Breakin’ Escape Rooms: Heist Plan

Breakin’s heist-themed escape room has you and your gang getting ready to carry out an audacious bank-robbing tour of New York City. Did we have the drive to pull it off?

Breakin’ Escape Rooms

• Location:  Highbury (nearest tube Highbury and Islington)
• Players: 3-6
• We played: November 2019 as a team of 3

Great things about Heist Plan

• While this room, being limited in space and technology, might not have all the high-octane thrills of actually zooming around New York City on a bank-robbing spree, it does interpret all the stages of getting ready to carry out a heist and transfer them to puzzle form in a fairly clever way.
• The props, machinery and decor in Heist Plan are all appropriate and on-theme. We’ve seen heist-themed games before (like this one in Amsterdam and this one in Brighton), but not one with this particular Fast & Furious angle, which might have special appeal to fans of the naughty-driving franchise or of fast cars in general. Large-scale, mechanical puzzles not only suit the room’s premise but are also (usually) fun to manoeuvre.
• The best puzzles featured in this room demand cooperation between at least two players, and are even better with more on hand to advise and guide.

On the other hand…

• Although a couple of Heist Plan‘s tasks elicit cooperation, most can be solved by one player alone, and overall there is not enough to do here to entertain more than two or three players.
• One part of the game, while not broken, did not work smoothly and for a while we weren’t sure if we were on the right track (we were) – there’s no feedback to indicate whether you’re close to success.
• Heist Plan uses a system of pre-programmed hints, which we don’t find as useful (or as fun) as the specific guidance of an attentive game host.
• The end of the game made sense in terms of narrative, but was somewhat anti-climactic. The last task could have been more dynamic, and could be made to include the whole team, to combat this.

Who should try this room?

Those who want to feel like they’re starring in The Fast and the Furious 17 (or whatever they’re on now) should play this room. It’s suitable for beginners, but not ideal for teams of more than 3. 

Rating – 6/10