‘SLEUTHS & SECRETS’ PUTS HMNS IN ESCAPE-ROOM GAME
HMNS HOSTS THE INTERACTIVE “SLEUTHS & SECRETS.”
I covered the “Cabinet of Curiosities” exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science when it opened, and I thought it was nice. That’s about it. It was a nice thing to do at the museum that was included with the price of a regular ticket, but it wasn’t as macabre and wonderful as a trip to Wilde Collection in the Heights. The only thing that really stood out was the sheer decadent experience of being allowed to touch things at the HMNS, which usually frowns upon that sort of thing.
Its new series, “Sleuths & Secrets,” amps that experience all the way to 11.
The setup is pretty simple. On one night every few weeks (the next time is July 31), the “Cabinet of Curiosities” is roped off for a small group to participate in “Sleuths & Secrets.” Inside the area, an ancient tablet has been hidden by a Victorian gentleman who has presumably gone mad from mercury poisoning and an overdose of imperialism. As a team, you have to scour the room for clues to unlock a fiendish set of puzzles hidden throughout various parts of the exhibit.
Yes, it sounds like an escape room but minus the claustrophobia. The whole thing is fiendish to play. It was expertly designed by Nicole Temple, who is also curator of the morbidly whimsical “Death by Natural Causes” exhibit. Temple definitely has a talent for stringing people along.
The experience immediately reminded me of a video game, something like “The ABC Murders” with its puzzle boxes or the 2014 “Thief” with its hidden panels and penchant for gruesomely beautiful trophies. In fact, as I played, I found myself moving my hands along picture frames and locks exactly as Garret does in “Thief.” For that feeling alone, the trip was amazing.
It’s very much a group activity. The organizer told us after we solved the room with literally seconds to spare that children tended to do better than adults because they are less reticent to work together. According to her, adults instinctively hoard found items, seeking to conquer the room alone, whereas children collaborate faster. It was hard to argue with her, as nothing much was accomplished until we started opening up and digesting the information as a collective.
“Sleuths & Secrets” is at first a scavenger hunt. There are various objects hidden in the room that you have to find. Half of them give clues to finding the other half. You can also discover coins that can be used to buy hints from the organizers, though they tend to be as cryptically unhelpful as most video-game NPCs. Without spoiling anything much, I found one such coin in an animal’s mouth, and I swear I heard a victory fanfare in my head as I did.
Once things got going, it was all about keys. If you read any Victorian crime literature, you’ll know they were obsessed with keys above almost anything else. Keys are the ultimate found item in the game, but they are still just a part of the puzzle. Even the locks themselves are backwards and counterintuitive, and there are numerous red herrings. One of them is an actual red herring, which led to the largest collective groan I have ever heard in real life.
Some puzzles can be forced through observation of the mechanisms, and some require fine deduction of numbers and symbols. I was lucky that I found myself tag-teaming with a pair of women who were far better at deducing number patterns than I was, where I had the better eye for matching up archaic symbols. That got us the final key just before the bell.
It is definitely a new way to experience the museum. At $40 ($30 for members), it is rather expensive for a 90-minute way to pass the time, but it did add a whole new level of respect and awe for the microcosms of adventure that the museum tends to create. It was truly unforgettable, and if you have a detective’s eye you might be able to conquer it, too.