Review of ‘Secret Studio’ Escape Room, London

Secret Studio Escape Room London was an amazing experience and I hated every second of it – which I think goes to show how incredible it was. These guys certainly know how to do their jobs, and do them they did.

My sisters and I have done many escape rooms before, this was our 8th time (7th success, may I add), it was our mum’s first escape room and it was our first (and last!) time doing one with escape room actors present. It was only the second escape room in London we have done. Lucy and I knew there were going to be actors in the room because of previous reviews we had read but we still managed to be the biggest wusses in the room! Without giving too much away, I would just like to add one thing that those reviews did not tell us – this escape room is not for the faint of heart.

Our welcome was very interesting and set us all at ease right from the start, all the staff at Secret Studio were very friendly and chatted to us before we went in. Our groups Game Master, Laurence, asked us each our names which meant when he was giving us the clues in the room he could refer to us by name, which was a personal touch we appreciated and had never seen before in any escape room we’d done. To start the game, he set up the scenario very well and explained the rules without making it a boring ‘Don’t touch this’ or ‘Don’t touch that’.  Once the game started he became our fifth team member and he was very helpful without taking away any discoveries and also gave us some entertaining conversations – even though he was only electronically there. 

Speaking of electronics, Secret Studio was the first escape room we’d experienced that uses electronics in such a clever way to further the story along. As it is set in a film studio it makes sense that electronics would be involved but when people are locked in a room with electronics I imagine that can be fairly dangerous (especially considering the people we saw leaving before us were a hen party casually doing shots in the street!). So the way it was incorporated into the game was smart and, I suppose more importantly, stupid-proof.

Along with the clever electronics, there were so many other clues and puzzles to solve. One thing we did think, however, was that the beginning of the game did require a fair amount of prompting in order to get us into the flow of things. What we found was that one clue didn’t necessarily connect to the next, so we needed a lot of guidance to get into the swing of things. Once we got over the starting hurdle, everything started to flow much better, although potentially not so smoothly. 

Secret Studio involves a number of different rooms which get progressively darker, and scarier, and personally, my liking of the game began to devolve after the end of the first room. I’m not too big to admit that I’m a little afraid of the dark; so each room and each continuation of the storyline made me more and more nervous. This lead to me breaking down into tears towards the end of the game, after being a quivering mess for roughly 20 minutes (Lucy actually said she could feel me shaking – however, our own mother simply told me to stop being a wuss!). When Laurence realised how afraid I was he sent a message saying I could stay in one of the rooms while the others carried on with the game. This lead to more fear on my part, which I think freaked him out a bit because he then came into the room I was in and apologised and gave me a hug while the others were in the other room, which I thought was very sweet of him and I did feel bad for him having to deal with me.

Despite all this, we managed to escape in a respectable time of 55 minutes and 41 seconds. We then had a slightly sweaty, shaky, cry-y group photo, then we gave our emails to Laurence so he could email it to us. We had a little chat with Laurence about what we were doing with the rest of the day and then we left, after much apologising for making me cry! Later that evening we each received a personalised email from Laurence with the photo attached, again apologising for making me cry and hoping that I had a good birthday and a great year at Greenwich University. We were all mega impressed with the attention to detail and the personalisation that went into this, I mean our conversation lasted about 2 minutes but he managed to send us each a nice message, specific to each of us, having only known us for a little over 90 minutes.

Important Information about the Secret Studio Escape Room

Secret Studio is located on Wentworth Street, London, E1 7SA although the exact location won’t be revealed until you book. The game starts with finding a location and a secret password will be given to you which you’ll have to say to be let into the building. Don’t worry though it’s not too difficult to find once you know where to look and if you’re lucky another group will arrive at the same time and you can convince them to say the password if you feel a bit silly doing it yourself! Groups of between 3 and 25 can play at once and they can even accommodate groups larger than this if required and most people will be able to play even if you have restrictions. Let the team know of any accessibility issues and they should be able to accommodate although, unfortunately, they only have access for up to 2 wheelchair users at a time. Children under the age of 14 are not permitted to take part and you must understand and speak a reasonable level of English. If you do struggle with surprises, claustrophobia or just general scariness just let your game master know. Secret Studio costs £30 per person but they do often have offers on and the whole experience lasts about 90 minutes including a briefing, 60 minutes to complete the escape room and a chat afterwards. To book your tickets online, just go to the Secret Studio website here.

Final Secret Studio Review

It’s a great escape room, we all agreed it was one of the best we’d been to. The guys running it were incredible and it’s definitely worth the trip, even if I didn’t particularly enjoy all aspects of it.  Logically I can see how well thought-out and clever it was, and it does do what it says on the tin when it says ‘Frights, camera, action!’.

If you’re heading to London why not check out a musical like Bat out of Hell or School of Rock.

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