Society of Curiosities Age: Recommended 14+ Players: 1-4 Playing time: 2-3 hours Difficulty: Medium Awards: Best Overall Table-Top Game Of The Year - Bullseye Award (2020) This was the last tabletop game we played before my solo Melbourne trip. Created by the Society of Curiosities, Madok’s Lost Treasure  is classified as a “mystery-in-a-box” game, a self-contained adventure that contains everything you need as long as you have an internet connection. You can purchase it outr

PostCurious Players: 1+ (1-3 recommended) Playing time: 2-4 hours Difficulty: 2.5/5 Awards: Golden Lock Award - Tabletop (2024) My solo Melbourne trip to play Carnivorous with the Escape Room Explorer was coming up, but I still had tabletop games I borrowed from him that we hadn’t played yet. One of them was The Morrison Game Factory  by PostCurious, a game I had heard great things about and had always wanted to play.   So, despite having a ton of work to finish, the boys and

DarkPark Games Age: 14+ recommended Players: 1-4 Play Time: 1.5-3 hours Difficulty: Medium Awards: Golden Lock Award - Tabletop (2024) This was the second DarkPark tabletop escape game that our friend the Escape Room Explorer lent us while we were on the Gold Coast and our third tabletop game (played the next morning).   After Witchery Spell , our expectations were quite high, so I’m glad to say we enjoyed Never House  even more. Personally, I think the two games are probably

Sherlocked - Home Mysteries Age: 12+ recommended Players: 1-4 Play Time: 120 minutes Difficulty: Hard Awards: Golden Lock Award - Tabletop (2024) Our second tabletop escape game on the Gold Coast was The Medusa Report by Home Mysteries, the tabletop label of the Amsterdam-based physical escape room outfit Sherlocked, best known for the TERPECA Top Room The Alchemist . It is the sequel to the popular Vandermist Dossier , which we have not played, though we understand this does

DarkPark Games Age: 12+ recommended Players: 1-4 Play Time: 1.5-4 hours Difficulty: Medium Awards: Best Overall Table-Top Game of the Year - Bullseye Award (2020), Gold - Player's Choice - Table-Top Games - Bullseyes Award (2020) During our Brisbane /Gold Coast trip, we managed to catch up with our buddy the Escape Room Explorer and he was kind enough to lend us some of his tabletop escape games — all of which I had really wanted to buy online but held off because of the exor

by Neil Patrick Harris ( Theory 11 ) Players: 1-2 (technically can be more) Age: 14+ (I'd say 10+ is fine) *Internet access required After being blown away by the masterful Box ONE , I immediately went online and pre-ordered Box TWO when I discovered it was coming out this year. Several long months of waiting later, the game was finally available in Australia and I picked it up right away. It's not easy following up what many consider to be one of, if not the best, mass-prod

Thinkfun - Escape the Room Age: 10+ Players: 3-8 Play Time: 90-120 mins Difficulty: Beginner A little while back, I bought three escape games from the Thinkfun - Escape the Room series. After playing the solid Secret of Dr. Gravely's Retreat and the underwhelming Murder in the Mafia , we kind of lost interest for a while. Alas, we had nothing to do tonight, so we decided to finally play the last one, Mystery at the Stargazer's Manor . This one was identical in format to Dr.

Thinkfun - Escape the Room Age: 14+ Players: 1-3 Play Time: 90-120 mins Difficulty: Intermediate After having a solid time with Secret of Dr. Gravely's Retreat , we returned to play another Thinkfun escape game — Murder in the Mafia — the one I'd been looking forward to the most because of its clever 3D design. As you can see in the picture, the game essentially simulates a miniature real-life escape room, one you can observe, study, and explore for clues as you try to unrav

Thinkfun - Escape the Room Age: 13+ Players: 3-8 Play Time: 90-120 mins Difficulty: Beginner to Intermediate It had been a while since we played a tabletop escape game, so I decided to look around for some alternatives to the EXIT and Escape Room: The Game. One of the more mainstream, commercial games that kept popping up was Thinkfun's Escape the Room series, so I bought a few that we will be playing through over the next few weeks. First up, Secret of Dr. Gravely's Retreat

by Neil Patrick Harris ( Theory 11 ) Players: 1 (technically can be more) Age: 14+ (I'd say 10+ is fine) *Internet access required Awards: Best Overall "Table-Top Game" Of The Year (2020) - Bullseye Award A single-player tabletop escape game? Designed by Neil Patrick Harris? Is this for real? Yes, it's real — and it's spectacular! Box ONE is an incredibly clever, cheeky and fun game that reflects the years of thought and effort that was put into its design. You just don't se

EXIT: The Game Age: 16+ Players: 1-4 Play Time: 2-4 hours Difficulty: 4.5/5 Having played a few of these now, we finally decided to take on one of EXIT's most difficult games, The Catacombs of Horror , a gigantic two-parter that can take up to 4 hours to finish. If you like the EXIT games and know what you're in for, Catacombs of Horror likely won't disappoint. It is similar to the other ones we've played, but with a step up in difficulty and scale. Being in two parts means

Social Escape Rooms - Alexandria (Sydney, Australia) Time limit: None (approx. 60 minutes) Age limit: None Players: 1-6 (recommended 2-4) Difficulty: Medium Immediately after coming out of Ransom , we started chatting with our GM and the conversation turned to Social Escape's "portable" escape room, The First of Them , a clever spin on the title of my favourite video game of all time. We initially hadn't planned on getting it, because it's quite pricey at $150 for an overnig

EXIT: The Game Age: 12+ Players: 1-4 Play Time: 1-2 hours Difficulty: 2.5/5 When there's nothing to do at home, our go-to now is to play an EXIT game. One of their most popular ones is The Abandoned Cabin (not to be confused with the real life escape room of the same name we recently did in Melbourne), an award winner that was actually quite hard to find both online and in shops. Did it live up to the hype? Yes! The Abandoned Cabin is definitely one of the better EXIT games

EXIT: The Game Age: 12+ Players: 1-4 Play Time: 1-2 hours Difficulty: 2.5/5 With a bit of spare time in the school holidays and not being able to do a real escape room every day, we went back to playing EXIT: The Game, this time tackling one of their most highly rated ones, Dead Man on the Orient Express . This turned out to be our favourite one. Perhaps because this one is a little easier, or because we have already played a few of these and have gotten the hang of the natur

EXIT: The Game Age: 12+ Players: 1-4 Play Time: 1-2 hours Difficulty: 3/5 The boy and I enjoyed our first EXIT game enough that we decided to step up the difficulty with the The Sinister Mansion , which we actually found a little easier than the Level 2 The Cursed Labyrinth because we had a better idea of what we were doing and what kind of things to look for. However, this one is a little different in that it appears less linear, at least in the beginning, and you are allow

Escape Room: The Game - Expansion Pack Age: 16+ Players 3-5 Playing Time: 60 min Difficulty: 3.5/5 NOTE: This is an expansion pack. The Chrono Decoder and keys from the full version of the game are needed to play this. We had a really good with time Escape Room: The Game a few years ago, playing around five or six games all up (including expansion packs). We found the Chrono Decoder quite a fun concept — it's a machine where you have to insert four different keys in different

EXIT: The Game Age: 10+ Players: 1-4 Play Time: 65-120 min Difficulty: 2/5 It's been a few years since we played a tabletop escape room (Escape Room: The Game + some expansion packs), and since it's impossible to do a real-life escape room every week, we decided to try out another tabletop game. After some research, we decided on EXIT: The Game, and started off with one of its "easier" rooms, The Cursed Labyrinth , even though the dude at the store warned me that it's "really