In one of our between seasons Patreon exclusive episodes, Rich Bragg and Dan Egnor joined us to share some of the wilder experiences they had playing escape rooms in Beijing, China. 

If you want to hear more, become a Room Escape Artist patreon member at the $5 level or higher. Join now and support all of our work at patreon.com/roomescapeartist 

A few months ago, David was interviewed by Corey and Helena on the ESCAPUZZLED Podcast, a UK-based show that interviews folks from around the escape room world. 

They talked about Room Escape Artist, Reality Escape Pod, and covered a wide variety of topics. If you want to hear David pontificating, this is him at his most self-indulgent. 

If you'd like to hear more of Corey and Helena's work, check out their show.

In this clip, Lisa and David share their truly wild experience of visiting the outdoor escape rooms of Escape Woods.

Listen to the Whole Episode:

When you support Room Escape Artist on Patreon at $15 per month (or above), you get access to the Spoilers Club, our exclusive podcast where hosts David Spira and Peih-Gee Law chat in depth with creators about iconic escape rooms... spoilers and all!

Let's revisit most interesting, entertaining, and impactful moments from REPOD Season 8.

Can't wait for the next season REPOD? Don’t worry, Season 9 of the podcast will be back in the very near future. To pass the time until then, have a listen to some memorable clips our editor Steve Ewing selected from each episode of Season 8. And there's a bonus clip from the brand new show PG's Playhouse! It’s perfect for new listeners of this podcast or fans who want to relive their favorite moments.

This season we welcomed many talented escape room owners & designers: Fro creates memorable stories at Boxaroo, Jeroen built an incredible romp through real trains with Demise of the Gricers, and Curtis & Derek at Escape Ventures build amazing escape rooms at incredible speeds. Don’t miss Francine & Victor talking about what it feels like to finish an epic project. 

We also invited returning guest Elan Lee to discuss his new Netflix show based on Exploding Kittens and his Survivor party game. Game & puzzle creators Sandy Weisz, Oskar Van Deventer, and Brooke Breit came on to talk about the finer points of balancing challenge and fun. 

Performers David Kwong and Yannick Trapman-O’Brien reflected on the ups and downs of their careers and the personal philosophies that have come out of that. And in Episode 11, escape room super-enthusiast Sera Dodd brought us one of the most emotionally powerful episodes yet.

We end the look-back with a Connections-like game from our new podcast, PG’s Playhouse. 

Show Notes

Thank you to our sponsors Morty, Buzzshot, & COGS by Clockwork Dog: 

Morty is a free app for discovering, planning, tracking, and reviewing your escape rooms and other immersive social outings. 

Morty News:

Special Badge for REPOD listeners:

You can learn more at morty.app/REPOD to sign up and get a special badge for our listeners (works for existing users also).

Buzzshot is Escape Room Software, Powering Business Growth, Player Marketing, and improving the Customer Experience. They offer an assortment of pre and post game features including robust waiver management, branded team photos, and streamlined review management for Yelp, TripAdvisor, Google Reviews, and Morty. Buzzshot now has integration with the other REPOD sponsors: Morty and COGS.

Special Offer for REPOD Listeners:

REPOD listeners get an extended 21-day free trial plus 20% off your first 3 months, with no set-up fees or hidden charges. Visit buzzshot.com/repod to learn more about this exclusive offer.

COGS by Clockwork Dog is an easy to use software/ hardware platform for running interactive events, including escape rooms, and other immersive experiences. They have plug & play hardware that seamlessly integrates with their software so you can create a show with lighting and sound cues without having to write a single line of code. Map all kinds of inputs to outputs by building up simple logic steps which determine what you want to happen and when.

Special Offer for REPOD Listeners:

REPOD listeners can get the COGS Starter Set for only $130 + free shipping to the USA. This bundle is usually valued at $257. You can learn more and purchase your Starter Set at cogs.show. Use code REPOD at checkout.

Hosted by David Spira, Peih-Gee Law, & Steve Ewing

Produced by Theresa Piazza

Supported by Lisa Spira, Richard Burns, and Tommy Honton

Edited by Steve Ewing of Stand Inside Media 

Music by Ryan Elder

Logo by Janine Pracht

A few months ago, Lisa and David played Ghost Light at Myss Tic in Brooklyn, NY, with Eric Molinsky, host of the podast Imaginary Worlds. Eric has been a long time immersive theater and larp fan, but he had yet to be sold on escape rooms. They were convinced that he (like so many others!) just hadn’t had the opportunity to experience what great escape rooms have to offer - so they pitched him on doing an escape room episode. 

What he made was a beautiful exploration of the escape room world. We absolutely love the episode that he produced and want to make sure that our community is aware of it. 

REPOD Season 9 is currently in the works... we have some amazing episodes already lined up for you. More soon. 

We're sharing one of our many Patreon exclusive Bonus Shows. We put a lot of love and have a ton of fun continuing the conversation after each episodes. We also record many extra episodes in-between seasons. All of this is available exclusively to our Patrons at patreon.com/roomescapeartist. Curtis Ratliff and Derek Townsley join us for more discussion about The Escape Ventures. They share an absolutely outrageous escape room story that we couldn’t put on the main feed. We talk more about game stores and the importance of inclusivity. David gives an argument against longer games, and we also get into the regional differences between Orlando and Los Angeles in terms of escape room culture and design. I also end up learning all about Bucky's.

Thank you to our sponsors Morty, Buzzshot, & COGS by Clockwork Dog: 

Morty is a free app for discovering, planning, tracking, and reviewing your escape rooms and other immersive social outings. 

Morty News:

Special Badge for REPOD listeners:

You can learn more at morty.app/REPOD to sign up and get a special badge for our listeners (works for existing users also).

Buzzshot is Escape Room Software, Powering Business Growth, Player Marketing, and improving the Customer Experience. They offer an assortment of pre and post game features including robust waiver management, branded team photos, and streamlined review management for Yelp, TripAdvisor, Google Reviews, and Morty. Buzzshot now has integration with the other REPOD sponsors: Morty and COGS.

Special Offer for REPOD Listeners:

REPOD listeners get an extended 21-day free trial plus 20% off your first 3 months, with no set-up fees or hidden charges. Visit buzzshot.com/repod to learn more about this exclusive offer.

COGS by Clockwork Dog is an easy to use software/ hardware platform for running interactive events, including escape rooms, and other immersive experiences. They have plug & play hardware that seamlessly integrates with their software so you can create a show with lighting and sound cues without having to write a single line of code. Map all kinds of inputs to outputs by building up simple logic steps which determine what you want to happen and when.

Special Offer for REPOD Listeners:

REPOD listeners can get the COGS Starter Set for only $130 + free shipping to the USA. This bundle is usually valued at $257. You can learn more and purchase your Starter Set at cogs.show. Use code REPOD at checkout.

Hosted by David Spira & Peih-Gee Law

Produced by Theresa Piazza

Supported by Lisa Spira

Edited by Peih-Gee Law and David Spira

Music by Ryan Elder

Logo by Janine Pracht

 Terry Pettigrew Rolapp and Tommy Wallach of Hatch Escapes in Los Angeles, California joined us to talk about their overwhelmingly ambitious game, The Ladder. 

 In this clip, we talk about the genesis of The Ladder, and the design philosophy behind this game, exploring the nature of difficulty.

You can find the rest of this Spoilers Club episode by supporting us on Patreon at patreon.com/roomescapeartist

We're trying something new and doing a throwback episode. Season 1, Episode 4 was an early darling amongst REPOD listeners. Guests Anne and Chris Lukeman of CU Adventures were such delightful guests. 

Back then, neither David nor Peih-Gee had played their in person games (but they loved their digital and tabletop games). Since then, David has gone to Champaign-Urbana, and fell further in love with their work. 

With that in mind, Room Escape Artist is hosting Escape Immerse Explore: Time & Space 2025 (Chicago to Champaign-Urbana) in the spring of 2025.

Tickets are available now for Session 1 (Sunday, April 27th – Tuesday, April 29th 2025) and Session 2 (Tuesday, April 29th – Thursday, May 1st 2025). 

Get your ticket now, while supplies last.

Production Credits

This is the final preview for PG's Playhouse being released on the Reality Escape Pod feed. Please go subscribe to PG's Playhouse wherever you get your podcasts to listen to future episodes. 

What's a roadtrip without a visit to that Giant Ball of Twine or a glimpse of a giant Muffler Man? If the sign says "World Famous" anything, I'm pulling over for it. Our guests today are Anne & Chris Lukeman, owners of CU Adventures in Time and Space, an escape room company in Illinois. They love roadside attractions, and in fact, their escape room business was inspired by a road trip to House on the Rock. Our game today is about regional foods, where they've been replaced with words that rhyme. David then gives us a short history on roadside attractions, and I learn about the World Famous Muffler Men – an icon of the road trip era.

Full Show Notes

Hosted by Peih-Gee Law & David Spira

Puzzles by Peih-Gee Law

Produced by Theresa Piazza

Supported by Lisa Spira

Edited by Peih-Gee Law

Music by Matt Farthing

Logo by Theresa Wagner

If you enjoyed this episode, you can also hear more from Anne & Chris on Season 1, Episode 4 of Reality Escape Pod and consider joining the Escape Immerse Explore Time & Space Tour.

In between Reality Escape Pod Season 8 and 9 we are starting a brand new show. PG's Playhouse. 

Remember Y2K? The end-of-the-world that came and went without a hitch? Guest Tommy Honton joins us again to explore what really went down in this episode of PG's Playhouse. Our game today is called New Beginnings, where we take the names of old fads and transform them into something new by changing the first letter. David then walks us through a short history of Y2K, the fear mongering about a global shutdown and how the prevention plans went off without a hitch (mostly). Tommy also brought a game testing our knowledge of Greek metric prefixes.

If you enjoy the show, please subscribe on your podcast app of choice.

Hosted by Peih-Gee Law & David Spira

Puzzles by Peih-Gee Law

Produced by Theresa Piazza

Supported by Lisa Spira

Edited by Peih-Gee Law

Music by Matt Farthing

Logo by Theresa Wagner