From the ConRecaps, Reports & Reviews

The Expanse Escape Room at San Diego Comic-Con 2017

By Miclpea

SYFY Channel brought The Expanse to San Diego Comic-Con 2017 in a big way. The principal actors from the show were there, as well as the showrunner and writers of the show. But they also brought a once in a lifetime opportunity to experience the excitement of being in space with The Expanse Escape Room.

SPOILER ALERT: If you plan to try The Escape Room at Fan Expo Canada or New York Comic Con, please be advised this article may have some details on the room and puzzles. 

The Escape Room was open to the public from Thursday, July 20th to Sunday, July 23rd. It was located across the street from the Convention Center in the lot between 2nd Avenue and J Street. The entrance to the Escape Room was on J Street but there was also a second entrance which led directly from the Blade Runner 2049 Experience. Inside the activation area, SYFY had exhibits of props from the television show in plastic cases.

Lines in the activation area led to the two entrances to the escape room. Here attendees were divided into two teams of 4-6 people and briefed on the scenario. They were told that they were operatives trying to recover a sample of the dangerous Protomolecule. Unfortunately for them, while they were trying to secure the sample, the derelict spaceship they were on suffered a total systems failure.

To safely escape the ship, the two teams had to separately use their wits and the safety instructions given to them by the ship’s computer to safely exit the ship. However, there was one problem: there was only enough air for one team to escape. The first team to escape lived, while the other team died. They had ten minutes to escape before the air would be depleted.

Inside a darkened room with only emergency lighting, the teams had to solve the first puzzle to get to the escape hatch. Several power couplings were detached and teams had to reconnect them. Fortunately, they were color coded but they did not know the code. Team one found the codes on the opposite wall and correctly reconnected the power codes. Next, teams had to enter a PIN on a keypad. The correct PIN, once entered, opened the door to the escape hatch. Team one entered the correct PIN and proceeded to the escape hatch.

In the escape hatch, team one had to enter a set of symbols in the correct order. Team one found the symbols with their numbers, which were scattered around the room. Once team one entered the symbols in the correct order on the touch screen, the escape hatch opened and they escaped. The winning team won an Expanse bag with the season two Blu-ray inside! Teams that did not survive were still given an Expanse bag with a fidget spinner inside.

The Escape Room was a lot of fun, but the winning team had to use their wits and work together to solve the puzzles. I found that the experience was amazing in how real and exciting it was. If you have a chance to take part in this or any experience involving The Expanse, please do it! You will not be disappointed. I can’t wait for season three of The Expanse!

Did you experience this offsite activation at SDCC? Click here to join the conversation on the FoCC forum.

Miclpea

I love going to conventions around the US and Canada. I'm an ardent fan of all things science fiction and especially The Expanse. I'm a senior writer for Friends of CC and I have co-written a science-fiction script called Punctuated Equilibrium.