In this month's newsletter: NoPro Immies, Thinky Games Awards, EnigMarch, Cerebral Puzzle Showcase, and more... อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ โ€Œ  อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ อ โ€Œ:  อ อ อ อ อ

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Hey Escape Industry Folks! ๐Ÿ‘‹

We're March-ing into a brand new month!

A month of lots of movers and shakers around the world. As always, I hope this newsletter keeps you up to date on the escape rooms opening, and sometimes sadly closing, news stories big and small, and more than a few fun conferences to look forward to!

By nature of the type of news in this month's issue, I wanted to share some thoughts and hopefully get some of your feedback on the construction of this newsletter.

I never quite know what to categorise as "big trending news" versus the regular list of interesting news stories. This month, most of the "biggest" stories came from industries adjacent to escape rooms - we have EnigMarch, the Thinky Awards, Cerebral Puzzle Showcase, NoPro's Immies. Relevant things if you like puzzle games in general, but maybe not quite as relevant to your average escape room owner or enthusiast.

This month I've decided to run with including all of those as the "big stories" from this industry even though they're not really in the industry. Maybe we'll just call it a "special issue" and hopefully resume back to just escape room news for next time. Perhaps that's okay?

In any case, I'd welcome your thoughts!

As always this newsletter is a community effort - I couldn't write it without so many of you sending me interesting content each month. So thank you!

Now, onto the actual news ๐Ÿ˜…

Mairi Nolan
Editor of Escape Industry News

 

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๐Ÿงฉ Trending Now

EnigMarch runs from March 1st - 31st this month

If you're a long time reader, you'll know we're big fans of EnigMarch. It's essentially a daily puzzle creation challenge. So whilst not explicitly escape room related, there are plenty of folks who take part in it from our community. Click the link below to find out more, or if you want to go straight to the puzzles, check out this spreadsheet.

Learn More

The Thinky Awards 2024 Winners Announced

The Thinky Awards is an annual awards ceremony to celebrate the best "thinky puzzle games" of the previous year. Video games, that is. The team behind it are Thinky Games, who also put on Thinky Con, and other cool initiatives in the video game space. Whilst there wasn't anything explicitly escape room-ey in this year's awards show, it's got some really fantastic games. Plus you might see a familiar face announcing the award for "Best Free Game".

Learn More

The 2025 NoPro Audience Awards Are Here

The NoPro Audience Awards (or the Immies) are back! Whilst this focuses on immersive experiences, there are plenty of puzzley and escape room-ey shows in this year's nominations.

Voting remains open to backers of No Proscenium until March 5th (so, the Friday before this newsletter comes out). Hopefully by the time you're reading this, there'll be even more details on the awards. Stay tuned!

Learn More

๐Ÿงพ In Other News

โ€ข Zoli shared some of the takeaways from a roundtable on the future of escape rooms, you can read all about it here.
โ€ข The
Spanish Escape Room Awards have announced April 27th as their gala ceremony date.
โ€ข Room Escape Artist have published an interesting
article on "getting captured" in escape rooms.
โ€ข If you've been following their "perspective" series, Richard Burns' article on
The Owners' Perspective has also been published.
โ€ข
Area15 has expanded 20-acres, with the new district focusing on immersive experiece. This includes an escape room.
โ€ข
The Brooklyn Paper published a nice article about MissTic in New York, you can read it here.
โ€ข As published by yours truly on The Escape Roomer, I decided to write a
guide to the best escape rooms (currently) in Edinburgh, UK.

Not quite an escape room but we think you'll be interested in...

โ€ข The
2025 Cryptex Hunt is live!
โ€ข The deadline to submit a puzzle game to the
Cerebral Puzzle Showcase is at the end of this month.
โ€ข We don't usually post job listings anymore, but this one looks too good to pass up - The
New Yorker is hiring a Puzzles and Games Producer. I'm not sure when the listing closes. Hopefully it's still live by the time this goes out. ๐Ÿ˜…
โ€ข Tickets are on sale for the
Minecraft experience in London.
โ€ข The 2025 New York Puzzle Party will likely take place May 17th, no link for now but details to follow.
โ€ข Thinky Games also published a "
best puzzle games in the Next Fest" article recently, it's well worth a look.
โ€ข Not exactly news, but I wrote up
this month's Thinky Third Thursday so you can be quite sure it's a little more escape room-ey than usual.

 

๐Ÿ“† Upcoming Dates for your Diary

March 1st - 31st
Enigmarch
Online

April 29th - 30th
Game On Conference
Canterbury, UK

April 27th 2025
Escape Room Awards
Madrid, Spain

May 29th - June 5th
The Cerebral Puzzle Showcase
Online (Steam)

June 28th
ER Champ Qualifiers
Online

August 17th - 18th
RECON Remote 25
Online

October 19th - 20th
ER Champ Finale
Sofia, Bulgaria

 

๐Ÿ”‘ Recent Doors Unlocked

It's a quiet one for new openings this month! Which is a shame. As always, if you spot any rooms in your local area popping up - please let us know. No news is too big or too small :)

๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ

CA

Escape Room Era is opening a new room, Ghost Hunters this month in Lake Forest.
Omescape has opened a new room, Witchly Ever After in San Jose.

IL

60 to Escape has opened an escape room mini golf, Putt Portal Mystery Gold in Woodfield Mall.

NJ

The Great Big Game Show has announced they're opening a venue in New Jersey.

NV

The Escape Game are re-opening in Las Vegas this spring, and pre-sale tickets are now live.
The Great Big Game Show is also opening at the same location in Las Vegas.

NY

BrainXcape has opened a new room, The Bloody Circus, in New York.
Ryco's Escape Room Lounge has opened in Westbury. Actually it opened a little while ago, but we just heard about it now!

OH

Conundrum Rooms has opened a new room, The Cabin, in Grove City.

WA

Escapology is opening a new branch with 9 games in Lynnwood.

๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ฆ

Escape Maze has opened a new room, The Candy Factory, in Peterborough, ON.
Flux Bar is a pop up immersive experience now open in Toronto, ON.
The Museum has opened a sci-fi pop-up this month in Kitchener, ON.

๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡ง/๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡ช

Channel Islands

MTG Escapes has opened a new room, Chloe's Camping CATastrophe in Guernsey.

East England

Escape Rooms Suffolk have opened a new room, Jack Frost & the Stolen Golden Egg in Bury-St-Edmunds.
Keylock Games have opened Madame Costello's Fortune Telling Parlour in Wickford.
Norwich Escape Rooms has opened a new room, Jack the Ripper, in Norwich.

Midlands

Break Escape has opened a new room, Dead Man's Chest, in Nottingham.
Escape Leicester have opened a new rom, Submarine, in Leicester.
Kidderminster Escape Rooms has re-opened Rockstar Swan Song (previously at Top Escape Rooms) in Kidderminster.

North England

Cliffhanger have opened a new room, Bank Diamond Heist, in Backbarrow.
Escape Hull have opened a new room, Escape the Seven Seas in Hull.
Eskape Whitby have opened a new room, The Night Watchman Returns in Whitby.
Houdinis has opened a new site with three rooms in Dewsbury.
Paradox Escape has opened a new room, Agent X: The Classified Escape, in Bradford.
The Great Escape Game Leeds has opened a new room, Quest for Atlantis, in Leeds.

Scotland

Game Vault has opened a new room, Bloodwood Cabin, in Ayrshire.

South England

Escape Plan LIVE have opened two new rooms in Chatham.
Housetrap have opened a new room, Killjoy, in Bodmin.
Immersion Escape Rooms have opened a new room, Portal, in Alton.
Room Lockdown have opened a new room, Escape the Clinic in London.
Salisbury Escape Rooms has opened a new room, A Case of Murder and Marigolds, in Salisbury.
The Panic Room are opening two new rooms in Gravesend.

Wales

Houdinis has opened a branch with three rooms in Swansea.
PanIQ has opened a new room, The Basement Conspiracy, in Porthmadog.

๐Ÿ‡ฆ๐Ÿ‡บ/๐Ÿ‡ณ๐Ÿ‡ฟ

None spotted this month!


A shout out to the resources & individuals who were a huge help this month: Escape the Review (UK), Rich Bragg (USA), Morty App (Global)

 

๐Ÿ”Š Listen

Last month in Podcasts, Radio & Live Shows

Escape This Podcast
"A show thatโ€™s a mix of escape room puzzles and tabletop role-playing."

โ€ข Podcast This Escape - Eskate This Room Feb 5
โ€ข
Early Summons ft. Kajsa Kรคmpe Feb 12
โ€ข
Podcast This Escape - Early Summons Feb 19
โ€ข
The Spa Who Loved Me ft. Jon Gracey and Viv Egan Feb 26

Escapuzzled Podcast
"Your one stop shop for all things escape rooms, immersive experiences, puzzles, virtual and tabletop escapes. In this podcast we'll be delving into all things escape rooms and talking to industry leading owners, creatives and designers to unlock the secrets behind these experiences."

โ€ข Tegan Hopgood - Freelance Pop Maker / Scenic Artist Feb 12
โ€ข
BONUS Episode - The Infinite Escape Room (Pubisode) Feb 26

The Infinite Escape Room
"The puzzling podcast where a gaggle of geographically diverse chums come together, have a drink - and work together to solve a home made escape room of the ears.โ€‹"

โ€ข A pint at the ISS Eisley Cantina Feb 2
โ€ข
Planet of the Dogs: Who Let The Humans Out? Feb 9
โ€ข
Planet of the Dogs: The Woof Factor Feb 16
โ€ข
Discussing Player Mental Load in Escape Rooms Feb 23

The following podcasts didn't release a new episode this month, but you should definitely check them out anyway:

  • Reality Escape Podcast
  • The Cager Express
 

๐Ÿ”Ž March's Puzzle

It's EnigMarch, so rather than post just one puzzle I'm going to share some of my favourites from the first few days:

  • Go With the Flow (Day 1) by atrialfun
  • Staff (Day 2) by rollforamnesia
  • House of Danger (Day 3) by Sarah W
  • Heart (Day 4) by Spencer Carver
  • Trap (Day 5) by willo


Which EnigMarch puzzles have you enjoyed the most?
You can share them with me by replying to this email!


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