As 2019 comes to an end, the team at Escape Games Canada find themselves reminiscing about the good-old-days. We’ve been thinking about all the changes we’ve made in the past five years and all the missions that have come and gone. We thought it might be fun to share our trip down memory lane, so here is a little gallery of our vintage retired missions.
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One of our original missions, Le Voleur de Diamant became the blueprint for the missions that replaced it. Both Syndicate and Pathogen have occupied the same space and follow the dramatic high-stakes heist theme. As you can see from the photos, we’ve come a long way since we built Le Voleur de Diamant. Despite everything, this vintage mission still holds a soft spot in the hearts of many, especially the handful of customers who recruited us to help them get engaged during their diamond heists!
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Counter-Ops was the original two-story mission (The Haunting of Noriko now holds the honour of being the only one). Set in a bank vault, the game recruited your team of time-travelling counter-terrorists to break into the vault and disarm a deadly bomb before it was too late. To call Counter-Ops a challenge is an understatement. By the time it closed its success rate was less than 1%, and we had created a “Light Mode” to lower the difficulty for anyone who requested it. Since closing, the space has been converted into an office for staff use.
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End of the Line was an ambitious game for our young facility. We wanted to build an atmospheric experience. The mission featured a creepy serial killer and a plot-twist. The story saw players trying to save their kidnapped friend from a killer in an abandoned subway station. But it turned out that the missing friend led you there! She wasn’t kidnapped, she’s the killer and you must escape or you’re next! Crossroads replaced End of the Line and while it may sound like there are similarities, End of the Line is a true vintage mission. Crossroads is a brand-new game with a brand-new story and brand new puzzles.
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Syndicate was the first mission we built where the entire game is controlled from one single terminal. It was built in the same space as Le Voleur de Diamant but was retired so that we could build the even more technologically impressive Pathogen in its footprint. By design, Syndicate felt very cinematic; breaking into the museum and stealing the mysterious relics was an intense test of teamwork.
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Mayan Curse was one of our original missions. A lot of people may remember it as their first-ever escape room, and it was a very beginner-friendly game. As an expedition through a cursed Mayan temple, players were challenged to appease an angry god before time ran out to escape. A little-known fact about Mayan Curse is that it featured one particularly difficult puzzle that used the actual Mayan counting system.
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Another of our beginner-friendly and classic missions, Escape from Bleak Prison survived five years before closing. It is also the most recent mission to retire, and we are currently busy building The Ark in its footprint. Many escape room businesses have their own version of this classic theme. In our prison, your team was divided in two and separated into different cells. The challenge was to cooperate and communicate in order to escape. It was a vintage classic, but had to retire to make way for the next big thing!
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