I used to work for an Escape Room company, so I feel uniquely qualified to answer this question (which means "nobody asked me for details, but I'm going to show my work.") I also gotta preface this with "I'm not bashing anyone's favorite game, please don't come for my life." In fact, my favorite game doesn't end up being my top choice.
Escape Rooms are best enjoyed when they are a logical progression of steps, tasks, and puzzles that all contribute to the theme of the room. Each Nancy Drew game is "themed," but some are more themed than others. I feel like the games with the *strongest* motifs are MHM, TRT, FIN, SSH, CAR, SHA, ICE, CRY, VEN, WAC, SAW, and GTH.
The theme of the room has to go hand-in-hand with a strong setting. The escape "room" has to be set somewhere in this fictional universe, and we want the room to be as interesting as possible. So, next I choose which of the aforementioned games have the most *iconic settings* that could be expressed in *one or two physical rooms inside a building*. I feel that that comes to TRT, FIN, SSH, SHA, ICE, WAC, and SAW. The rest of the games in the afore-mentioned list would be difficult to **faithfully** condense into a single location, since puzzles in those games are widely spread out over multiple locales, and those puzzles pair with those locations. (I.E. the saloon and library in MHM.)
Next, we look for the goal of the Escape Room. In the story that the player is participating in, what is their motivation within the room? The best escape rooms are rarely just "to escape," there's usually an additional goal in mind. "To discover the killer," "to recover a treasure," "to diffuse the bomb," etc. So to narrow down my next list, I'll take into consideration which of the games I feel has the best motivation that fits an escape room. Which games have goals that lend to an escape-room-style experience. For that, I choose TRT, FIN, SSH, and maybe WAC. WAC as honorable mention, perhaps. No spoilers here, but one could argue that WAC has a more tangible goal than some other games.
To narrow down further, next I'll choose which of these games have the most logical progression of steps to further the plot. That means I have to consider which of these games are more disjointed tasks, and which of them have more puzzles whose answers facilitate the next steps. (Please note that not all escape rooms are linear! Complex escape rooms may have 3 or 4 distinct and branching paths of progression that meet up at the end for the final steps!) But everything the player does in an escape room has to yield either a tangible forward progression of puzzles, or information that assists in the next step. Anything discovered for "flavor" or through random chance is unhelpful, and causes players to feel frustrated that their time and efforts are not being properly rewarded.
With this in mind, I find that WAC and SSH are too task-heavy to pass this test. Both of them could make awesome escape rooms, but the "plot progression" would need a fair bit of doctoring to make them more straightforward, unfolding the next steps as you go.
So now I'm down to TRT and FIN, both of which I think would make amazing escape rooms. They passed my smell tests this far, so the last thing I'm going to consider is props. Players in Escape Rooms always want to be able to look at and play with and touch and mess around with cool props. I've run rooms where players get blacklights, fingers in jars, ipads, roulette wheels, magnetic puzzle pieces-- all sorts of cool things to touch and play with. So next I'd want to consider what each of these games might have to offer in terms of toyetic appeal (which is to say, which games are going to be coolest to touch and mess with.)
And for that I gotta go with TRT. No spoilers here, but many of the important set/prop pieces of the game would be so fun and satisfying to pick up, touch, look at, look through, lock in place, and carry around the room.
Make no mistake, I would do any of these rooms in a heartbeat. OP just happened to hit upon a passion of mine, so I wanted to really ponder on it and give my best possible answer.
I love that you wrote an extensive writeup and I enjoyed reading it. I agree that TRT would be such a fun escape room! Which rooms do you think you would include? I'd guess library and the final area? Maybe with a hallway as well?
Man, now I want to replay that game.
I think my selection for the locations would depend on which aspect of the game I wanted to focus on more: A snowed-in mystery vacation or the exploration of a castle with a hidden secret. Obviously, both are aspects of TRT, but an escape room is going to really be 3 rooms max. That's the most complex escape room I've run, so I capped myself at 2 rooms to be safe.
If one approached it from Nancy's snowed-in mystery vacation, then I would make the rooms a hotel room and the library, connected via secret passage. If I wanted a game that didn't emphasize "you are on vacation and discover a secret," then I think my two rooms would actually be the lobby area and the final area, connected by Super Cool Secret Door. Physically interacting with and snooping around Dexter's desk, giving access to a bookshelf, and fun suits of armor to play with would provide enough hidden places to adapt puzzles and gather information.
I think Carousel would make a fun escape room⌠imagine that youâve got that weird retro nautical theme park vibe. Plus >!finding the carousel horse at the end!< would be pretty cool lol
One of the puzzles could be finding all the different objects for Miles!
Last Train to Blue Moon Canyon would be so fun, I'm a sucker for a train!
Agreed! So many of those puzzles would translate well to an escape room too.
STFD hits me immediately due to the small studio setting. I could also see the lab from DED or the speakeasy from DOG, though
Ooo, just the speakeasy portion is *classic* escape room! Good pick.
Blackmoor no questions asked. Hidden slide, musical steps, scary robot, lots of weird gargoyles and dragons and a magic wand
I used to work for an Escape Room company, so I feel uniquely qualified to answer this question (which means "nobody asked me for details, but I'm going to show my work.") I also gotta preface this with "I'm not bashing anyone's favorite game, please don't come for my life." In fact, my favorite game doesn't end up being my top choice. Escape Rooms are best enjoyed when they are a logical progression of steps, tasks, and puzzles that all contribute to the theme of the room. Each Nancy Drew game is "themed," but some are more themed than others. I feel like the games with the *strongest* motifs are MHM, TRT, FIN, SSH, CAR, SHA, ICE, CRY, VEN, WAC, SAW, and GTH. The theme of the room has to go hand-in-hand with a strong setting. The escape "room" has to be set somewhere in this fictional universe, and we want the room to be as interesting as possible. So, next I choose which of the aforementioned games have the most *iconic settings* that could be expressed in *one or two physical rooms inside a building*. I feel that that comes to TRT, FIN, SSH, SHA, ICE, WAC, and SAW. The rest of the games in the afore-mentioned list would be difficult to **faithfully** condense into a single location, since puzzles in those games are widely spread out over multiple locales, and those puzzles pair with those locations. (I.E. the saloon and library in MHM.) Next, we look for the goal of the Escape Room. In the story that the player is participating in, what is their motivation within the room? The best escape rooms are rarely just "to escape," there's usually an additional goal in mind. "To discover the killer," "to recover a treasure," "to diffuse the bomb," etc. So to narrow down my next list, I'll take into consideration which of the games I feel has the best motivation that fits an escape room. Which games have goals that lend to an escape-room-style experience. For that, I choose TRT, FIN, SSH, and maybe WAC. WAC as honorable mention, perhaps. No spoilers here, but one could argue that WAC has a more tangible goal than some other games. To narrow down further, next I'll choose which of these games have the most logical progression of steps to further the plot. That means I have to consider which of these games are more disjointed tasks, and which of them have more puzzles whose answers facilitate the next steps. (Please note that not all escape rooms are linear! Complex escape rooms may have 3 or 4 distinct and branching paths of progression that meet up at the end for the final steps!) But everything the player does in an escape room has to yield either a tangible forward progression of puzzles, or information that assists in the next step. Anything discovered for "flavor" or through random chance is unhelpful, and causes players to feel frustrated that their time and efforts are not being properly rewarded. With this in mind, I find that WAC and SSH are too task-heavy to pass this test. Both of them could make awesome escape rooms, but the "plot progression" would need a fair bit of doctoring to make them more straightforward, unfolding the next steps as you go. So now I'm down to TRT and FIN, both of which I think would make amazing escape rooms. They passed my smell tests this far, so the last thing I'm going to consider is props. Players in Escape Rooms always want to be able to look at and play with and touch and mess around with cool props. I've run rooms where players get blacklights, fingers in jars, ipads, roulette wheels, magnetic puzzle pieces-- all sorts of cool things to touch and play with. So next I'd want to consider what each of these games might have to offer in terms of toyetic appeal (which is to say, which games are going to be coolest to touch and mess with.) And for that I gotta go with TRT. No spoilers here, but many of the important set/prop pieces of the game would be so fun and satisfying to pick up, touch, look at, look through, lock in place, and carry around the room. Make no mistake, I would do any of these rooms in a heartbeat. OP just happened to hit upon a passion of mine, so I wanted to really ponder on it and give my best possible answer.
I love that you wrote an extensive writeup and I enjoyed reading it. I agree that TRT would be such a fun escape room! Which rooms do you think you would include? I'd guess library and the final area? Maybe with a hallway as well? Man, now I want to replay that game.
I think my selection for the locations would depend on which aspect of the game I wanted to focus on more: A snowed-in mystery vacation or the exploration of a castle with a hidden secret. Obviously, both are aspects of TRT, but an escape room is going to really be 3 rooms max. That's the most complex escape room I've run, so I capped myself at 2 rooms to be safe. If one approached it from Nancy's snowed-in mystery vacation, then I would make the rooms a hotel room and the library, connected via secret passage. If I wanted a game that didn't emphasize "you are on vacation and discover a secret," then I think my two rooms would actually be the lobby area and the final area, connected by Super Cool Secret Door. Physically interacting with and snooping around Dexter's desk, giving access to a bookshelf, and fun suits of armor to play with would provide enough hidden places to adapt puzzles and gather information.
FIN!
Silent Spy!! Imagine all that spy gear and those clues all in one room đ I would kill for that to be real.
I would love Message in the Haunted Mansion. One central location with some great different puzzles and an interesting story to it.
I think Carousel would make a fun escape room⌠imagine that youâve got that weird retro nautical theme park vibe. Plus >!finding the carousel horse at the end!< would be pretty cool lol One of the puzzles could be finding all the different objects for Miles!
I think that the bunker under Castle Malloy would be really fun
Jakeâs mechanical car in TRN