Insomnia Escape Room DC - "The Alchemist"

Updated: Apr 6

LOCATION:  Washington, DC, USA

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📝 ETR DECODER

🔑 GAME: The Alchemist
📅 DATE PLAYED: July 6, 2019
🎬 GENRE: Mystery
🧠 DIFFICULTY (Based on 2 ppl): 7/10
👥 TOTAL # OF PLAYERS: Up To 8PPL
🕒 LENGTH OF TIME: 60 Mins
💰 PRICE: $28-150/PP (pending on group size)
☎️ BOOKING TYPE: Private
🔓 ESCAPED/ COMPLETED?: Yes

We arrived at Insomnia Escape Room DC quite late on a Saturday. It wasn't difficult to find street parking and it was free. When you arrive at the building, make sure you go to the right location as some of their games are upstairs ("The Mafia", "The Alchemist", and "Oblivion") and some are in the lower floor ("The Patient" and "VR Zone"). After being buzzed in, we headed upstairs in preparation for “The Alchemist” room. Once you enter, there’s a small lobby area with sofa seating. It felt quite cozy like we were in someone’s living room. They also have a small party room which you’ll see a bit of footage of in our exclusive interview with the onsite manager on our YouTube channel.

“The Alchemist” is ranked their hardest room on their website. As we headed towards an unmarked wooden door, we were sent into the mystical world of DC’s most eerie library to discover what secrets lies within. I would have to say when it comes to books, I get a little lightheaded. I was very worried that by the mere number of books in that room, I was going to raise my white flag and surrender. But after the game master's ensuring words of encouragement that “not all books are important”, we began our journey. We appreciated that the lighting was just right in terms of correlating with the atmosphere, but at the same time we were still able to read the clues. The puzzles were very well structured and straightforward with no red herrings (there was one puzzle which I created a red herring on my own just to add difficulty to the puzzle because why not? Just kidding, I just didn’t read carefully). There was a good mixture of technology and traditional locks throughout the room. We did however have a little delay with a tech piece during the latter half of the game. With just the two of us (without using any clues), we managed to escape with plenty of time left. Maybe this room’s puzzles just clicke-d with us, but we did feel that a few more puzzles could be added to the latter part of the game since there’s a good amount of potential to be utilized.

At this point, this is an older room at Insomnia Escape Room but still a favorite by many. As we've seen a good amount of new tech rooms, we do appreciate the classic ones but with some added improvements while still retaining the story line and theme, this room is still a strong contender. We really enjoyed the room and we can’t wait to return to Insomnia in the future to see what they have to offer with their new room designs (“Dungeon Things” coming soon)!

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(If you do decide to try this game, give us a shoutout or tag us on social media so we know you heard it from "ESCAPETHEROOMers"!)

** We don't want to go into detail and ruin any surprises for you, but you want more info like if the room is a multi-room or what other additional tips we can provide to you, feel free to email us.

Disclosure: We thank Insomnia Escape Room for comping our tickets for this game. Although complimentary admission was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.