RATING: 2 Keys          RESULT: Win          REMAINING: 12:38

Get out as fast as you can – because it will save you a loong wait.

Enter the Woods of Terror and take on the challenge that few have dared to attempt. You find yourself trapped inside a confined space with limited light and limited oxygen. You must escape before the terror catches up with you, and you are lost in the woods forever.

While on the journey to the annual haunt event at Woods of Terror, we find ourselves distracted by and ensnared in an escape room adventure apart from the main crowd. We do not know what lies within the narrow game space, but we do know that we are helpless to resist its call.

As far as the story goes, Woods of Terror doesn’t have much to work with. Basically, there is a space we are locked inside, and we need to get out. The end.

Escape the Terror takes place inside a shipping container in the middle of the woods leading up to the Woods of Terror haunted thrill park. Once inside the “box,” we found it to be decorated better than expected. The game area is divided into several different segments, either by a door or by blackout partitions commonly used in haunted attractions.

The initial room appears to be a kitchen small enough to have Martha Stewart’s head rolling. Not only is it limited in counter space, it is littered with random junk. A dirty sink and cabinets hold crumby secrets, as do a few other crusty hideaway places. As we made our way into the next space, the scenery transformed into what looked like a living room. All of the typical items you’d expect, such as old furniture and family pictures, are present to help convey the setting. The lighting is dark and makes it difficult to see at times during the game.

The third chamber is a kill room and is the darkest of all. The usual, stereotypical hanging plastic lines the environment and is donned with plenty of Pollock-esque blood spatters. Various stalker’s files are scattered about the space.

Escape the Terror is very heavy-handed during the discovery phase. There is little to no tech present in overall with most of it being almost entirely just locks and keys. All of the old furniture in the experience made for good – albeit obvious – hiding spots. There are some creepy, nasty places to reach into to search for clues, but some left us empty-handed after working up the courage to do so.

Halfway through the experience, we found ourselves getting lost in some logic leaps and even after some confusing hints, we were not that much better off. The majority of the challenges are puzzles for puzzles’ sake and are present basically just to keep you busy.

The game master also grafted onto you along the way during the entire experience, which was a little off-putting. It seriously dampens the fun when you have someone literally in the room with you watching you play. As we moved further along in the journey, they would be close on our heels resetting the previous area right away and would enter the current space once finished.

While this room is better than we were expecting, it could have used more work along the entire spectrum of the game. The scenic was decent, but at this point we have seen some really nice shipping container experiences. We would have also liked to see the puzzles better tie into the story rather than just existing because it was an escape room.

It is sad to say, but the best aspect of playing Escape the Terror wasn’t even the room itself. The container was located at the outskirts of the woods near the entrance to the haunted experience. Since we were planning on doing the haunt that same night, we were allowed to start the trail right away after our game ended and did not have to walk back to the main midway area to wait with everyone else. Essentially, the exit to the game turned out to be a free Fast Pass ticket. It was the first time of all the years doing the Woods of Terror that we did not have a large wait time. As an added bonus, it was just the two of us going through the entire haunt by ourselves because we just happened to end our game between large groups entering the haunted trail. That was worth the price of a “just OK” game right there.

This experience was only run during the 2016 haunt season with nothing offered in the years since. Maybe the venture into escape rooms didn’t go so well for the venue because they have discontinued offering them. Perhaps they wanted to give this escape room thing a test drive, and in the end the vehicle didn’t end up taking them very far.

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Venue: Woods of Terror

Location: Greensboro, NC

Number of Games: 1

GAME SPECIFIC INFORMATION:

Duration: 60 minutes

Capacity: 6 people

Group Type: Public / You may be paired with strangers.

Cost: This game has since been retired.