Midsummer Scream Offers an Opportunity to Escape

Along with traditional haunts and immersive entertainment (Prologue, Shine On, Captivated, and others), Midsummer Scream provides an outlet for escape room companies to advertise with 10-minute mini-games. Below are short reviews of the two escape rooms at this year’s Midsummer Scream. Thank you to Cristen Brinkerhoff for her contribution to this article.

The Asylum – Crossroads Escape Games

Fans of Crossroads Escape Games were treated to a small taste of a much larger adventure to come in Asylum, a ten-minute escape in which two participants must truly rely on each other to survive. To say that teamwork is necessary to complete the tiny room is an understatement — groups of two are literally strapped together in a straitjacket, the key to freedom clasped in one player’s bound-up hand. The puzzles are short but clever, and provide an excellent tease for the long-expected full-length escape room, The Psych Ward, that Crossroads is opening this October. Expect the same high level of tension and challenge that Crossroads brought to the table in their excellent Hex Room, with a similarly dark twist.

More information, including teaser trailers full of mysterious clues, can be found on their YouTube page. You can also sign up for their mailing list on their website, or like them on Facebook, for updates on all-new games.

The Cromwell Estate

An Orange County horror escape room, The Cromwell Estate brought a small new escape experience for Midsummer Screamers to try out. Maintaining the creepy atmosphere of their full experience, The Den, Cromwell saw guests trapped by a serial killer with only 10 minutes to solve the puzzles and escape. A novel addition was the option to play “against” a fellow escapee to see who would live to tell the tale. Haunting tried this innovative two-versus-two option to mixed results (one team got out in four minutes, the other ran out of time and was left to the killer). The two rooms had similar puzzles with slight variations, incorporated both mental and physical logic problems, and added a nice dose of creepy by using body parts in jars. The Cromwell Estate’s mini-game provided a fun little escape from a killer’s trap.

See if you can survive the full-length Den, and check out The Cromwell Estate’s website and Facebook page for new rooms and events.