Photo above is property of Escape Room Helsinki
Company: Escape Room Helsinki
Game: Midwinter Sacrifice
Language: English/ Finnish
Country: Finland 🇫🇮
Type of Game: DIY Escape Kit 🖨️
Genre: Mythical, Adventure
Date Played: October 16, 2021
Difficulty (based on 1 player): 8/10
Size of Team: Unlimited
Time: Unlimited (Finished: 59.53)
Price: €20.00/ team
🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈
According to old legends, the sun disappears into the underworld at midwinter. Every year, a brave hero is chosen to undertake the dangerous Journey of the Sheaf and deliver the last sheaf of wheat from the autumn harvest to the Land of Darkness. The grain bears the strength of warm summer days and with its help, the sun will return. This time, the heroes are you and your team, can you complete the journey and help bring back the light?
Video above is property of Escape Room Helsinki
🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈
You are sent two PDF files for the game, one containing pages to print and cut, and other with some reference material and instructions for the game. You access the website and start by watching a beautifully ethereal short video with the backstory to set the scene. You then login using the code you purchased (which can be activated 3 times), choose your team name and begin. The game can be played over multiple sessions but you can only activate your code 3 times. The creators have even included a suggested soundtrack to listen to on Spotify while you play, which is a lovely touch! However, the game does contain audio intrinsic to the puzzles too. The game plays out on a website with a page per puzzle, titled so that you can see which parts of the printed material to use. The instructions are very detailed and easy to follow.
Photo above is property of Escape Room Helsinki
The files to be printed are full size A4 full colour, so you will need a good printer, although you can reference back to the pdf on screen which I had to do several times as my printouts from an inkjet are not that clear or bright. I also printed them 2 to a page to keep ink and paper use down. I believe that you can get way with just printing a couple of the puzzles (The starlit tree and the bear’s compass) if you are short on ink, or even use a touchscreen to solve all the puzzles if you’re lucky enough to have one to draw on the screen. The background images make it look pretty but are a big ink drain.
🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂
The puzzles are all connected to the legend, and thus are based on symbols, items and words connected to the theme. There are 10 puzzles in all that range in difficulty and style. The first two were fairly simple, but there was one with a sneaky twist made me scratch my head until the a-ha moment.
If you submit a wrong answer, you are met with a sombre drum beat sound, which if you’re struggling over a puzzle and trying different attempts starts to grate a bit, but get it right and you are met with a very celebratory chant.
The answers to the puzzles are quite often Sami words, which means unless you know this language, if you are almost correct or just hazarding a guess, it is quite difficult to know if you are close, as the words are not common and without certainty you could have a multitude of possible answers. The ending page gave me a link to the answers with a password but I could not access this page to see the solutions.
Photo above is property of Escape Room Helsinki
There is a hint system that will give you up to 3 hints, and I had to use this several times, as some of the puzzles just did not click for me. Some of the ones I had to use all my hints on were ones that the image used felt not intuitive or not clear enough. There does not seem to be any penalty for using them, but if you have used all 3, you cannot reveal the answer, the only choice is to “skip the puzzle”. The answer is revealed usually on the next page though as the story progresses.
There are several videos and images to be used in solving the puzzles. These are nice, with lovely music, imagery and sound, and add a bit of interest.
🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂
Despite using many hints, and having some issues with a few of the puzzles I found this to be a charming game with a lovely theme and other than the oft-heard drumbeat of an incorrect answer, I also found this to be a nice relaxing and interesting game, which opened my eyes to some mythology and took me away on a magical adventure for an hour.
(If you do decide to try this game, please remember to let them know that you heard it from"ESCAPETHEROOMers"!)
Disclosure: We thank Escape Room Helsinki for providing us with a sample of the game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.
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