Dania Experiences

The last time my husband and I were in Kuala Lumpur with our friends, we actually tried our hand at one of the rooms from a Breakout Escape outlet. This brand also had a short stint in Singapore where they set up a few escape rooms in Kreta Ayer. That was how we first got to know about them and we were extremely impressed with their game designs. As such, it was no surprise that our itinerary for this trip was pretty much dominated by visits to their Avenue K outlet! Plus, it was conveniently located right across Four Seasons Hotel where we were staying.

We bought entry passes via their direct website for 3 out of the 5 escape rooms in total. As they were running some promotions at that time, we were able to snag a 10% discount for our first game (just by following and tagging them in an Instagram story) and 15% for the subsequent games (valid for games played within 30 days of the first game). Remember to check their website for the latest promotions before heading down!

Alas, we encountered a minor setback before we even got there. I initially scheduled all 3 games to be back-to-back on the same day but on the day before our reservation, the staff informed that some mechanism in the Cerebrum room was spoiled and they couldn’t promise when it’d be fixed. They did offer a refund, which we accepted. Then, they somehow managed to fix it the next day. It was great news in a way, but because of that, we had to sacrifice our reservation at The Ultimate Escape Game in Berjaya Times Square.

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• Inclusions:
  • Post Mortem room (MYR90 for 2 pax)
  • Chamber of Hocus room (MYR85 for 2 pax)
  • Cerebrum room (MYR85 for 2 pax)
• Spent: MYR260

The rooms here can accommodate 2 to 8 players and you’re given 60 minutes for your escape attempt. It’s always a good practice to arrive 10 to 15 minutes prior to your time slot to buffer for briefings and form-signing of any sort. This is especially so for Breakout Escape as they have an additional feature we haven’t seen at other escape rooms so far – a menu of special abilities! Basically, all players get to select one special ability each (no repeats, if I’m not wrong) to be used during the game, so it helps to have the extra pre-game time to strategize.

My husband and I find that some abilities are more helpful than others so after experimenting, we eventually had our modus operandi figured out. I’d always choose the Oracle, which allows me to look at (and hopefully memorize) 8 photos of clues in key areas of the rooms, helping us zone in on the clue sequence and what’s important for solving the puzzles. My husband would switch between the Lightbringer, where he gets to use a flashlight and exchange it for a hint if needed, or the Time Bender, which adds an extra 5 minutes to our game time.

When we first saw this menu, my husband was extremely amused by the idea of us combining the Assassin, which gives you a hint in exchange for one person sitting out, with the Gemini ability, which duplicates the ability of anyone you choose. This combination basically meant that both of us will end up sitting out of the game… and that notion tickled him to no end

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Moving on to the games, the first one we played was Post Mortem, where we’d been brought in as investigators to solve the mystery of two murders that had been committed in a post office. The puzzles were quite interesting, requiring us to be detailed and make connections. You do have to pay attention to the storyline by keeping track of who’s who and all that, something I wasn’t particularly motivated to do, heh.

The storyline for the second game we played, Chamber of Hocus, involved us having to catch a magician who had swindled many people of their money. There are a lot of cool contraptions in this room, although it was incredibly dusty. Pro tip: A flashlight would seriously come in handy for this room. You’ve also got to be very observant to solve some of the puzzles. However, the way the storyline progressed was a little strange and felt almost forced in.

For our last game, Cerebrum, we started out in two separate rooms and had to communicate to solve the puzzles, eventually landing us in a common room. During the debrief, I discovered that this storyline was actually quite well-thought out (unfortunately, I’m not someone who pays much attention to storylines, oops). Anyway, knowing that the room had a faulty mechanism the day before, I freaked out big time thinking something had malfunctioned again when a certain phenomenon happened during our game. I only realized my folly when the staff explained over the walkie-talkie that it was, in fact, supposed to happen. Afterwards, my husband and I had a really good laugh about my temporary hysteria, and I’m guessing the staff did too 😛

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My overall rating of the experience: 4 out of 5 stars. We really enjoyed the intelligent puzzles and the amount of thought that went into connecting them conceptually to the various storylines. The idea of having players pick special abilities is pretty unique too, adding another dimension to the game play and strategizing. Different rooms have varying levels of difficulty, allowing for players of all experience levels to try them out. We found most of the puzzles within the easy to moderate range of difficulty, with just a few tough ones to crack. Not to worry if you get stuck during the game as the staff there are super helpful and will definitely assist if needed. The ones we interacted with came across as genuine and friendly, and we could tell they were very passionate about what they do here (: Aside from the fact that some parts of the rooms were rather dusty and triggered my cleanliness alarm, Breakout Escape truly lives up to its near-perfect rating on Google reviews 😀 We’re certainly looking forward to try the rooms at their other outlets!

If this post helped you in some way and you’d like to buy me a coffee, I’d be incredibly grateful (: