Fare?
Location: New York, New York
Date Played: December 18, 2019
Team size: 2-8; we recommend 4
Duration: 60 minutes
Price: $39 per player
Ticketing: Public
Emergency Exit Rating: [A] Push To Exit
Physical Restraints: [A+] No Physical Restraints
REA Reaction
Runaway Subway Train felt like a scavenger hunt with locks that didn’t work… in a moving train-like space.
This wasn’t a good escape room, but at the onset, it seemed like it had potential.
The sad reality was that Escape Virtuality just had us identifying codes and putting them into locks. There was almost nothing to solve and half of the challenge that we encountered was struggling against the worn out locks.
We badly want new and amazing escape rooms in New York City. We wanted to be able to tell you that the Runaway Subway Train is worth your time and money… but we can’t. The only people to whom we can recommend this game are potential owners who want a $39 lesson in how to waste potential.
Who is this for?
- Scavenger hunters
Why play?
- The game has unrealized potential
Story
Our subway was out of control and about to crash – in an hour!
Setting
Our team was split up into two adjacent subway cars. We entered through train-like pocket doors. Each car had roughly the same subway car structure of bench seating with advertisements above.
While everything had the right structure, the details weren’t there. It looked like a subway, but only if you haven’t been inside of one with any level of recency, which is unlikely in Midtown Manhattan.
Gameplay
Escape Virtuality’s Runaway Subway Train was a standard escape room with a moderate level of difficulty and a split-team beginning.
Core gameplay revolved around searching, observing, and making connections.
Analysis
➕ The first few puzzles taught us how this escape room wanted us to play it, for better or for worse.
➖ There were few puzzles in this escape room. The gameplay was almost entirely of the “observe and input” variety. We spent most of our time searching or waiting on our teammates to struggle with an input.
➖ Because this game required us to observe and input, we spent a lot of time trying anything we’d observed in every lock. There was no way to know what would be important. Guess all the things!
➕ There was one challenging, layered puzzle in Runaway Subway Train. This solved well with teamwork. It was the highlight of the gameplay.
➖ We encountered some misleading cluing, which might have been the result of ghost puzzles. These included a switch that triggered nothing and cluing a code to a digital lock when the input went into an analog one. We also encountered puzzles that weren’t clued at all.
➖ The one reveal was a missed opportunity. Instead of adding intrigue, it was hard to see, and looked worse than what had been there before.
➖ The locks in this game were in rough shape. We open locks more often than most players and we struggled repeatedly to open multiple combination locks.
➖/➕ The set design was subway-like. Escape Virtuality built in all the key elements of a subway car, but for New Yorkers who ride the subway everyday – and probably rode the subway to get to Escape Virtuality – they didn’t sell the concept with their build. They did, however, make it feel like our subway cars were moving. This was the best part of the set design.
Tips For Visiting
- Parking is a challenge in Manhattan. Take the subway (1 to 28th Street or the R/W to 28th Street.)
- There are tons of restaurants in this neighborhood. We enjoy Hill Country Barbecue and Market.
Disclosure: Escape Virtuality comped our tickets for this game.
