people and that larger groups may find stretches where it’s difficult to have every person engaged at the same time. With some minor tweaking of the set and improvement of the very difficult puzzle this would be even more fun. We definitely recommend a visit for intermediate and advanced room escape players.