Random Escape Room Employees Describe Weirdest Things They've Ever Witnessed On Job (18 items)

• (#1) The Thirst Is Real(ly Bad)

  From Redditor /u/SartresChill:

  We had a group that was evidently high. They weren't disruptive or anything, so we just briefed them, and took them to their room. So far so good.

  We have cameras and microphones inside the rooms, that way we know what hints to give out. [A]nother important thing is that the room they were at had a small fountain, and since the particular aesthetic of this room was dusty, that water was filthy. I'm talking murky, brown-yellow, mud-water.

  At one point one of the guys says he is thirsty, and proceeds to stick his mouth onto the fountain's stream and take a hefty gulp of the sh*t-water. We spend a second of shock/guffaw, and tell them that drinking the f*cking water isn't part of the puzzle.

  The guy reads the hint and just says "that's alright." He proceeded to do the same thing four times and drank the whole fountain (small fountain, but still like a gallon of mud-water).
• (#2) Prepping For The Proposal

  From Redditor /u/simonjester523:

  So we do proposals. Ring in the final puzzle box, proposal signs, whole package deal, people love it. Dude calls up to set up a proposal, I ask what room he wants, etcetera. So then I tell him the total price to book out the entire room for the proposal.

  He says he just wants to buy the two tickets for him and his girlfriend. I tell him we can't have strangers playing a game [where] their experience is impacted/altered by the fact that there's a proposal going on. Proposal happens in an Escape Room, there's no longer a game, it becomes about the proposal. I know this because I've seen it happen a hundred times.

  Anyway, dude refuses to buy out all of the tickets. Says he wants strangers to be there, he's not going to buy the other four tickets. I hand the phone to my manager, they hash out details together.

  Over the next three weeks leading up to the proposal, this guy calls every. Single. F*cking. Day. There's nothing else to figure out, we've got it all set up, but this guy is constantly badgering us.

  The big day rolls around, he arrives early so he can hide out, and this dude is a kid. Like, pimple-faced, voice-cracking, hair-growing-in-weird-places kind of kid. Everybody in the control room is talking about him, because he's been a thorn in our collective sides for weeks, and we're speculating about telling him marriage at his age is a horrible idea, but whatever it's too late.

  So he hides, the girl and her friends show up, they get started and we stash the dude in the second hidden room that they'll eventually end up in. Everybody crowds around the monitor to watch and this guy pulls out a bouquet of flowers and unfurls a sign that says "NAME REDACTED, will you go with me to PROM?"

  And the entire staff loses their collective sh*t. Weeks of constant pestering, endless phone calls, and the most stressful proposal deal we've ever put together. For a f*cking PROMposal.

  She said no.
• (#3) Putting It Down On Paper

  From a former Redditor:

  At my Escape Room it's a fairly common occurrence for first generation kids to bring their parents (from various countries - Vietnam, Bangladesh, Italy, Spain, we have many many people in this city) with them to the room, even though they don't speak English. I always feel bad for this reason, because a lot of the puzzles directly depend on English wordplay and stuff like that. But they seem to have fun just being with their kids, so we all have fun together.

  One time a family came in that seemed to fit this profile. I'm not sure which country of origin they had, but they seemed Asian American to me. But I am an uneducated buffoon, so I couldn't tell you what language the parents spoke. They spoke very sparingly in their original language, and the children spoke in accented English. They went through the room, the children solving most of the puzzles, and the father following them around silently with a notepad and pen, nodding and writing things as they found clues.

  They got out, I took their picture, and they left, and everyone seemed to have had a good time. When we clean up the room, we have to rip several of the pages off from the notepad so people can't see the clues or even the indents of the clues people had written down from previous games. I was looking forward to seeing what language the father had been writing in the whole time.

  I reset the room, then get to the notepad, only to find the first page in perfect English: "What if we can't get out? Do we die in here?

  I burst out laughing, realizing this man was hilarious and I wanted to chase him down and take his family to lunch, then I flipped to the next page: "Day 56 our rations are running low. We fear for our lives. We are thinking of cannibalism."

  It was my best experience working there and I'll never forget it as long as I live. 
• (#4) It's A Rule- and Judgment-Free Zone

  From Redditor /u/theleviwasbr1:

  One time I had a group of kind of redneck people come in and they all smelled funny. We assumed it was some weird pot and just got them in the room.

  One of the weirder gentlemen went outside in the middle of the game and came back in and released a large cloud of smoke into the room. After they failed to escape, we took their picture and the same guy screams "All right guys, let's go smoke some more m*th!"

  We still don't have rules against this.
• (#5) Ultimate Family Secret

  From Redditor /u/nadroj37:

  If a group doesn't show up 10 minutes before their start time, we call to ask if they're making their way or not.

  Well this guy put his home phone number and when we called, his wife answered, but she had no idea what we were talking about. We asked for her name and she wasn't on any booking information, so we assumed it was a wrong number.

  Well the husband shows up with A DIFFERENT FAMILY. She seemed to be his girlfriend by the way they flirted in the room, and she also had kids.

  Then, when they escaped, he refused to have his picture taken. We called that event "the night of Affair Guy."
• (#6) Making A Break For It

  From Redditor /u/NOTYARYP:

  At our establishment we have a room called "Jailbreak" with a fake door towards the very end (it's covered with plywood). This girl takes one look at it and says "jail...break...." and charges the door full force and breaks through.
• (#7) It's Like A Couples Retreat (From Reality)

  From Redditor /u/GloriousTuna:

  One couple couldn't agree on how to solve the puzzles and broke up inside the room.

  Another couple had the guy surprise the girl with a proposal.

  Another couple got a horror-themed escape room and just sat on the floor and cuddled. They didn't look scared. They didn't bother to solve anything either. They just cuddled with all the creepy props and sound effects surrounding them. I guess they couldn't find a creepy motel to cuddle in... ?
• (#8) The Communist Agenda

  From Redditor /u/hussain300:

  The weirdest thing I saw was a young couple, in our hardest room (they asked for our hardest), who when they couldn't solve our puzzles took off their shoes and just sat down and talked. When I would send them hints (to get them to start playing again), the lady would call me a commie. It was weird.

  For example: the lady would pick up a red clue paper that goes with a pyramid puzzle. They would stare at it, then put it to the side. I type in a hint "the red papers go with the pyramid!" She looks up [at] the screen, "[W]e were getting to that, commie!"

  [I'm] not a communist, and the room isn't communist themed in the slightest
• (#9) Some Magnetic Personalities There

  From Redditor /u/MrKerk:

  I saw a man eat a magnet. There are rubber snakes in the room and one has a magnet in its mouth. He thought he should do as the snake did.

  He offered it back, but we told him once he found it he could keep it.
• (#10) One Way To Family Bond

  From Redditor /u/Se7enkb:

  The best group I've ever seen inside my room was a family of stoners. Mom, dad, son, son's gf, and daughter. All reeked of weed coming into the building. They had 90% of the room solved in about 15 minutes and I was freaking out. Even called my boss and I remember saying "I have 5 stoners about to break the record by 20 minutes." 

  But then all of [a] sudden all 5 got burnt out. They sat in a circle and talked to each other for about 45 minutes in the middle of the room. They took 1 hour and 15 minutes to finish.
• (#11) Mellow Yellow

  From Redditor /u/BlueWhite618:

  We [used] to have a giant banana as a mascot and once we had a group of kids that were intoxicated. [O]ne of the guys in the room started crying so we decided to let him hold it. So the guy cuddled with it on the ground and fell asleep about 10 minutes into the game. Had the time of his life
• (#12) 12-Year-Old Terror

  From a former Redditor:

  [A] little 12 year [old] kid came up to me before the room and asked: "Are you in the room with us?" I replied: "No but I'll be in the control room" To which he replied: "Okay, good, so we can torture you when you don't give us any good hints"

  When they were in the room he proceeded to say: "Give us some good hints, you rotten child."
• (#13) That's Not What Flashlights Are For

  From Redditor /u/WildyMegaWolf:

  For some reason people like to put the flashlight that one of our rooms has in their mouth when they know they aren't the only ones who have used them. Some people put them between their legs, in the crack of their [butt] as a joke, and not to mention just roll around the ground a majority of the time.
• (#14) A Real Rosemary's Baby

  From Redditor /u/WitlessWit:

  [A] couple wanted us to help them announce their pregnancy to friends by putting up a "We're Pregnant!" poster in one of the rooms (we had multiple rooms per escape zone). It'd be cute if the LED screen with a hand-drawn baby carriage wasn't in a Satanic-themed escape room. It was a hit though so... *shrugs*
• (#15) It's Like That Episode Of 'The Office'

  From Redditor /u/RayRay223:

  People have tried to climb through the ceiling tiles on multiple occasions. We now have to mention in the pre-game spiel that it's not necessary to climb through the ceiling tiles. My job often reminds me of this scene in The Office. People laugh at the things we mention, but anything we mention that you don't have to do has probably been attempted before.

  One of my co-workers said that a group started getting really [aggressive] in the room, to the point where they literally threw the computer on the floor to see if something was hidden inside (there wasn't anything hidden inside, they need to use a special magnifying glass to read the monitor). 

  We abruptly removed them from the room after that. They actually ended up coming back another day and were extremely well-behaved. I guess they learned their lesson.
• (#16) Nothing Like The Thrill Of Escape

  From Redditor /u/breathe_intheair:

  [O]ne time I asked the group if they had ever played an escape game before, and an elderly gentleman responded, "One time my wife tied me up and gagged me. Does that count?"

  His friends thought it was hilarious, but the high school couple, that was obviously on a first date, [that] they were paired up with did not find it as funny.
• (#17) Was It Worth It?

  From Redditor /u/Tcmmi:

  One group gave up after 5 minutes, and decided to drink alcohol [the] rest of the game. They paid [almost $140] for the game.
• (#18) A Regular Sherlock Holmes

  From Redditor /u/Dank_Pickles:

  We give people a box for them to bring in, so they can store their belongings while they play. One time, about halfway in, an inquisitive older man started going through their own stuff. He pulled out a purse and shouts "Guys, I found some... this is our stuff isn't it?" It was hilarious.

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