Visited for sons 16th birthday,with 4 teens aged from 15 to 18, myself and husband, we played the hand in the cabin escape room and we manged to escape with a few helpful hints. The member of staff who welcomed us was very friendly and set the scene of our escape before sending us on our way. The way the locked boxes and safes popped open from different key pads was very well done! We will be back to do the rest of the rooms, and will be bringing my other children too. Highly recommended.

We had an amazing experience at Escape Newcastle. The set up is great, the puzzles enough to make you think without making you give up and the staff were great role playing and giving hints at just the right time. We will definately be back!

This whole experience was great! From the details in the rooms to the story told, every thing was so immersive! Also a huge shout out to Elsie at the Grainger Street venue. She was our leader for the experience. She was so energetic and enthusiastic and clearly very passionate about the whole experience. She really made me feel excited and set the tone for the escape room when telling the story. Overall was a great time and would definitely go again.

We are an experienced escape room team, having done around 70 games with a 97% success rate. We visited recently to do the ‘witchcraft and wizardry’ room. Whilst in reception and being briefed, it was obvious that the games master for our room was also running another room at the same time- not ideal. When we discussed clues, we said that we prefer to ask for them as we can usually work through a puzzle even if it might look as though we’re stuck initially. We were told there was no system for asking for clues, and that the CCTV that she was watching didn’t have audio- we would just have to jump around and wave our arms to catch her attention. Around fifteen minutes in we needed a clue. After three minutes (according to the countdown monitor) the GM realised we needed a clue...and provided one for a puzzle that we’d already completed several minutes earlier. She clearly didn’t know where we were up to and therefore wouldn’t have been able to offer a clue even if she thought we were stuck (if she’d realised that). When she eventually realised which part of the room we were stuck on, the clue was to push much harder on something that initially appeared not to move (despite the briefing saying very clearly that force is not required). We did consider whether we needed a clue at a later part of the game, but decided that asking for one and waiting for it would waste too much time. When we escaped she explained that the other team had escaped when we were needing a clue, so she’d lost track. We escaped with over half an hour left, and there was already another team in reception waiting to go into a different room- so again, she’d have been supervising two teams at once if we hadn’t got out so quickly. We do not blame the GM for this. She was lovely. It was clearly a management decision to have her supervise multiple rooms simultaneously and a management decision to not have a system for clues/communication (very unclear why, given that other rooms in this company have radios). It also seems odd that monitoring the rooms is done from the potentially busy and distracting reception area as this clearly impacts the GMs’ ability to pay full attention to the team. At £50 an hour, teams shouldn’t have to wait several minutes to get a clue, and shouldn’t have to hold up props to the cameras to try to show where they are up to.

A friend and I did the First Contact room which is based on the movie Predator. The puzzles are badly written and have very little structure, everything just seemed really random with no order or linear progression. Even the setting of the room was really basic and unimpressive. If you put me inside the room with no context, I would have absolutely no idea what the theme of the room is supposed to be. Our game operator Cyril (sorry for spelling) was friendly and welcoming, although when asking for clues, instead of giving us a hint and letting us work things out for ourselves, he just explained the whole puzzle to us? He had no idea where we were at in the game as he (by his own admission) does not listen to the microphones inside the room. This would have been handy so he could have tailored his hints to where we were at, but instead he just told us exactly what to do, step by step, which was super disappointing. We have done lots of rooms so just small hints would have sufficed. I have done around 20 rooms as well as worked in 2 and this is one of the worst I have ever been to. A huge let down, I would definitely not recommend Escape Newcastle.

We love escape rooms and we’re excited about this one. Unfortunate it was more of a factory to get people in and out. Things didn’t quite work correctly and the room was tired. Would recommend finding a smaller escape room company that would be more passionate about keeping the place working and fresh.

Have played Dead Man's Hand and First Contact at the Gate location. I have a voucher for Contagion at Grainger Street and really excited to see on the website today that there is a new 3rd location with 2 new games I have never seen in at an Escape in the past so excited to also play those!! I can highly recommend Dead Man's Hand and First contact. The games are great and the staff were so lovely. I have also played Witchcraft and Wizardry, Magic Emporium, 221B Baker Street and The Cabin at other Escape locations and can highly recommend those games.

The escape room game was really good however the venue is terrible. A room in a dingy office block at the top of three flights of stairs in the city centre. Initially thought oh my god what have I paid £80 for. Slightly chaotic when we turned up as another group were being briefed therefore ushered into a cloak room with two chairs. But the game was good and would definitely go again maybe to their other venue. On the way out there was no lights on to leave via three flights of stairs we had to use our phone torches.

After completing all the other games and locations of escape we were thrilled to hear they had opened a new location with more themed escape games. We booked into the Sherlock themed one and as soon as the door closed we got to work and headed straight to our first lock to find it was already unlocked the staff hadnt shut it which put us off straight away as it was the first thing we headed to and felt that it was no point in playing after that. As it was new and a new location we gave the benefit of the doubt as I really wanted to try the TAKEN room.. what a mistake again .. a key labelled 'taken cell' was left in the room in one of the games so I opened the cell with the key thinking you had too meaning we have finished the game with loads of puzzles left to do. The game host came in closed the cell took the key and said that wasn't suppose to be in here. 2 times in a week something went wrong and for alot of money we didn't appreciate it :/ the other locations are fab and had no problem but this new location and games have failed to win us over

My partner and I did First Contact together at the Gate’s Escape and had a great time. We actually set the record so far for this month, escaping in 36 minutes. The room was well thought out and the theme was really interesting. Jay made our visit though, they were the best host! We’re going back today to do Dead Man’s Hand 😊