1 October 2024
In todays review, we take a look into the real world adventure games by HiddenCity. These are like treasure hunt experiences but guided by your phone across London. The company has developed a new style of escape room experiences without any set locations but incorporating the same sort of puzzles and real props you would still expect.
The company has come leaps and bounds since it first started, with it now having a large selection of themes and games to challenge yourself in. As of October 2024, you can find 4 adventures to tackle. You have an adventure into the strange, surreal and absurd with The Hunt for the Cheshire Cat. You can take a journey into the world of a criminal mastermind with Moriarty’s Game or even take a fairytale quest inspired by the world of snow white with The Enchanted Mirror.
The experiences do range in time but the average time is around 3-4 hours. You can play seven days a week as it is all set in the city of London but the times of play do depend based on daylight and set locations needing to be open. Prices vary depending on which game you wish to play, anywhere from £16 to £25 per player is required, and it is recommended to pay for each player, as each player can have access to the game from their phone which is crucial!
In this review, we take on the latest mission which is 007 Shadow of Spectre. As we enter the world of James Bond and try to complete our mission in central London…
007 has been targeted. MI6 needs you to investigate. Gather intelligence, navigate the city and solve clues in a bid to outsmart Spectre…
In collaboration with the producers of the James Bond films, 007: Shadow Of Spectre is a treasure hunt-style game which blends interactive gameplay with real-world exploration.
Your mission: become an MI6 agent, working with Moneypenny, Q Branch, and other characters to solve a trail of clues left by Bond.
To crack the case you must follow the clues sent to your mobile and embark on a journey across the city. You’ll go undercover in secret locations and decipher clues as you solve the mystery of what happened to James.
Along your adventure you will uncover dead drops, engage with enemy associates, seek out private libraries, stalk through 17th century taverns, and sleuth through 5 star hotels.
Optional breaks allow aspiring agents to rest and rejuvenate at select locations during their mission, treating themselves to food and drink with exclusive discounts.
After booking your experience online and setting everything up prior to your start date and time, you are given a start location to head to and key instructions on how to start your mission. Using WhatsApp, you and your team can communicate with the several characters in the game and gain crucial information to proceed forward to complete your mission. Starting in a bar, we had to say a key phrase to the people working behind the bar and as a result, we were given an envelope with real props. This was key to starting our mission and had a spy map and locations, coordinates and other top class information. We loved this as it started the game with a shock that this normally operating bar was a part of the game and secret.
All answers and questions were asked via WhatsApp and giving the correct answer, would result in a new location to head to. What we loved is that the directions were not straight forward, they required you to use statues or what you see to guide you the right way. This made following somewhat easy but also questioned if you were going the right way on your journey.
You would be surprised at how many locations you enter and have to speak to the staff, even places you would question, really?!? This really made the mission interesting and that next step up compared to your average mobile or outdoor escape room game. We loved all of the props we were given in person, so not everything was digital, meaning it felt like your own real life spy mission and blended that immersion of real life and gameplay.
Being a spy is tiring work and the game does take 3-4 hours for the average team, so with this in mind they have put break stops in for you. They have found locations to recommend to stop for a drink or a snack and these are factored into the games at key points. With this said, you can skip the breaks or choose to stop at any point you may need to for any reason. Equally, you can stop in different cafes or bars than they recommend but, we would recommend checking out these spots as its unlikely you’ve visited them before or even knew about them. We enjoyed many new bars, stopping for a drink and maybe solving a puzzle or two. We did skip a few breaks also as we wanted to continue on and this was easily done with the commands given to you via WhatsApp.
Our mission took around 3 hours and this was with a break and for us being pretty experienced and quick. With this said, we did use a help function when we got stuck on 1 puzzle and did have to use a hint once or twice also. This can be accessed when you are seriously stuck and need a helping hand to proceed forward, as there is no real life game master to ask. All the answers made sense and the hints made perfect sense too.
At the end of the mission, we had a really cool ending to sum the story up. We were also given a small gift as a token of our hard work, which was neat! Our favourite moments of this 007 Shadows of Spectre mission had to be all of the locations we visited, outside and inside and the blend of immersion, with it not all being digital. Plus, there was a moment where we had to make a decision which affects the end result…
We would love to say thank you to the team at HiddenCity for allowing us to play. They did gift this to us in return for our review & video however, our thoughts and opinions have not been influenced. We really did enjoy our time playing this game and would recommend this to anybody looking for a escape room, treasure hunt game to do whilst in London.
Tickets are available until January 2025 at present and to book, it is best to head to the website & book directly. For more information, check out our TikTok!
@thrillnation Do you want to see a different side of London... then check out Hidden City experiences! #hiddencity #scavengerhunt #treasurehunt #london #daysout #escapegame #fun #family #friends ♬ Powerful songs like action movie music - Tansa
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