Escape Reviewer

Creativity: ✭✭✭✭✬ 4.5

     Novel: 5.0

     Comprehension: 5.0

     Surprises: 3.5

Puzzles: ✭✭✭✭✩ 4.0

     Challenge: 4.0

     Logic: 4.0

     Abstract: 4.0

Charlotte’s a spine-chilling thriller that sees your group assume the role of a police investigation team, charged with making one final inquiry into a decades old cold-case. Twenty years ago the community was rocked by a mysterious double-murder suicide; for reasons that remain unknown, Gerald Grundy killed his two daughters and then took his own life. While several investigations have been mounted since the incident, a series of unanswered questions remain. What drove Grundy to commit such an act? What did he do with the now-missing bodies? And could the Grundy family attic still be hiding secrets, years removed from the crime?

 

This game is a dual challenge: your group must escape in 45 minutes, and in that period, discover the truth of the Grundy killings. Captive boasts no flashy tech, but often focuses on atmosphere and storytelling instead. Nowhere is that more evident than in Charlotte, where the escape game format is used to tell a narrative that only becomes clear as things unfold. The game side of Charlotte is a mix of searching with a heavier emphasis on puzzles, but that’s really only half the experience. While most escape games reward success with tools or clues in a progressive chain of puzzles, Charlotte mixes in objects that are purely narrative; figuring out what’s a puzzle piece and what’s a story element is one of the game’s unique challenges, and it’s integral to your success.

 

Sounds easy? It’s not; the atmosphere conspires against you. Depending on your stomach for suspense, Charlotte will rank somewhere between tense and terrifying. When game masters Shaun and Marina purchased the space for Captive, they did so in part for the space that Charlotte now occupies: an authentic set of attic apartments that had been locked and sealed for over forty years. The peeling wallpaper, creeky wooden floors, and worn doorknobs are all authentic, giving Charlotte an incomparable feel. Props were sourced from antique dealers and garage sales, giving the players a chance to interact with some surprising and delightful objects. Beginning in close quarters, the game quickly opens up in both space and story. However, as you gain full run of the Grundy’s previous home, things only become more uncomfortable; discoveries stack up, and the grisly story starts to reveal itself.

 

While Charlotte is beautiful, atmospheric, and ambitious in the way that it uses the room escape model, the game does feel a little rushed. Being a 45-minute room, it could easily extend to an hour for sheer purpose of gameplay; there are a couple puzzles that require a great deal of processing. You don’t want to rush the experience; the room’s best enjoyed slowly and thoroughly, soaking in the spooky and searching for things previous investigations might have missed. As it stands, the police file provided at the beginning of the game can feel like a time sink, and the final sequence – which is suspenseful enough on its own– can become even more tense due to the time limit. 

 

I love the use of an authentic alarm clock as a time keeping device for the game, but hated how difficult it was to keep track of it in the doom and gloom. The busy pacing raises the difficulty level a bit higher than what I’d consider ideal, given the goals of the narrative design. There’s an intriguing story here with a great ending – a tremendous rarity in escape games today – but it’s a shame many groups won’t have time to really enjoy it.

 

Regardless of the pacing issues, Charlotte and its companion room at Captive, Dracula’s Library, are currently tied for my favorite 45-minute rooms in the GTA. Fellow Escape Reviewer Chris has played both as well, and said the same when we discussed. Charlotte’s great for intermediate or experienced groups who know what they’re doing, and will appreciate the ambition of the room’s added context. There’s even a meta-narrative element that only becomes apparent when the game is over, which is easy to miss. Charlotte invokes the escape room format in familiar ways, but takes it to a very different conclusion, and for me that makes it a must-play! 

Reviewed by Jason on July 18, 2015