Yesterday I announced that I’m leaving Red Hat and today, if you’re here to see the announcement for what I’m doing next, it’s not happening.
Not until I start at the new space on Monday 01 June.
So… the next three weeks will be super boring if that’s the only reason you’re here.
I’ll try to write about other SUPER NEAT THINGS in the meantime.
But first the news:
- Major festivals not on the calendar until Covid-19 vaccine is ready
- Reports of a Loose Camel Lead Police to Escaped Ostrich
- Government urged to rethink decision to keep gyms closed
Do you remember when I wrote about gaming and escape rooms and addictions?
Yesterday I did a virtual escape room with a friend.
(Hi, C!)
It seems like more and more escape rooms and building online options that range in price from free to donation to reasonably cheap to ghastly expensive. I’m exploring the options out there to see what’s entertaining, valuable and especially team building.
C and I dove into enigmati-c-aper last night.
Designed and created by Gigglepud with assistance from Shulkle, it’s a simple story – you’ve broken up with your girl friend and she’s changed her Webflicks password and you want to binge your favorite stories.
I’ll admit, initially, I winced from the story.
But when you solve it?
Gigglepud specifically says TL;DR stalking is bad – play escape rooms / puzzles instead.
#SOLID
The escape room isn’t so much a trapped in a room and need to get out in sixty minutes as a goal with a time estimate of one to two hours. C and I, being more experienced, gave ourselves a time limit of sixty minutes, with the promise to return to finish it at another time, if we didn’t make it.
We made it.
In forty minutes.
With distractions.
We maintained video communication via WhatsApp and wrote notes in a shared google doc and while this game is HIGHLY hackable – don’t look at the source code unless you want to be a dork about it – we enjoyed solving the puzzles through the three social media accounts set up specifically for the game.
The reason this takes a bit longer is figuring out how to communicate, how to LISTEN and share information and thoughts, over a new medium.
We’ve done many physical escape rooms together and we’re friends in real life and this was actually a bit of a hindrance because we were used to doing escape rooms THAT way.
I think we might’ve solved it quicker if we had the google doc set up ahead of time. And maybe used a video conferencing tool to communicate? And do a lot more of these together so we get used to the medium and methods.
It’s a hard life.
While escape rooms originated as puzzles within games, this is the first time that I’ve been doing the online versions in a WHILE.
It’s definitely the first time I’ve done one With A Partner.
I highly recommend enigmaticaper for a few reasons.
It’s awesome how it ranges over several places (rooms!) and hints are embedded in the game itself rather than having a live assistant. You can also do this one alone or with a small team.
Plus, it’s free!
BONUS! She also links a few more games (with her notes) on the Credits page:
- Hogwarts Digital Escape Room – the first where I’d heard of the concept
- ParadigmQ’s SOS Puzzle – the structure which this game emulates
- E.B.O.N.Y – from which some of the puzzles are inspired by (and it’s also my favourite puzzle/riddle game ever)
- Zero Escape: 999 – which i was playing when i first decided I wanted to make this
I’d love to hear your thoughts, Warriors.
Are you doing an escape rooms these days? Enjoy them? Tell me more.
I’ve got to feed this addiction somehow, eh?