Thames & Kosmos Exit: The Abandoned Cabin Game

You are confronted with a strong sense of "how do we even begin this" after reading the instructions but stick with it. Once you have "permission" to read the first riddle card the mechanics of the game all starts to become much clearer... and you get the reward of having triumphed over the less than encouraging instructions. For fairness, I should add that the instructions are entirely accurate and pretty clear (if repetitive), they just lack a friendly touch to point the way to the start line.The puzzles are non-trivial and so satisfying when solved. We will definitely be ordering another one. Note that the series are ranked according to difficulty (on the box, bottom left, from Novice, 1/5, to Expert 5/5). This one (Abandoned Cabin) seems to be the easiest (rated 2.5) and so a good one to start with. Secret Lab is rated 3.5, Pharaoh's Tomb 4. I was impressed that aside from the first, ease-you-in-gently puzzles, they were generally taxing but fair. We had 5 players and it worked very well. Could be marginally even better with 4, I suspect, to ensure everyone is engaged all the time. Would expect that more than 5 would be a stretch but not impossible. With the advantage of 5 rather different minds working on this we didn't need to consult the Help cards but it still took us an hour and 20 minutes to complete. Would highly recommend.

I don’t think I’m stupid . I have a degree and 20 years professional work experience and run a business. I played this game with 3 other similar individuals and we could not even work out what you were supposed to do or how to kick it off properly. These people giving it 4 or 5 stars must be genius. We gave up after 30 mins trying.

Very fun indeed! Took us 1hr 58mins and we did it ensuring we didn't ruin any materials, which is possible. I can now pass it on to a friend for a 2nd use.

After having played 'The Pharaoh's Tomb' we found this one more fun (and you can quite easily find some creepy musics as background on youtube); and the main theme (an abandoned cabin) also seemed less 'artificial'.The various riddles are interesting but not really hard: it took my friend and I 50 minutes to fully solve the game without any clue - so if you're used to escape rooms you may not want to play this game with a large group, because you'd finish it really quick.Good thing is, you DON'T have to destroy any of the game material: one or two sheets of tracing paper will perfectly do the job ;)

We had great fun. 2 sixty year olds plus a 14 & 10 year old. It took us an hour and 50 minutes - but the time moved quickly. We all had input into solutions and we slowly took on roles as part of 'our team'. The game allows you some leeway with clues when you are stuck which we needed a couple of times.The instructions are fairly good but there were a couple of times when the wording was rather confusing - that lost the package one star.Would we do it again? You bet!!!!