Cabin Cult

Strange World Escape Rooms - Darlinghurst (Sydney, Australia)

Time limit: 70 minutes

Age limit: Recommended 18+ (jump scares, coarse language); under 17 requires adult

Player limit: 2-8 (recommended 4-6)

Difficulty: 3/5

Date visited: November 2025

One of our most anticipated new rooms of the year was the new entry by Strange Worlds, which impressed us last year with their first room, Mrs Claws, a fun, campy horror-comedy. For the longest time, we thought the new room would be Fugitive Funhouse, but the owners, Tanner and Will, decided instead to first roll out Cabin Cult, a semi spin-off of Mrs Claws that takes advantage of the existing infrastructure and build.

As mentioned in a previous post, we were supposed to play Cabin Cult a few weeks ago, but Strange World convinced me to push the date back so they could implement all the tweaks to give us the best experience possible. And because of the delay, Cabin Cult turned out to be my 100th game! Yay!

So how was it? Was Cabin Cult worthy of being No. 100?

• Absolutely! I'm glad I will forever remember Cabin Cult as the room that made me an eligible TERPECA voter (and just in time too!).

• I was initially a little concerned that Cabin Cult would merely be a "reskin" of Mrs Claws — but I could not have been more wrong. Apart from a single facade of the wooden cabin in the foyer you see upon entering the premises, the rest of Cabin Cult was completely different to Mrs Claws.

• Mrs Claws's sister, Betty, is a returning character, but she merely serves as connective tissue that offers a bit of friendly familiarity and a tone setter to let players know that they are in for more campy, darkly humorous fun. Don't worry if you haven't played Mrs Claws — we played an earlier version of the game that didn't even have Betty, and it made no difference to our experience or enjoyment.

• I was extremely impressed with how Will and Tanner completely redesigned the room, making clever use of space that was previously not utilised in Mrs Claws while repurposing some existing walls and props to create a fresh experience with a brand new layout and entirely different route.

• The puzzles were also quite well done and in our opinion more refined and flowed better than they did Mrs Claws (albeit the earlier iteration of the game that we played). There was a good mix of hi-tech, mechanical, and traditional puzzles (including a few padlocks), as well as elements of hunt and seek. While we had seen variants of most of the puzzles before, Will and Tanner put a new spin on them — with plenty of surprises and hidden compartments — to keep things fresh and interesting. There was one particular puzzle that we had not seen before and found very cool.

• Warning: Some puzzles do test your senses. If you are colourblind, have trouble identifying things by touch, or can't smell very well, there might be a few puzzles you will struggle with.

• The effects added an extra dimension to the atmosphere. Everything from the lighting and sound design to the special effects and animatronics enhanced the immersion, humour, and scares.

• Was it a scary room? I would say yes, but for us it was not too bad — though take that with a grain of salt as we've been told by just about every horror game GM that we're a very difficult team to scare.

• The scares were more reliant on jump scares than atmosphere, which remained mostly lighthearted and campy. That said, it had one of if not the highest ratio of jump scares we've experienced in an escape room — lots of sudden, expected sounds and probably the highest number of live-actor interactions I've seen (perhaps outside of Carnivorous). Tanner and Will kept themselves very busy throughout the entire game and were both sweating profusely by the end. Let's just say you're definitely getting your money's worth.

• In all, Cabin Cult came across as a levelled-up, more polished version of Mrs Claws in all respects. I could tell the success of Mrs Claws fuelled this new build with more confidence and ambition. Yet, I still feel like the best is yet to come from Will and Tanner as they keep growing and improving. They are currently in the process of acquiring a new premises, which will hopefully have enough space to house Mrs Claws and the upcoming Fugitive Funhouse, plus another new room!

Escape time: 49 minutes and 51 seconds out of 70 minutes (new no clues record!)

Theming	Atmosphere	Puzzles	Creativity	Fun
A-	A-	A	A-	A

Verdict: If you enjoyed Mrs Claws, you'll love Cabin Cult! Similar campy vibe but a completely different game, with upgraded puzzles, effects, and more hilarious/scary live-actor interactions. Worth the wait and a worthy No. 100!

OVERALL RANK:

H	E	Z	J
A	B+	A	A