8 Suspects

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According to their website, “This IS a room-style game, but it is NOT a locked-door escape game.
This game is booked by time slot, not individual tickets. When you buy out a game time, you may bring up to 8 players (4 minimum required). No other groups or players will join your game. Each player becomes a story character, so teams of 8 are strongly recommended. This game requires substantial amounts of reading and may be difficult for non-native English speakers.”

Real Escape Games is located in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles. Parking can be found on the street or in nearby lots; they do not offer any validation for parking. There are a variety of “shops” in the area ranging from match and coffee, sushi, a Japanese market, clothing stores, and art. There’s even a mini Challenger Space Shuttle dedicated to astronaut Ellison S. Onizuka.

You meet your group members in the lobby. Please note, the lobby has no seating and you cannot enter until it’s your time to play. They do not have lockers, but you can safely leave your belongings in the lobby if you’d like because they do lock the main door while you are in the room playing. You started out getting to know one another by saying your name and listing the best or worst memory from high school. It’s a fun way to tell a story about yourself and get a few laughs. After the participants are done you get to hear the Game Master’s worst story from high school, which leads you into the mystery you are about to try and solve.

The Game Master is an author who sets the story for you: your party members are gathered together today to figure out which one of you killed your favorite high school teacher years ago at a reunion. Since you each graduated different years you may not all know each other, but you do have one secret in common… you all helped bury her body and the guilt lives with you to this day.

Through the use of clues and teamwork it is your team’s job to find out what happened to your teacher and who the real killer is. You spend some time reading about yourself and your relationship with your teacher before exploring the room you entered. Throughout this room and the other rooms are hints to what has happened and how it happened; sharing information is key. There are some clever puzzles interwoven with the story. Everyone is a suspect. Are you the culprit?

While this is not a locked escape room there are some hazards. The main room is small and cramped with a large table in the middle of it. There’s a lamp on the table and the power cord and power strip are lying on the floor directly where you walk. There was more than one instance of a party member not looking and stepping on the cord or tripping over it. Some of the props could use some TLC; pages in the books are half falling out and one of the final puzzles stumped us as it was not as articulate, for a lack of better word, as the Game Master thought it was. The other rooms are sparse and have few decorations in them. A few story elements were confusing. We didn’t understand the role of the Game Master as an author. It’s nice to have someone in the room with you in case you should need a hint, but it was already crowded with 8 of us in the main room.

Overall, the staff was kind and excited to be there, as they usually are, which always adds to the experience. Although most of us enjoyed the room quite a bit, the lack of story and attention to the physical details in the room left us more to be desired.