Paradox Project (Athens, Greece)

  • Time: 180 minutes
  • Capacity 3-7 players
  • Theme: Mystery
  • Difficulty: Hard
  • Recommendation: Unmissable

Check position in our ranking and our detailed rating.

Date we played: May 2018 (4 players)

The famous 3-hours escape room of Athens

That’s right, 3 hours! And 120 m2 perfectly decorated.

In a country with a well developed escape room culture, a group of passionate players had the dream of building the beeeeest escape room. But… their budget was not enough for the super production we all have dreamed of. Then, how did they satisfy as much as possible their ambition?

To begin with, they decided that the story should be perfect. Complex, entertaining, and flawless. And they thought that, instead of adapting a story to their escape room, it would be better adapting their escape room to a story. Actually, one of the creators is a professional writer. And he wrote a novel. A real novel: with a beginning, a development, characters, rising action, surprises, and an end. When they had the story ready, they started to work… But making a team of escapers live a novel, with consistency and details, is not that easy. At the end, they had to limit the game to the first 23 pages of the novel. It seems it was a hard work to fit them in 3 hours… but they did it with success. In addition, instead of avoiding some elements that seemed to be difficult to integrate into the game, they appear as Easter eggs. Don’t worry if you don’t notice them during the game: the game master will be pleased to point them out after you play. Actually, it’s a bit sad that the game covers only a part of the novel… until you find out that they created Paradox Project 2: The Bookstore!

You will find classic puzzles and modern puzzles. It is a high difficulty game. When we played, it had been open for almost 2 years: they told us that no team had completed the game without hints up to then. The hint system is well integrated, so we never felt it took us out of the game. Furthermore, despite we needed hints in several occasions, we never got frustrated by the puzzles.

The game masters are especially nice. They are glad to offer recommendations, not only about other escape rooms to play but about Greece in general. Either you use their suggestions or not, such attitude is really appreciated.

“Hey… in 3 hours… wouldn’t our excretory system feel the need of being relieved?”. The game takes place in a whole mansion, the whooole for you. And the mansion has a WC. So don’t worry about that.

“But playing 3 hours non-stop… wouldn’t it be too much?”. Don’t worry, they also thought about that!

It is an escape room with text, not excessive, but we recommend at least a member of the team with a good level of English (or Greek).

Located in a good area where to eat or drink something before or after the game. A mandatory visit if you pass by Athens!