Escape the Room opening at Oakbrook Center this month
A national escape room, one of the fastest-growing forms of entertainment, is planning to open at Oakbrook Center later this month.
The exact opening date for Escape The Room has not yet been set, said company spokesman Garret Heinrich. He said that the suburban location will join 21 other locations across the U.S. The concept involves a small group of people who are locked in a room for an hour. They search for a way out by answering trivia questions, solving puzzles or scanning the room for a secret door.
The Oak Brook location will open with five “technology advanced” rooms during the launch and then add another four rooms. These rooms have garnered more than 5,000 Five Star reviews throughout the country, company officials said. Examples of the mysteries available include saving a city by stopping a meltdown in 3 Mile Island, and traveling through time and trying to get back to present day in the Clock Tower.
Tickets are $28 a person Sundays through Thursdays and $30 a person Fridays and Saturdays, Heinrich said. Guests will be able to book reservations online at EscapeTheRoom.com/Chicago.
Escape rooms are a form of immersive reality entertainment designed for participants of all ages. The themed games are live action puzzles in which players utilize clues to complete a mission or escape the room in 60 minutes or less. Corporations have also discovered escape rooms for team-building and communication exercises.
Escape The Room was created by Victor Blake In New York City in 2013 and has expanded to 22 locations in cities including Albuquerque, Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, New York, Pittsburgh, San Antonio, Scottsdale and St. Louis. Escape The Room is projected to host nearly 900,000 patrons in 2018 and prides itself on being a premier family friendly immersive experience, company officials said.
An offshoot of video gaming, escape rooms were developed about 10 years ago in Japan and have become popular in the last five years in the United States.