Room Escape Artist

Toy Fair, officially called the North American International Toy Fair, is an annual event put on by the The Toy Association. On one hand, this industry event is designed to showcase new and upcoming toys and games. But it also works to build cohesion in the industry by getting many different facets of the industry under one roof: developers, manufacturers, public relations, shipping, and so on.

For the second year in a row, I was lucky enough to attend Toy Fair in New York City. I was joined by fellow REA contributor Brett Kuehner. Our job while at Toy Fair 2025 was to walk the many, many aisles looking for new and interesting games and other products to call to your attention. Brett and I found some familiar faces, some new entrants, and a few updates from my trip to Toy Fair 2023.  And this is just a small taste of everything that Toy Fair offers. The entire Javits convention center was filled with toys and games and vendors offering glimpses at thousands of new and upcoming projects.

Thames and Kosmos

The Kosmos game line is a perennial topic here at Room Escape Artist. We have covered their Exit: The Game series extensively, and Kosmos continues to expand it. They have a new family version called Exit: The Game – Family, which bridges the gap between their Kids games and the standard Exit games. Kosmos currently offers one product in this Family series, but it is a two-game pack designed for families with children 8+.

We have been big fans of the Exit series of puzzle advent calendars, and we were happy to see that Kosmos is releasing another game this year. We’ll have to wait a little while for it, because The Intergalactic Race releases in Fall 2025.

Kosmos isn’t just about the Exit: The Game series, though. We saw a fourth entry into their Master of Crime series, Mosquito. We also got a preview of Dice Words, a word-building game. It’s kind of incredible how many variations of “here’s a bank of letters, build a good word from them” there are, and Dice Words falls into that category, with some extra challenge from how bonus points are scored. It looked like a fun, short game to add into a game night rotation. Both Mosquito and Dice Words are slated for a Fall 2025 release.

Professor Puzzle

Professor Puzzle had quite a few boxed escape games on display. We’ve played and reviewed a few games from Professor Puzzle in the past, and they have a lot more to offer now.

Professor Puzzle was showing off 30-minute and 90-minute boxed escape games and murder mystery experiences. They have a couple of newer games in the 30-minute variety, with Escape from the Lost Temple being the newest. Escape from the Aquarium is aimed at younger solvers. Unclaimed looks to be a puzzle-heavy boxed game where the race is on to find a very valuable last will and testament.

Boogie Board

While not a puzzle company in and of itself, frequent visitors to escape rooms have surely used one as a note-taking device in a room at some point. They’re a relatively low-tech solution to a pad of paper and pencil or a whiteboard and erasable marker. There’s some rather elegant technology that makes them work so consistently and cleanly – so says Brett, who is much more the engineer between the two of us. As we talked to the company’s representatives at their booth, they showed off Boogie Board’s newest form factor – a 3-pack of 4”x4” reusable boards called VersaNotes. These were surprisingly delightful and Brett and I were happy to walk away with a sample pack for ourselves.

Hachette Boardgames

We were lured into the Hachette Boardgames booth when a representative handed Brett and me a free game called Suspects which promised a ‘captivating mystery.’ There are three entries in the Suspects series, each coming with three individual mysteries to solve. The newest is Adele & Neville: Investigative Reporters, where players take on the roles of Adele and Neville as they investigate murder mysteries. Hachette also displayed their new deduction game Kronologic: Paris 1920, a hidden information game about strange occurrences at the Paris Opera.

Mechanical Puzzles: iDventure and Puzzle Potato

I would have stopped at both iDventure’s and Puzzle Potato’s booths anyway, but I was legally bound to visit all mechanical puzzle booths since I had Brett (a mechanical puzzle fan and collector) with me. We’ve reviewed a good number of iDventure’s puzzle boxes before, and it was nice to talk to the representatives, especially about their upcoming Kickstarter project Alice in Wonderland. Alice is part of their new series that incorporates jigsaw puzzles into their already intriguing mechanical puzzle boxes.

At the Puzzle Potato booth, Brett drew my attention to their Tesla Box. Interestingly, it had electronic components but did not require batteries. That alone was enough to capture my interest in Tesla and to see how Puzzle Potato is moving this sector of the industry forward.

Quick Thoughts

• We visited the Abacus Brands booth again to see what they were offering. While they didn’t have a new product in their Cold Case VR line, they did remodel their packaging. The new flat-pack design looked less like a police evidence box, but it did cut costs down considerably, reducing the price of their VR products.
• Big Potato Games had a copy of True Crime Stories. True Crime Stories was a three-pack of mysteries from the vaults of the United States Postal Inspection Service, and it utilized a lot of printed materials and out of game elements like phone calls and emails. True Crime Stories is currently sold out on the Big Potato website, but may be available from other retailers.
• As we walked past the Ridley’s Games booth, we noticed a series of escape room games that were new to us. We took a look at the three games in their Timescape series, each entry in this family-friendly series taking place in a different time period. Their newest was Jane Austen’s Plight.

Toy Fair 2026

Toy Fair will return to the Javits Center from February 14–17, 2026. This is great news for us locals, as their plan had been to relocate to New Orleans for 2026 through 2028, and perhaps beyond. Due to feedback from the industry at large, those plans were scrapped and Toy Fair will remain in New York City for the foreseeable future. New Orleans is a great city, but I will be happy for it to stay local so that I can visit again in 2026.

Stay tuned for review of some of the games we explored! I expect some of them will end up in our next Holiday Gift Guide in November.

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