Review
A note from lexi: pyko and I did this room at different times, so we had two different experiences. We'll note where things differed for us in the review!
Dr. Disaster has a time limit of 60 minutes. pyko kind-of-successfully completed the room with four people with some hints. We say kind-of-successfully because her group took longer than the allotted 60 minutes but had enough trouble with one particular puzzle that one of the game masters had to come into the room.
lexi successfully completed the room with two people, a few oblique hints, and about 10 minutes to spare. (lexi: Meaning, I win! Nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah to you, pyko!)
Dr. Disaster, much like In Memoriam, starts off with a video from the eponymous Dr. Disaster himself. It's soon interrupted by a scientist on the run from the dictator, before we were dressed up in suitably island-holiday-style garb and sent into the room itself. As with all that the Enigma Room does, the video was polished, with high production values - and pretty hilarious to boot. It's a fantastic send-up of old-school spy movies!
The room itself looks just like you'd imagine an evil dictator's lab (or bunker?) to be. Equations and other notes scribbled on the walls, a desk with eeeeeeevil plans, a periodic table poster, a locked door to a staff room, and, of course, clues to be found! It took us a while to find our feet, there was so much going on. There was one particular puzzle that lexi's group completely overthought, and was a very smart use of the room's decor. (lexi: It seemed so obvious until it didn't work and we got a hint, after which the actual answer seemed so much more obvious...)
The range of puzzles through the rooms was fantastic and fit the theming perfectly. We had a few "ah-hah!" moments, too. There was one particular puzzle that was brilliantly layered - we had to bring together three different pieces of information scattered through the room (and not all the information was words on paper!) and piece them together to finally get the combination we needed. Let's just say the room engaged all our senses! (lexi: Also, it makes perfect sense that minions pay video games in their down-time! This should totally be a thing.)
pyko's group had problem with one puzzle, in that the mechanical aspect simply didn't work as expected. It came to the point that a game master had to come in and attempt it as well, but in the end it was very much touch-and-go. lexi's group struggled with it too - they started doing it the right way, and when that didn't quite work, attempted a few other wrong ways before finally getting a hint that they'd been doing it the right way at the start! Unlike pyko, they managed to get it working in the end, with a little bit of luck.
We do want to point out that we did think the puzzle was quite smart. It was simply the execution that failed. pyko's group was also given more time to finish the room, which we thought was a very nice gesture. Though, when pyko talked to the game master afterward, they mentioned that they'd used the strongest and best materials they could get their hands on. You can only do what you can do, we suppose! And the rest of the puzzles were so fun and well-executed they made up for the problematic one.
The finale to the room was a heart-pounding scramble that sent us scrambling back through items in the previous rooms. It was one of those scenarios where you think you've solved the final puzzle... then all hell breaks loose. As per every good spy movie!
We enjoyed Dr. Disaster a lot, and aside from that one frustrating puzzle, would recommend it to anyone in Sydney.
Hint system
Excellent. They have a normal and a hard mode. In normal mode, they’ll send hints when they think you need them, and in hard mode you only get hints when you ask for them. We were given a small tablet running their custom-developed app.
Asking for a hint was as simple as pressing a button, and they would then send through a tailored hint that didn’t give too much away. As they were monitoring the room, we did specifically ask out loud for oblique hints. As they told us, the only limit to the number of hints you can ask for is your pride! (lexi: We have none.)
Difficulty
Medium to hard. There's a lot going on throughout this room, and a couple of layered puzzles that aren't as straightforward as you might expect. Also a couple that will fool you if you jump in with existing assumptions because you're familiar with the
Skills
Dial up your senses!
What we liked
The layered puzzle that made use of one particular sense. Or maybe the puzzle that made use of the room's decor. Basically, puzzles.
-lexi
The extra pressure at the end, and the part where you think you solved it, but wait, there's more! And, the sense puzzle lexi mentioned. That was the first time I'd experienced a puzzle like that!
-pyko
Visited on 27 Jun 2015 by pyko, lexi and friends (pyko and lexi went separately)