Puzzle Rooms In Frederick Quickly Becoming a Most Popular Activity To Do Downtown
by Barry Fleming and Christina Huffer
Surelocked In is a new business that opened in November 2016. When you enter a puzzle room, you and your group are working to solve all these different puzzles. The ultimate goal is to get out.
As of right now, there are three different rooms, that take an hour each to solve. The two main rooms are Ship Outta Luck and Escape Groom. Escape Groom is the most difficult room, and only 2% of people have passed it. There are three separate rooms in Escape Groom that all have different clues. Naughty and Nice is a seasonal room relating to Santa and his elves, and it is also the easiest room. Ship Outta Luck’s Difficulty is in between Naughty and Nice and Escape Groom.
This brand new business has become one of the most popular things to do in downtown. It may seem like all fun and games but it’s actually a workout for the brain. Co-owner and chief game room designer Chris Sparks said “We opened our doors on Black Friday of 2016, November 26, 2016. I absolutely love games, and also because my family was out on vacation in Denver. I’m the oldest of three brothers and all of us like incredibly different things but the one thing that we absolutely loved was our first escape room, and the best possible thing happened: we lost with one puzzle to go. After that we thought ‘You know what could really use an escape room? Frederick.’ So we designed some riddles and puzzles, built the rooms and now we’re bringing people on through, we built the whole thing in three months.”
Three months to design all of the riddles in these rooms is not a lot of time at all. Every room has at leave 50 clues leading you to more puzzles and more clues all connecting and most of them being useful.
“I think we took the rooms to another level; the one in Denver was an absolute blast as well as many of the other escape rooms I have been to throughout the country, both here and in Canada. I think what I really like about ours is [that we] have different kinds of puzzles for everybody. If you’re really number oriented, we’ve got you, if you’re really logic puzzle oriented we’ve got you, or if you’re just really good at being creative and noticing things that are out of place we’ve got you as well. For me, I have always been an actor,
“I’ve always been a storyteller, and I’ve always been a game player. So for me I didn’t study anything related to that in college, but college is a place where you can always find your passions, and right after college I discovered escape rooms. We’ve become the most popular thing to do in downtown Frederick. We’re open Friday, Saturday, and Sunday as you can see on our website www.surelockedin.com.
“We’re open during the week by appointment. Right before this group [our group], I was actively looking at some different buildings in Frederick so we can open up new rooms in the near future. After that who knows? I would love to bring this to as many people as possible. This is just something we just know as fun, and something that we would just love to have in Frederick. The money that is raised from this is being used to expand and to pay our employees. But for us it’s never been about making a dollar [as] it’s been about watching you all have a blast inside the rooms,” said Sparks
“My employees have yet to make it through a room; the first room they [tried] was the Christmas room upstairs [Naughty and Nice]. [They failed], they are the first names on your naughty list. Everyone who doesn’t make it through the Christmas room signs that naughty list. They didn’t test the pirate room because they helped build it, so they knew all the answers. The Escape Groom (up the street) since it is so difficult only a few groups have ever beaten that, and the employees are not one of those groups. For now the Pirate room and the Escape Groom are here to stay, but the Christmas room we are actively buying parts and building puzzles for Knight Out” commented Sparks
Surelocked In is a place for you and your friends to not only challenge your brains, but to use everyone’s individual talents. We hope to see more of these locations near us soon. To book an appointment visit their website www.surelockedin.com to challenge your brain and to have a good time.
