(Ad|review) Trapped: Family Escape Room Game Packs Review from Golden Bear Toys (age 8+)

I love a puzzle game, so 'escape adventures' or 'exit room games' are right up my street. Golden Bear Toys have just added 3 new titles to their range of family friendly escape room game packs, which everyone from around 8+ can join in with together.

We were sent the 3 new games to try - The Zoo (Easy), Mission To Mars (Medium), and Flight 927 (Hard). All of the games are suitable for 2-6 players, and we played with 4 people. 2 adults, plus our 11 and 12 year olds.

 
Everything for the game is packaged neatly in a single envelope style box. It's actually a very small pack. It's light, and handy for taking with you for a visit or overnight stay. When you open it, there is a lot inside, and most of it is NOT to be looked at, or even revealed until the right moment in the game. 

We tackled the Hard 'Flight 927' game first of all. As beginners this was an error on our part, but I'll come back to that later. 

There is 5-10 minutes set up time, as you transform your boring lounge into an airplane interior. Passports and tickets on the table, airplane windows on the actual windows, meal plan on the wall etc. You even get lots of small easy-remove sticky pads, although we mainly just went for blu tac. There are absolutely loads of different evidence / clue sheets, which all have details to help you solve the puzzles and work out the codes. 

If you are struggling and find yourself stuck, there are 3 available hints for each mini puzzle, by turning over the evidence sheets and finding the corresponding number in the hint book. The 3 hints get more obvious, and some click instantly, but others take a little more thinking about. We needed them. It was actually embarrassing. 

We pulled back a little respect once in the cockpit. By this time we were in the mindset, and we managed to get the mayday distress code sent with only 15 minutes of extra time, and no more hints! We saved the passengers! Almost!

It is loads of fun, and while your house doesn't actually turn into a plane,  you do become immersed in the imaginary world around you. We were determined not to take too long over the second section, and you get more points for completing in under 90 minutes, so we still had that excitement and competition to 'beat the buzzer'. 

When we started playing, we held off looking at any of the hints for about 40 minutes. I'd recommend that if you haven't got any idea within 20 minutes, check a clue. We just weren't thinking in the same way as whoever wrote the challenge. Once we had seen a couple of solutions and said "ahhhhh" for 5 minutes, we were all over it. 

We all took part in the challenges, with our 11 year old taking over on any maths, and the 12 year old enjoying visual clues. There are several different puzzles to solve within the game, and they are very different, so everyone has a chance to play their part. We really did feel like a team. 

It took us 53 minutes of our hour to get into the cockpit, with 7 hints! We completed in 1 hour 15 minutes, giving us a modest score of 4/10. You have to use less clues, or take less time, to score more points.

Although the games are all 8+ (you need to be a fairly confident reader to get the most from the games), really for beginners I'd suggest Easy 8+, Medium 11+, Hard 13+ ish... Once you've played a few though, you'll probably be far better than we were, even at age 8! 

Next weekend, we're doing The Zoo - the Easy escape scenario. Hopefully we might have a little more success - and maybe even escape within the hour. We are determined we won't need more than 1 clue though. Even if we don't manage it, playing a Trapped escape room game is an excellent way to spend a couple of hours together, honing your logic skills and working as a team. Everyone wins.

If you are in the UK and reading this post before Sunday 20th June, then I have a giveaway running where 1 winner will win the same 3 games which I have reviewed. You can find my Trapped Escape Room Game Packs Giveaway here.  

There are lots of different Trapped Escape Room Game Packs available to buy now, and the 3 new games are available to pre-order, or buy from Thursday, priced £9.99-£12.99 each - which is very reasonable indeed for the amount of work that goes into them, and the entertainment value they offer. Handy Amazon affiliate links below:

We were sent our Trapped Escape Room Game Packs for review. Amazon links are affiliate, which earns me a few pence if you buy through my link, but never costs you a penny more!