10 tips to successfully escape an Escape Room

1. 1. You’re not alone: A great team works together and isn’t about size. The most important thing is to work together. So, pick a leader and trust your team. But be careful: many times, more than one leader can also bring your team down!
   2. Teamwork is about trust: Teamwork is about trusting and not doing everything together all the time. Divide and conquer – each person from your team can work on a different piece so you’re all saving time. If you need help, just ask for it and if someone is having a hard time solving a puzzle, go and help! Also, don’t forget that patience and kind words are helpful when you’re stuck.
   3. Divide and conquer: A useful tip is to divide the room in sections and have each person be the owner of one. For example, if your team has 6 members, divide the room into 6 parts and each member will be responsible for his or her corner. Of course, everyone can ask for help but you’ll see that with this process it’s easier to comb through all the information in the room.
   4. Keep the team active: As time goes by, a few members of your team can become a little upset and lose energy. Don’t let it happen. You will need all the energy and excitement to escape. Be cheerful and try to bring people up! Keep the confidence level high.
   5. Rotate and double-check: After you’ve divided the room for a while, let’s now rotate that division! Sometimes you may get really used to a specific area that you can no longer see what is hidden in it or in front of you – you may miss things. You’re a team and you’re only going to win by sticking together! Remember to double-check everything. You may be more effective after a short break and a fresh new challenge.
   6. Listen and ask for clues: Listen carefully to all instructions from the gamemaster and try to know by heart the many codes you have to use to escape. In addition, don’t think that you can solve everything on your own – you only have 60 minutes so don’t hesitate to ask for hints as soon as you can (don’t wait for the last 5 minutes)! Maximize your time in the room and keep going!
   7. The simpler the better: Many times, the simplest solution is the best you can find! Keep that in mind when you enter a room. Don’t over-complicate things – sometimes the solution is simple. Focus on one task and don’t over-think it otherwise you’re going to be exhausted and short on time that it will be much harder to escape.
   8. Verbalize everything: Remember to verbalize everything you see out loud! Sometimes you cannot see what your partner is looking for, so if you verbalize everything for everybody you may be able to help solving a puzzle without even thinking about it! Solutions can come from everywhere, any time!
   9. Look again: You’re running out of time and you don’t know what to do anymore? This is the perfect moment to take another look everywhere again! Just pretend that you are beginning the game again, try to think under a different angle, take a deeper look at everything, and you should be able to find something new!
   10. Be aware of tricks: Keep in mind that escape room games aren’t supposed to be easy and were designed by specialists. So if it looks too easy it may be a trick (but you still owe it to yourself to try it)! Look for patterns but also look in the most odd places you can find in the room. Remember the first look when you memorize everything? What was awkward in the room? What was too perfect to be real?