Room Escape Artist

Having played my fair share of horror escape rooms, and having recently lurked as a team played one of my personal favorites, Dark Park’s Honeymoon Hotel, I’ve come to a few conclusions about how to build the right team for a horror escape room.

It’s All About the Mix

You need the right mix of bravery and fear among the teammates to maximize the fun for the entire group. 

If Everyone is Terrified

When everyone is paralyzed by fear, the team will seriously struggle to play because no one will be able or willing to search and solve puzzles. 

If Everyone is Brave

When everyone is unflappable (or pretending to be), then the horror escape room quietly transforms into a regular escape room… just with low lighting, jump scares, and probably lots of gore. 

This can still be a cool game, but something is missing.

Balanced Teams

Strive for a team with a good mix of players who are varying degrees of terrified and brave.

Terrified players need brave players to advance the game (and possibly to cling to). 

Brave players need terrified players to protect, and through whom they can experience the fear vicariously… because empathetic fear is a great substitute for the real thing. 

The right player mix keeps the game moving and maximizes the emotional experience for everyone.

If you’re on the fence about playing a horror game, find a brave player or 2 with whom you can create a symbiotic relationship for an hour or so. 

The REA Duo

We’ve had some of our best escape room experiences in horror escape rooms.

While I’d attribute much of this to the games themselves – we’ve played some horrific masterpieces – some of that definitely had to do with our team composition. Lisa was terrified. I was … not so terrified. Our responses to horror complement each other. We strive to build out teams that are equally balanced.

Getting Started with Horror

Join one of our Escape Immerse Explore Tours.

As part of these tours, we help timid players who are interested in trying out horror take the plunge so that they get to experience the brilliance of more scary rooms such as The Asylum at 13th Gate, Blackwell Manor and Cabin 2.0: Simon Says, “Die” at New Mexico Escape Room, and Haunting at Haruka High at Omescape. We will create a supportive team for you, and use our proven “defanging” methods.

Update 2024: For more tips on getting comfortable with horror escape rooms, read How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Horror Escape Rooms by Heather Burns.