Cici Cao

Mar 12, 20215 min read

Virtual Escaping - "Expedition North Pole" & "Underground Murder"

Updated: Apr 28

Company: Virtual Escaping

Country: Netherlands 🇳🇱

Language: English, Dutch

Type of Game: Digital Escape Game 💻

Date Played: February 21, 2021

Size of Team: Up to 6 Devices

Price: $40.00/ team

🆃🅷🅴 🅶🅰🅼🅴 🅿🅻🅰🆈

Both "Expedition North Pole" and "Underground Murder" are point-n-click style games that can be played as a team using one voucher code. Once you see all the team members' names in the online portal you can click "start" the game. You'll also get to choose what level of difficulty you want to play the game in. We chose "hard level" for both games.

The games started with a video intro of the backstory and then bought us to the games' platform. The games were silent from that point on. For the "Expedition North Pole" story, we were mainly in a laboratory facility. In the "Underground Murder" game, we're in an eerie underground subway station. From a graphics standpoint we preferred the "Underground Murder" game.

There was a build in video conferencing device but we decided to use Zoom instead. Each player was able to explore on their own but if one player unlocked a lock, every player will need to enter their own code to unlock the same lock. There was no inventory bag for the game which we wished the game could have implemented. Certain locations would lock back again once we had left that spot so we suggest to write down all your solution answers incase you would need to access that area again. We started taking snapshots of the clues we found on our phones instead of having to go back and forth in between the game. "Expedition North Pole" had a lot more of back and forth play than "Underground Murder". (Update 3/12/21 - I was told by the game developer that the locks should stay unlocked and there is an inventory system in the game. It seems that we've experienced some technical issues during our play that day so hopefully you won't be experiencing the same when you play your version).

🆃🅷🅴 🅿🆄🆉🆉🅻🅴🆂

The puzzles felt harder in "Expedition North Pole". We had to use a few hints (build-in to the game) in order to understand how to use certain items or codes that we found. The association of the clues to the solution were less clear in some cases.

"Underground Murder" was able to capture more of the storyline and utilization of cool props in creating more logical puzzles. It had a much smoother game flow. I really enjoyed the detective vibe and how the puzzles were used as tools to identify and eliminate suspects. The interactive components to several puzzles throughout these games were my favorite parts of the puzzle design.

Game: Expedition North Pole

Genre: Mystery

Difficulty (based on 4 players): 5.5/10

Time: 90 Minutes

🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈

Sander Klaus has many professors assisting him with his microorganism research. Just as he's about to have a breakthrough, he's unable to contact the current assistant. what could have happened to him?

𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤❜ ℙ.𝕀.𝕤❜ 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤

Andrew K.

I got to play "Expedition: North Pole" with the ETR crew, and I was definitely challenged by the experience. The experience started with a quick video, and an option to choose your level of difficulty. We opted for the "hardest" difficulty. The platform also has some interesting interface options including built-in video and audio for communication. The experience has lots of rooms to navigate, and tons of interactive elements to the story.

What worked:

There were several really neat and subtle puzzles and interesting takes on classics that made the experience fun
The use of interactive elements in the game definitely added to the experience.

What missed:

The hint system was fairly linear, and directed players to essentially complete puzzles one at a time, while there were multiple puzzles that we were tackling at the same time. It would have been neat if the interface could give clues based on which room you were in.
The ending seemed abrupt and without fanfare. A video to bookend the experience would have helped give closure to our experience.

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Bethany P.

The setup to this virtual game reminded me of one you would get on your phone where you click around to find interactive parts. It is simply designed with a variety of puzzles in varying difficulty. When someone solves a puzzle of finds a clue it appears on everyone's screen. The only thing I found a bit annoying was having to re-enter codes if you leave an area that required one to get into. There is also a chat box, microphone or webcam options to communicate with other team members which is helpful.

Game: Underground Murder

Genre: Detective

Difficulty (based on 4 players): 4/10

Time: 75 Minutes

🆃🅷🅴 🆂🆃🅾🆁🆈

A man fell off of the subway platform and died this morning on his way to work. None of the witnesses saw what had happened. It's up to your detective skills to find the truth....

𝔼𝕊ℂ𝔸ℙ𝔼𝕋ℍ𝔼ℝ𝕆𝕆𝕄𝕖𝕣𝕤❜ ℙ.𝕀.𝕤❜ 𝕋𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙𝕥𝕤

Dave E & Catherine B.

The underground murder escape room is the first digital game we have played and it was lots of fun! Set on a New York subway platform you are a detective tasked with solving a murder. There were lots of challenging puzzles and deductive reasoning with a couple of stingers that required teamwork to solve. We are looking forward to playing more games like these. We made the mistake of playing on a tablet so some of the screen was chopped off but we worked around that. The setting was unique and atmospheric. The puzzles were sensible and clever (some were blindingly obvious in hindsight!) and deductive reasoning had to be applied to finish the game. The only minor negative was missing out on some solutions because someone else solved them first! Loved it, would recommend to everyone.

🅲🅻🅾🆂🅸🅽🅶 🆃🅷🅾🆄🅶🅷🆃🆂

Out of the two games played, we prefer "Underground Murder". The graphics felt more realistic, the storyline felt more conclusive and the puzzles were more logical. If the interface could be a bit more user friendly for team play, these would be quite solid as digital point-n-click games. I would suggest playing with less people if possible as large team might solve the puzzles too quickly and some players could miss out on what was solved and where it was solved. Overall, we had a fun time with our P.I.s and without them, we definitely wouldn't have been able to solve these cases so quickly!

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(If you do decide to try this game, please remember to let them know that you heard it from"ESCAPETHEROOMers"!)

Disclosure: We thank Virtual Escaping for providing us with a sample of the game. Although complimentary experience was generously provided, it does not impact our opinion on the review whatsoever.