Month: February 2019

TOYBOX – Cluedo Tudor Mansion

When: 3 Feb 2019
Team: Three people
Venue: Sentosa

Once again, my interest in escape games and related events led me to participate in a game clearly meant for younger players. TOYBOX Powered by Hasbro, to give the event its full name, contains many diversions based on the multinational toy maker’s products. Among these is Cluedo Tudor Mansion, a 15-minute game with a recommended age of “5 years old and above”.

Despite being significantly older than that, I found the game to be a cute experience, with varied things to do and some surprisingly clever touches given the target audience.

While not worth the trek down south on its own, if you’re going to be in Sentosa anyway (perhaps for the ONE PIECE Puzzle Hunt, located very close by) and don’t mind the $12 price tag, then you might be charmed and/or entertained by this mini mystery. If you have kids and would like to expose them to the world of escape rooms early, this seems the perfect opportunity.

Result: Successfully pinpointed the suspect, weapon, and location of the murder. Just as well, given our age.

TOYBOX Powered by Hasbro
https://toyboxsingapore.com/play

SCRAP – ONE PIECE Puzzle Hunt
[The game is running until Feb 13!]

When: 3 Feb 2019
Team: Six people
Venue: Sentosa

It’s been a while since we’ve had any events by SCRAP, the Japanese company behind the original Real Escape Game series. This ONE PIECE Puzzle Hunt, based on the long-running shounen manga series, was created in partnership in SCRAP — though you might not notice unless you pay attention to the small print.

In familiar SCRAP fashion, the event consists of simple first-stage puzzles, a more complex and thus satisfying meta, and a clever finale. Though the first-stage puzzles weren’t very exciting, the latter two stages elevated the overall experience for me, making it well worth playing.

One big plus (for my team, anyway) is that the area covered is not too large, and is therefore perfectly walkable despite the blazing sun. There’s a sustained attempt at keeping the route relevant to the narrative, though no real integration of the puzzles with the environment per se. Although an AR app is recommended, it’s completely possible to play the game without using it, which I personally appreciated. There’s no need for each individual player to buy a puzzle kit, either — teams can share as few or as many kits as they want.

My team didn’t contain any serious ONE PIECE fans, but it seems that the game contains some apt references to the series. Your experience won’t suffer if you lack any knowledge of the series. If you are a ONE PIECE fan, then you will probably appreciate the fact that each game kit contains components that are basically ONE PIECE merchandise. Every successful completion also lets you receive another piece of merch, which is nice.

Result: Succeeded after a bit more than an hour, at a fairly leisurely pace.

ONE PIECE Puzzle Hunt
https://sg.onepiecepuzzlehunt.com/