EXIT: The House of Riddles

SPOILER-FREE REVIEW TL;DR Version... PROS: - great price for the experience - excellent at-home approximation of the real thing, down to having help/hint cards, like you might ask a real-life game master for help - no experience necessary - during COVID: an escape room... in your house... with only those you already hang with daily! - free mobile app for skip-reading-the-rulebook instructions with graphics AND a timer with appropriate atmospheric audio, which adds a lot to the experience (they should promote this feature more) - a "scoring system" that favors quicker exits without using help cards and compares your accomplishments across different Exit games (or to other people, if you want that) - some of these puzzles are just ingenious and I don't know how they can make so many across multiple games and maintain excellent quality CONS: - really struggling to come up with any here... - reaching/picky: there's one puzzle you can only really solve (beyond a powerful imagination) with a very common kitchen item that's not mentioned in the "other things you'll need" section (but is depicted when you get to that puzzle) ... but I can also see an argument that naming it would give too much away - there's also one puzzle where the scissor-work required just takes a long time, only one person can do it while the others watch (long, boring for them), and the longer it takes with the ticking time-pressure, the more socially agonizing it is to be "Edward Scissorhands" ... so this one game could be improved if there was a way to shorten that one puzzle. - unlike a real escape room, you can't break off into sub-teams to solve any puzzles simultaneously ... this is 100% linear ... a very minor thing, though. FULL REVIEW: My first escape room experience was when my 2nd-level-up boss had us do one as a team building thing around the holidays a few years back. So ~8 of us made it out of a hostage-like situation with ~10 seconds left. The thrill of that is akin to the first time one makes an amazingly unexpected shot while golfing (regular or mini-golf). And it makes you want it again. But my first "hit" was free. I not only wanted that experience again, but also wanted to share it with my family. This past summer of 2021, the kids were old enough to get into it, so for my birthday we tried out a real room together. We failed... with several puzzles remaining. We figured if we played smarter and ask for more help earlier, we could win one. So we did it again the last week of summer. And failed again. But this time we were so close, the game master generously gave us 5-10 extra minutes to experience finishing it. Nice, but still a bummer to "lose" again. And they cost about two hundred fifty dollars combined. Worth it, but deterred from another go for a while. Plus, it was a summer of COVID before kids could be vaxed, so we were masked up and scheduling the first session of the day to avoid people, which is much harder during the school year. When along comes my discovery of these Exit games. Gave one each to the kids for Christmas. Now, I'm a board-gamer, so it takes some mental toughness for me to consider buying a game (out of Germany, no less) where I will be damaging game parts on purpose and only playing it once. BUT for the chance of giving my family the escape room experience for this price compared to the real thing ... this is practically a steal! New Year's Eve 2021 was an ideal time to try this, and House of Riddles was the first we've tried so far. It just went fabulously! Everyone contributed, even the 8-year-old spotted some things that saved us. In the end, as a team, the family figured everything out without a single Help card, and we finished in less than the 90min max, but more than the 60min "ideal" which docked us 1 "star" (equal to under 60min + 1 Help card). This was a family-bonding, new-years accomplishment we could all be proud of. And to round out the experience... in real escape rooms, if you win/finish, they get a pic of your group while holding a board with your time on it. Otherwise, you can get a pic, but no time. So before this, we had 2 family photos with no one holding a time. But to close out 2021, I screenshotted & printed the final time (and score) from the mobile app, setup the tripod, and we got a family photo (dog included) where we finally got to hold up our successful escape room exit time! Bottom Line: While it is "just a game," it also holds the potential for building memories with family & friends that you will never forget. Thank you, game makers!

Played with 3 people and we all felt this was one of the better Exit the Games for the puzzles and the story. Giving no spoilers here. This game is rated as 2 out of 5 on the difficulty scale on the box and I believe that to be accurate. I never time games as that adds stress to something that is meant to be fun, but you can time with the free app if you want (app not needed to play). The story is fairly mellow and makes sense. The best part of the game is that the puzzles are in order. In some of the more advanced games the puzzles are not in order and can be confusing for even advanced players - that is not the case with House of Riddles. Fairly straight-forward. the GREAT thing about the Exit games is there is a hint card system so even if you feel lost take a hint and keep having fun. IF YOU ARE NEW to the Exit games make sure to read the instruction booklet. It is a fun read and often there is info there that is important for the game you are playing. For those wanting to play an Exit game with others over a video call... you can do this if each remote player has the game. Trying to play it with only one game isn’t exactly going to be fun for the remote player. I played this game with one of the group being remote with their own game in front of them - so 2 copies of the game (one at my house, and one at their house). It worked out perfectly. We all had fun and laughed. Worth it.

I've played games from the Exit series before & decided to get this as a gift for my dad for my family to play together. We had 3 people (all adults). I felt that most of the puzzles were fairly quick to solve, but the solutions were always fun so we never got bored. Most of the riddles in this one had mini hints in them, which made it much easier than some of the other games in the series. The puzzles get harder as you move along, so I feel that it builds very well for people just learning to play this kind of game. You do have to destroy the game pieces to solve puzzles & it is one time use, so that hurts a little. But, I still feel like the price is good for a one-time fun experience for a small group of people. If you've played room escape board games before, I would recommend you find a different game in this series. The Exit series is good & has several games on different difficulty levels.

Overall the game was fun, the puzzles were generally solvable with some thinking (although one puzzle didn't actually, you were supposed to do something that reversed some numbers, but it didn't reverse them when I tried), but had one flaw that is really annoying. This game would be replayable by giving it to someone else, but one part of the puzzle had you taking a part out and writing on it. It was the only part of the game that really required you to destroy anything. Given you didn't need to do this for any other part of the game, I can't help but feel they added this in to prevent people from sharing the game rather than create a neat puzzle. Absent that complaint, the game was pretty fun, and lasted around 90 minutes.

This was the 3rd Exit game that I have played. The first one, The Cabin, I played with my 16 year old granddaughter. (I am her 67 year old grandmother) We really enjoyed it, but had to learn as we went in order to get a feel for just what the creators expected of us. We used some of the clues just to see if we were on track to solving the riddles which we usually were. We did manage to complete each riddle and it left us wanting to do another Exit game! Then I played The Rollercoaster with my 13 year old grandson and found myself trying to solve the puzzles on my own. He didn't really engage in the experience. Not the fault of the game. But then I played the House of Riddles with my granddaughter and her 47 year old mom. We had a blast! The adults sipped wine as we played and all three of us contributed in the solving of the different puzzles. We found that three heads were better than two. We only needed a clue on two of the puzzles and the several ah ha moments, which we celebrated with high fives and cheers made it a great fun night for three generations of ladies! My granddaughter then played the Pharohs Tomb with her 47 your old dad who had never played before and they had a blast! Her prior experience playing the game helped them navigate through the different puzzles. So my take on the exit games is that it matters who you play with, how many are playing and the experience of the brains that are playing with you! This could explain why there are varying reviews on these games. Thinking outside (and inside) the box is often required. We will be ordering more in the Exit the Games series!

Pizza night, game night! My husband and I (in our 50s) played this with our adult children (19 & 23) after dinner this evening. We've played several of these EXIT games before so we knew what to expect, and this one is only a difficulty of 2/5, so we got through it pretty quickly and without using any clues. But it was still really fun. Clever story, cool artwork, and the puzzles were challenging enough to be interesting without straining our brains. The solutions made sense and felt satisfying to figure out. It can only be played once because once you've solved it, you've solved it, but for the price it's about the same as renting a movie, and the family time is priceless.

My husband and eight year old have limited Escape Room experience- we have completed two, and we managed to get out right under an hour. Keeping this in mind, this was a great option for a rainy weekend day! We completed the House of Riddles in just under two hours, using five clues. Most importantly, it was fun and challenging without being too terribly hard. If you are stuck, use the clues and you will figure it out. Overall it was well worth the cost and convenience. We look forward to trying many more! Pay attention to the levels associated with each game…this one is considered “novice” and I would agree with that description.

Great idea and we had a fun time playing through it and solving the riddles. Two of the riddles we needed the solution given to us to move on they were a tad challenging. I have two comments/complaints about the game: 1) Wasteful. I felt really bad throwing out the entire game after a single use. 2) very difficult for 4 players to work together at same time around a relatively small booklet with pictures. They should really include two of the little booklets so each pair of two can look at the picture and try to solve. It would allow all four players to work together at the same time. With just the one booklet and the picture being so small two people literally just sit aside and do nothing. It almost would be best just being a two person game. Yea actually thinking about it I would recommend MAX of two players. If four players just be prepared for two people to sit and be bored while the other two work on a riddle.

I did not think an escape room could be done as a board game.. well i was certainly proven wrong. Super fun game and very well prepared and thought of. Cant wait to start the second one and many more to come for sure.

The best in 2* difficulty games. You should definitely start Exit games with this one if you're doing this with kids. Kept us invested till the end. Definitely not boring.

Excelente juego de escape room

Challenging but fun The game series can be difficult. You definitely want to start with a lower difficulty game for the first until you learn how it works generally

Such a fun game to have. we had to think, learn and solve. Super exciting game for the entire family. A very good game to plan an escape room party in your house. I purchased it and use the clued to plan a escape room party/gate night for my husbands party. Everyone from 8 years of age to 44 yrs of age enjoyed. Recommend it strongly