Photo above provided by USB Escape
Company: USB Escape
Game: Knott Family Chronicles - Season One: Owen
Country: Canada 🇨🇦
Language: English
Type of Game: Puzzles By Mail 📬
Genre: Horror, Crime, Mystery
Date Played: 5/22/2021
Difficulty (based on 2 players): 5.5/10
Size of Team: Unlimited
Time: Unlimited
Price: CAD $14.99
🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈
You received a strange letter from a mysterious person named "C". He seems to think that you would be intrigued by a cold case from awhile ago regarding Owen Knott. Perhaps he's been following you and knows that you love to solve mysteries. Dare to crack this case?
🆃🅷🅴 ❞🅻🅾🅾🅺🆂❞
Season One: Owen came in a small bubble-wrapped package. Inside, you'll find a handwritten "Thank You" letter from the creator, a wax sealed note and a USB stick. Currently the game is available in PC or MAC. Make sure you order the right version for your computer. Our review version came with these beautiful stickers (photo below) which you can purchase for an additional cost on their website.
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Once you read the letter from "C", you should be intrigued enough to plug in this USB. Once you open the drive, you'll see a bunch of folders in date order. There's not much instructions on how you would approach this game but I would advise to go in date order. We made a mistake of checking on the "police file" too early and saw some spoilers so definitely make sure to check the dates of the files before opening them.
Throughout the game you'll be given various emails, documents, pictures, audio files and they'll be able to help you solve the password locked folders. The folders you see labeled "password reset" are nudging hints and they are only to be used when you're stuck. They are not the type of password reminders that you see in some games where it's part of the puzzle. We made that mistake initially and quickly closed them for the rest of the game.
If you love Easter eggs, there's a few bonus puzzles in the game as well. See if you can find all of them (according to the creator there should be three).
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In almost all of the folders, there's a puzzle embedded in the context. They varied in terms of how they were presented. Some came in formats of text, others were through images and even audio. It was ingenious to be able to connect these to the narrative. I love the utilization of the different types of digital formats to tell us this chilling story. The videos were my favorite but also the ones I fear the most to open.
The puzzles were not too difficult as I'm sure the creator wanted to focus more on the narrative. There's no solution given in the game. If you still can't get the answer through the nudging hints, you'll have to either email the company.
🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂
I'm a scaredy-cat that loves horror and crime. This is the perfect theme for me. How does a scaredy-cat play these types of games? By covering her hands in front of her eyes and peeking through her fingers.
I love the way the creator was able build up the intensity of the story from beginning to end. He also had us guessing and changing our minds throughout the entire game play. At first we thought it was one thing and then when new information arrived, our hypothesis was ruled out and we have to start from scratch again. Till this day, I still think about some of the details in the game and get chills. I'm super proud of myself for finishing the game at 2AM in the morning. But be prepared to embrace the big cliffhanger. The ending was left open for interpretation. I guess we'll have to wait till Season 2, which will be released on Nov 27, 2021!
Check out our interview with the creators to understand more on the development side of these game:
(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"!)
Disclosure: We thank USB Escape for providing us with a sample of their game. Although a complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.
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