Location: Charlotte, NC

Players: 2-10 (We recommend 2-5)

Price: $25 per person

Time to Escape: 60 Minutes

King Tut’s Directional Lock

Theme:

You are a team of archeologists sent to the tomb of Tutankhamen, dead set on recovering the missing crook and flail that he was buried with. Unfortunately, the infamous curse that has hovered like a dark cloud over the tomb since it’s discovery in 1922 has struck again, sealing you inside! You have little time to find a way out, but it’s certain that you’ll need the crook and flail in order to do so! Unluckily, someone’s crept into the tomb and put modern locks on everything, which is a bit weird, but what’re you gonna do? Escape rooms, right?

First Impressions:

Escape Tactic is located in a pretty nice area just across the way from Exit Strategy South, which was convenient after we finished up the amazing Twisted! We were definitely jazzed to keep the escape train rolling, and from the look of the nicely appointed lobby and later, the excellent set of the tomb, we were immediately ready to take on King Tut’s Curse.

High Points:

As previously stated, King Tut’s Curse boasts an excellent set, with stone walls, a beautiful sarcophagus, and interesting props. While the immersion was quickly broken by the large amount of key and code locks, it was still an impressive room to look at. With a mostly non-linear array of puzzles to work on, our group of 4 immediately set upon the room’s adventure! The game flow works well, and flows from puzzle to puzzle until the ultimate resolution of each thread. Each room is mostly self-contained, allowing for ease of solving, and is immediately accessible to newcomers to escape rooms. Most puzzles worked well, and though there wasn’t much tech, it provided a magical feel to the tomb itself in a way modern locks cannot.

Low Points:

After looking over Escape Tactic’s website and reading their online reviews, I was pretty excited to see what they had to offer. The promise of “Escape Rooms Remastered” however, was not what was delivered. In fact, Escape Tactic really didn’t have much in the way of next generation tech or effects within their rooms. King Tut’s Curse was very simply a early days, classic escape room with a snazzy set design. While a classic room isn’t a bad thing per se, we were really expecting more from the new kid in town. While the set is admittedly well done, there are so many random objects that don’t belong in an ancient Egyptian tomb, like cabinets, modern cases, and loads of present day locks. For a room that is touted to be extremely immersive, that immersion was broken quite frequently through such anachronism. Also, many of the classic escape room sins were exemplified within the room. Random hidden codes in illogical and sometimes random places made for a tedious scavenger hunt during some puzzles. Destructible state puzzles reared their ugly head, meaning that several props could be moved, making a puzzle unsolvable if the GM doesn’t pay perfect attention. Repeat lock types were scattered all over, forcing us to try to open locks via trial and error once we’d found a code. Finally, among the very slight technical interactions, the mechanisms were so temperamental that you have to spend a long time adjusting the pieces around, hoping that the puzzle will finally trigger after it has been solved. Don’t get me wrong, we had a decent time, but it really wasn’t what we expected when booking.

Verdict:

King Tut’s Tomb is a fun, if basic introduction to escape rooms and the types of puzzles usually included. A newbie to the hobby will definitely enjoy the room, though enthusiasts will get the feeling of “been there, done that” from most, if not all the puzzles. A classic experience that tasks you with finding keys and locks throughout the room, with a few technological interactions here and there, the room provides an alright experience, but lacks the Wow factor that many other rooms in the Charlotte area provide. You can book your time escaping King Tut’s Curse here!

6/10 (Alright)