Circus of the Lost Souls

Immersia Escape Games (Boisbriand, Canada)

Time limit: 60 minutes

Age limit: Suitable for all ages

Player limit: 2-6

Difficulty: Hard

Awards: TERPECA Nominee (2025)

Date visited: July 2026

Circus of the Lost Souls was our third Immersia game and second at their Laval location. It is Laval’s lesser known circus room, but don’t mistake it as a Temu version of Escaparium’s Magnifico, because they are completely different types of games. The room was previously closed down due to flooding, so I’m very glad it was reopened in time for our visit, and there were enough changes made to it that it's now listed as the "2025 version". So how was it?

• Circus of the Lost Souls was a delight to play and I would say I have a soft spot for it as I enjoyed it more than the rest of the family. As someone partial to that unsettling carnival atmosphere, I really liked the game’s big top set, which has colourful floor-to-high-ceiling theming and an eerie travelling circus vibe.

• It has a simple, easy-to-follow storyline with an identifiable villain presented through impressive visual and lighting effects throughout the experience.

• The puzzles were strong — we didn’t love all of them, but they were at least diegetic and aligned well with familiar circus/carnival tropes. I especially liked how they blended circus acts, dioramas, and physical showground games into the puzzles, which were predominantly tech-based, with only a couple of locks (that made sense in the story and space).

• As with Immersia’s other games, the use of a live actor was sparing but effective. They could have easily dispensed with the living acting without taking much away from the game, but having it there definitely added to the immersion and interactivity.

• We struggled in this room more than any other Immersia room, and even received a tip from our GM when we got stuck on one puzzle for too long (thanks to us missing something because we had accidentally placed a prop on top of it). In hindsight, I wished we could have voluntarily asked for a hint, because the hint system in this room seemed really, really cool.

• A couple of other nitpicks: It was a little too dark (and unnecessarily so) for my liking in some parts of the game. And while it was not a small room, the way it was designed basically gave away where and how big all the sections were going to be, so it lost a bit of the surprise and excitement from discovering new spaces.

• On the whole, I still really enjoyed the room for its overall vibe and range of thematic puzzles. Apart from Immersia’s headliner rooms (Project R.E.S.E.T. and The St-Onge Case), this one was my favourite of all their other games.

Escape time: 56 out of 60 minutes

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

Verdict: An atmospheric circus/carnival room that makes the most of its theme to deliver fun, diegetic puzzles, magical effects, and a playful yet unsettling vibe.

OVERALL RANK:

H	E	Z	J
A	B+	A-	A-