Tag: Gnome & Raven

Gnome & Raven – The Tomb Ruins (Review)

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Location: Richmond, VA

Players: 2-10 (We recommend 4-6)

Price: $25 per person, every experience is private, with a 4 person minimum

Time to Escape: 60 minutes

It belongs in a museum!

Theme:

From the Gnome & Raven website:

Ever since archaeologists uncovered the tomb of the young pharaoh Nekauba and took his favorite ruby, strange things have happened in every museum to display it. Inexplicably, museum workers would find nearby exhibits damaged or broken and mysterious power outages plagued every building to store it. Some even claim that a ghostly red light fills the hallways at night. It was finally decided that the ruby needed to be returned to its beloved and rightful owner. Your job is to navigate Nekauba’s tomb and restore the ruby to his tomb once again. But beware – the tomb is still protected by traps and ancient puzzles and getting to the pharaoh’s room won’t be easy!

First Impressions:

After a fun romp through a fairy tale museum, we were very interested to delve into the ancient tomb of Nekauba! We began our trek at the archaeologist’s base camp, ready to seek out the stolen treasures. Though the Museum of Light and Dark was pretty large, the scale of The Tomb Ruins was even more magnificent in it’s size and décor. As our game master began to brief us on our mission, I could tell we were in for an excellent adventure.

High Points:

Katie, our game master, was phenomenal. She did an excellent job portraying the story and psyching up our group for the mission. It’s great that Gnome & Raven has game masters that introduce their rooms in character, and have ensured that the folks they’ve hired are all in for the performance. As mentioned before, the tomb itself is huge, with a Hollywood quality to its design, and the soundtrack that goes along with the experience lends it an astounding measure of immersiveness. Lighting also serves to keep the tomb dim and spooky, without making it arduous to complete puzzles due to lack of light. There were a few traditional locks at the base camp, but the tomb’s puzzles, barring a couple instances of locks explained by the story, utilized hidden technology to great effect, making the solving process feel mystical while still sticking to the over arching theme of the game. The whole experience was very tactile and intuitive, with many excellent surprises sprinkled throughout, and a few set pieces that provided large scale “wow” moments.

The game flow worked splendidly, with a non-linear run of puzzles during any given stage of the game keeping our group entertained and fully engaged. I really enjoyed the fact that the room begins with your team breaking into the tomb itself, rather than starting us out already in the ruins. There’s something about busting into the escape room ourselves that adds to the fun, and I think a lot of rooms would benefit from not beginning in medias res. The definitive beginning, middle, and climax really solidifies the flow of the game, and when we did reach the end, it felt like a triumph. There’s not a specifically deep story, but the adventure exhibits shades of Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider by presenting a tomb full of traps and puzzles and a mystical treasure to find.

Low Points:

One particular puzzle was a bit irksome, and required us to engage in a banal interaction that seemed out of place in the tomb. It was over fairly quickly, but was still a weirdly ho-hum puzzle in a sea of otherwise amazing interactions. There were also several hidden drawers that would trigger, and while they were luckily easy to find when they triggered due to the sound they made, they were also very, very slow to open. It wasn’t too big of a deal, but the whole team did have several occasions to crowd around drawers, crack a few jokes, then go back to marveling at how slow the drawer was moving.

Verdict:

The Tomb Ruins is one of Richmond’s most amazing games, and is absolutely one of my favorite rooms in the area, and of all time! Families, friends, new players, and old veterans will definitely find something to enjoy within the ancient tomb of Nekauba, and I recommend checking it out without reservation! Book your time in The Tomb Ruins here!

9.5/10 (Excellent)

Gnome & Raven – Once Upon a Heist (Formerly, The Museum of Light and Shadows, Once Upon a Time) (Review)

~ EscapeAdventurer ~ 1 Comment

Location: Richmond, VA

Players: 2-12 (We recommend 4-6)

Price: $25 per person, every experience is Private, with a four person minimum

Time to Escape: 60 minutes

Once upon a time…

Theme:

The Museum of Light and Shadows has been robbed! A mysterious raven and the most powerful magic wand in the land have disappeared, but no one was seen leaving the premises with these priceless relics. It’s very possible that the thief has stashed them inside the museum itself in order to create confusion and secret them away at just the right time. It’s up to you to find the missing items and restore the museum to it’s former glory!

First Impressions:

Gnome & Raven is Ravenchase’s newest family friendly experience, boasting the ability to not only entertain kids of all ages with their escape experiences, but also provide the space for a party replete with cake and all! Though we weren’t celebrating any particular occasion, other than being on another whirlwind escape adventure, we were excited to see what Ravenchase could do with this whimsical, family oriented theme!

High Points:

As is usual for a Ravenchase room, the Museum’s set is absolutely beautiful! Boasting a large table, ornate accoutrements, and fantastical props, The Museum of Light and Shadow is truly a sight to behold! The whole place is filled to the brim with elegant and whimsical items, befitting for a fairy tale museum. Though there is a lot to look at and use, there is very little clutter, and everything that seems important, usually is. The room itself would be mind blowingly magical for a group of kids set to celebrate a birthday, but challenging enough for a group of enthusiasts to enjoy. Gnome & Raven also provides a character actor for introduction to the room, as well as for game mastering, and though the actor doesn’t usually stay in the room, we were advised that they are available to for younger groups that might need a little more direction.

The game flow works well for the most part, with only a couple of spots where it stalled out. The museum itself is massive and packed with a fairly large amount of non-linear puzzles, which allowed our group to divide and conquer as necessary. The experience utilizes a fantastic mix of technical wizardry and mechanical lock based puzzles, instilling a sense of magic to the room, heightening the immersion within the mythical museum. All enigmas and interactions are themed well into the theme of the adventure, and most are introduced with a riddle that evokes the cadence of a childhood storybook, without being patronizing. The whole room struck a unique balance between family friendly and challenging, which is truly a feat on it’s own!

Low Points:

One particular part of the game advises against taking a certain course of action, which we later determined was supposed to be necessary in order to progress. This caused no end of confusion, and ended up stalling us for a good while as we put together a workaround that we were told was not the intended solution. The fact that we were told not to do something, then were given a punishment (albeit a small one, but there was no way to know that at the time,) for doing so is a poor way to design a interaction, and was frustrating to no end. Another puzzle was very unclear in it’s presentation, and could’ve used a bit more cluing to clean up the ambiguities inherent to the solution.

Verdict:

The Museum of Light and Shadow is a fantastic room to book for kids of all ages, and would be a wonderfully whimsical place to reserve for your child’s birthday! I one hundred percent wish that there had been something like this around when I was a kid; I imagine the adventure of finding your cake at the end of such an immersive experience would be stunning. Adults and enthusiasts can find a lot to like inside as well, as the usual Ravenchase challenge has not been dulled in favor of the theme. You can book your time in the fairy tale museum here!

7.5/10 (Good)