Why should we book with you?

Our company has been hosting virtual team building events since 2017, and our games are designed by an MIT and Stanford educated neurobiologist. We’ve hosted over 800 virtual corporate team building events with companies all over the world, and our team of professional actors and facilitators are top notch. You’re looking for a trusted vendor to help your team have fun, relax and get to know each other better, and we can make sure that your group has a great time!

How does a virtual escape room work?

Instead of trying to escape from a room yourself, you work as a team of detectives to help your in-game host escape (or find cursed treasure, etc). The host has some clues with them in the room, and solving puzzles may also involve players calling a phone number, which leads to a website, which leads to an email, which leads to a Twitter….

With some of our games, participants also receive their own props, puzzles, and clues in the mail prior to the event.

Unlike a physical escape room, our games are scalable: we have over 100 trained actor/facilitators who can host teams of 5-10 players in breakout rooms. This means we can host up to 1000 people in the same game and still guarantee a quality customer experience.

What’s the difference between a team building game and a normal game?

When we host a virtual team-building game, we create a safe, playful sandbox where your team can feel comfortable exploring together, being silly, and stretching the ways they interact. Our trained actors/facilitators ensure that everyone has a fun experience without being pushed out of their comfort zone. The tone is light and fun, but our founder, an MIT- and Stanford-educated neurobiologist, always keeps the science of community-building and human connections in mind when creating games. The end result is a fun shared experience that helps create more effective teams, prevents employee burnout, and fosters team camaraderie.

Why should we pay this much for a remote event when we could just do a happy hour ourselves for free?

This is not your average unstructured virtual event where most people spend the whole time on mute and tuned-out. Our games are interactive and hosted by professional actors/facilitators trained in improv, facilitation, and “reading the zoom room.” Based on five years of research and hundreds of interviews and surveys of remote teams, we’ve designed these games with the neuroscience of connection, community, and play in mind. We tailor the experience to the needs of your team and make sure each event achieve’s the client’s objectives.

Do you send a cocktail kit for your Cocktail Party Murder Mystery?

Because of laws regarding shipping alcohol across state lines, we can’t send you a cocktail kit. We suggest having participants bring their own or using a third party. Our game is named the Cocktail Party Murder Mystery because it actually feels like a virtual cocktail party, where players are mingling, interrogating suspects and playing icebreaker games.

What makes a good puzzle?

Good puzzles stretch the imagination. They're innately collaborative, tricky but not impossible, and they give solvers a "hero moment." Our puzzles require multiple people to work together, and they use different parts of the brain. By incorporating a variety of puzzle types (creative insight, logic, visual, etc.) in our design, we make sure different types of people all have the opportunity to direct the game.

We also love puzzles that make you rethink the way you typically interact with your surroundings. (For instance, one of our bonus puzzles directs players to a password-protected website. They have to figure out that the clue for the password is in the website's URL.)

Our goal is to present challenges for players to overcome together as a team. We never want to trick or stump the players, which is why the game host plays a support role and can give players hints and cheer the group on as needed.

What do your actors/facilitators do in a virtual escape room?

Our actor/facilitators all have high emotional intelligence, and they make sure everyone has fun and feels supported in our games. Bouncing off the energy of the group, they give hints and clues to stuck teams, take notes on the group dynamics at play for a facilitated feedback session, and redirect groups that are completely off-track. Above all, they foster a safe environment that encourages everyone to be heard and come together.

Here at Patchwork, we’re really proud of our actor/facilitators. They have previous experience performing on the stage, TV, and the big screen. They have coaching certificates, DEI consulting experience, and have spoken as keynote speakers at large tech conferences. Several have won prestigious acting awards, and one was even nominated for an Emmy! They’re simply amazing!

What are past clients saying about your games?

“Excellent experience and the entire team had fun. Absolutely would recommend. Very creative strategy!” -Ron, Affirm

“Hosts did a great job staying in character and moving us along through the clues. Was a great change of pace from other Zoom calls.” -Neil, Equinix

“The detective crew was super fun! They were all great actors! It was super interactive.” -Noemi, Google

“Got the whole team involved and interacting! Definitely a fun way to spend an evening together when we can't actually be together.” -Matt, Tinder

“This was such a fun event! I love solving all the different clever puzzles and interacting with the actors! Murder mysteries are my favorite when I don't have to actually do any of the acting, only asking questions and solving puzzles, so this was the best!” -Meg, Twitter

“Really enjoyed Escape the Zoom! I got to problem solve and have some fun with Clover colleagues I'd never met, which is especially nice in the age of Covid. Thanks so much for putting this together!” -Lynda, Clover

“Thanks so much for today! We all had great fun. What a great break from the monotony of quarantine.” -Anna

“I had the BEST time with the game and the host was a RIOT!!! What an absolute rockstar he is at playing the crowd and humor and keeping the flow on track!!!” -Gwen

“It was an incredible experience! Brought all of the fun of an escape room and didn’t try to just do the same thing virtually. It is a brand new thing with puzzles and tricks designed with a virtual space in mind. Truly a great time!” -Brendan

“Amazing experience. I've done escape rooms that are really hard and this one was just hard enough to be really fun. Hosts were kind and funny!” -Jake, Outschool

“Nicely crafted, puzzles are easy to follow, great host too!” -RS, Atlassian