Real Stealth Game: The Secret Agent (Remake)

Real Escape Game Crossing - Shibuya (Tokyo, Japan)

Time limit: 45 minutes

Age limit: 12+ recommended (6+ requires ticket)

Player limit: 1-3

Date visited: July 2025

We travelled from Osaka to Tokyo by Shinkansen the day before our flight back to Sydney, giving us just a few hours in Japan’s capital. I had heard about SCRAP opening up a new flagship English-friendly branch in Shibuya and wanted to try it out, so I booked The Secret Agent, an updated version of an older game that was previously available only in Japanese at Tokyo Mystery Circus on Shinjuku. There were a couple of other options on offer, including the original Escape from the Nine Rooms and Escape from the Underwater Puzzle Challenge, but both of these utilised that annoying system where your game time might end up being twice as long due to the amount of waiting time.

The Secret Agent Remake was less of an escape room and more of a stealth spy challenge in the vein of the Metal Gear Solid video game. The staff at the venue spoke limited English, but the perfectly translated English subtitles in the instructional video were more than sufficient. To start off, each of us was given a basketball singlet with a number to help identify what team we were on, and a utility belt that included a transparent card, a torch, and a sensor pack (more on this later).

Essentially, the aim of the game is to infiltrate a base and steal enemy secrets within a 45-minute time limit. The base is patrolled by armed guards you must evade, and if they spot you, they will fire! Every time you are hit, you lose 90 seconds off your game time. The guards’ guns operate like laser tag weapons, which is why we had to wear the sensor tag on our belts. There are also other things in the game that could cause "damage" and thus lead to lost time, so be very careful!

Another crucial piece of equipment was the tablet we were given at the start of the mission, which we had to use to tap certain checkpoints to upload/receive information from headquarters. It basically served as a guide that told us how much time we had left and what to do next. 

The game space was surprisingly big, taking up most of the basement level of the venue, with multiple open areas, safe zones, and various rooms of different purposes. The theming was not terrible, but leaned toward "bare minimum" in that only essential props were used. Despite this, the atmosphere was excellent because of the patrolling guards' constant footsteps and the threat of being "caught".

On the puzzle front, there weren't a lot to solve, and the majority of them were quite straightforward. However, the fun of the game came from the stealth element, which required sneaking by the guards and hiding whenever they came into a room you’re occupying.

I totally sucked at the stealth part, getting shot no less than four times right off the bat! I still remember the shock on the kids’ faces when we finally cleared the first section and took a look at tablet, only to see that we had already lost extra 6 minutes off our game time thanks to yours truly. Fortunately, we regrouped and Z took the lead from there, guiding us around the patrols to tackle one spy challenge after another. The key was to learn their patrol patterns and know where the safe zones and hiding areas are in advance so you can quickly get your team to safety.

Now, it is important to note that The Secret Agent has an annoying cash-grabbing mechanism that plagues many of SCRAP’s other games — the option to pay extra (in this case 800 yen per person) for an additional 10 minutes of play time if you fail your mission within the allocated time. We had encountered this before in two of their “nine room” experiences at Tokyo Mystery Circus but refused to play on despite reaching the final room, and it left a sour taste in our mouths.

This time, we were very lucky to visit on a Thursday afternoon, when there were no other groups before or immediately after us, or else we could have been bumping into them or getting into each other’s way inside the room (or having to wait at certain sections for them to finish before we could enter). As a result, we had the entire game to ourselves, which I’m sure significantly enhanced our experience and played a big part in us completing our mission with just under 5 minutes to spare (this included losing 11 minutes from "damage"), giving us an overall rank of A!

Escape time: 29 minutes & 1 second (with 11 minutes lost from "damage")

Theming	Atmosphere	Puzzles	Creativity	Fun
C+	A-	C+	B	A

Verdict: Not a great escape room by most metrics but a fun, thrilling stealth spy experience that sure gets the heart pumping!

OVERALL RANK:

H	Z	J
B	B+	A-