If you are looking for something a bit different to do with the family, I can highly recommend Breakout Manchester. It delivers an exciting and challenging activity that the families with older children can enjoy together. We played a Wild West themed escape room, Most Wanted, and it was absolutely brilliant for us all, from 7 year old Freddy to 48 year old Dad!
Escape rooms are the latest in immersive, interactive entertainment. Guests find themselves locked in a themed room and are given 60 minutes to find clues and solve puzzles in order to escape. With physical and mental challenges, you work as a team, aided when necessary by your Break Out host who monitors your game from the control room and communicates with you via cryptic clues on the TV screen.
I had very little idea what to expect, and was quite nervous, but our host Lucy made us very welcome as she gave us our brief. We were bandits breaking in to the local Sheriff's barroom in a bid to steal his stash of poker chips. The Sheriff was due to return in an hour, giving us sixty minutes that counted down on the TV screen in our room.
I won't give you any spoilers, but we had to solve a series of clues to lead us to keys or codes to open padlocks, which gave us further puzzles to solve in order to break out of the room in the allotted time. The attention to detail in the room was amazing and added to the authenticity of the experience. Most Wanted has the added challenge of collecting the poker chips that are hidden around the room and behind padlocked cupboard doors. You really have to experience an escape room to understand just how cool it is. I felt like I was experiencing something like a cross between The Crystal Maze and a Clint Eastwood Western.
We were so pleased that we succeeded in breaking out of the room and we also got onto the leader board for collecting poker chips. We felt a real sense of achievement and enjoyed working as a team using our strengths to solve the clues. Everyone of us played a part and I was so pleased with Freddy who really got stuck in and was an awesome team player.
There are plenty of other themed rooms, so if you'd prefer to be a spy, solve a murder mystery, find a cure for a life threatening viral outbreak, thwart a mad scientist's deadly experiment, outwit a twisted serial killer or escape a hotel room from hell, there is a room for you. I honestly can't wait to play again!
Find out more and book your team's game at: www.breakoutmanchester.com
