Reality Escape Pod - Escape Rooms & Immersive Games
Your hosts David Spira & Peih-Gee Law explore immersive gaming from all angles. Our guests have made awesome stuff: ARGs, puzzle hunts, tabletop games, and of course, escape rooms. Our aim is to bring together different segments of the gaming world and share ideas between them.
Episodes
In fact, over the course of the interview, Eric often came back to the importance of finding your inspiration. His two most well-received games were both conceived when an inspiration "lit a fire inside (of him)." He also very candidly tells us about losing that inspiration while in the process of playtesting The Dome, and how he needed to step away to regain a fresh perspective. This worked, because David tells us that there was...
In keeping with the theme of Box Two, Neil Patrick Harris is back for his second appearance on our podcast. And not only that, he also brought a friend. Jonathan Bayme, CEO of theory11, is a longtime collaborator and Neil's bestie. They first met at a magic show Jonathan created for the Nomad Hotel in New York. Neil and Jonathan quickly bonded over a shared passion for elevating t...
"Congratulations and Condolences" is the default phrase when a team of puzzlers has just won the vaunted MIT Mystery Hunt. This is because according to tradition, the winning team must write next year's Mystery Hunt. This daunting task was recently undertaken by Death and Mayhem, the team that wrote the 2025 MIT Mystery Hunt titled "The Case of the Shadow Diamond." At the helm of this i...
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...
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 ...
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...
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.
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 ...
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 t...
Wizard's Treasure designer Grant Leucke joins us to take a deep dive into his design philosophies, he talks to us about how he built this game.
In this clip, we talk about the importance of testing and maintaining your games.
You can find the rest of this Spoilers Club episode by supporting us on Patreon at patreon.com/roomescapeartist
In between Reality Escape Pod Season 8 and 9 we are starting a brand new show. PG's Playhouse.
In the inaugural episode of PG's Playhouse, Peih-Gee Law and David Spira are joined by immersive creator Tommy Honton to explore the controversial topic of whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie. We kick off with a game called "Christmas-fied" where non-Christmas movies are transformed into Christmas-themed titles by adding festive song l...
This week, we're joined again by episode guest Victor and Francine from Sherlocked in the Netherlands. They tell us about the escape room they built for Hotel Zoku during the pandemic, and we also explore outdoor escape room style adventures, what to call them, and some logistics to consider when designing them.
We also talk about escape room tour logistics, especially when it comes to a potential Netherlands Tour. Finally, Victor ...
After 1,200 escape rooms, it certainly takes something remarkable to capture the #1 spot on David Spira’s list of favorite games. As he tells us in this episode, his favorite game shifts from moment to moment, but in this particular moment, that game is The Alchemist, created by Francine Boon & Victor van Doorn of Sherlocked Escape Rooms in Amsterdam.
David had...
In this Bonus Show, we're joined again by guest Sarah Dodd. We cover a whole range of escape room topics, including well-crafted small scale escape rooms, whether we should introduce more categorization in escape room awards, and we also talk about taxonomy and the jargon of escape rooms.
In this preview, we talk about designing for neurodivergent friendly escape rooms and the importance of accessibility options
When people find out I’ve played 400 escape rooms, they react with awe and wonder, to which my usual response is “That’s nothing—my podcast co-host David Spira has played over 1,200 escape rooms!” However, as it turns out, even David is not the final boss when it comes to the most escape rooms played.
Enter Sera Dodd, who alongside her partner Sharan Gill, is on...
Puzzle designer Sandy Weiss joins us again to talk all things puzzles. We dive more deeply into creating elegant puzzles that connect within their narrative context, and we talk about bringing puzzly games to various audiences. Sandy shares his perspective on Noms, or nicknames, at the National Puzzlers League, and we also talk a bit about his course curriculum and our shared love of Blood on the Clock Tower.
This clip is a bit of ...
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