Red Door Escape Room

We had a great time at Red Door in San Mateo. The puzzles were actually satisfying to solve because they didn't feel impossible, but they were definitely challenging enough to keep us thinking the whole time. A huge thank you to Stevie for being such an awesome Game Lead. They really made the experience for us by keeping the energy high and knowing exactly when to jump in with a helpful nudge. We will definitely be back to try the other rooms soon.

I genuinely had such a wonderful time here! My boyfriend and I drove from San Jose and I’d say it was totally worth the drive. We did “The Gift” and “Fair Game.” Both of the escape rooms were nicely decorated, the puzzles were perfectly challenging, and overall they both were a lot of fun. Our experience was definitely enhanced by Jillian and Ivan. Both of them were super sweet and cool to talk to. They were super eager to answer our questions and we ended up having really nice conversation. Will definitely be coming back to finish the rest of the rooms.

We purchased the birthday package for the Confinement room. Jillian hosted my group and she was thorough with the rules and kept all the kids engaged during the introduction. We were fortunate to escape and will be returning for future episodes. Overall, the immersive rooms, fun puzzles, and friendly staff made it a memorable experience.

I’ve been to this escape room so many times with my partner and friends but this was the first time with my siblings and mom! It’s truly great for all ages!! My 2 year old niece had fun playing the room Fair Game! And we escaped with one minute left! Our game master was Jillian and she was super enthusiastic and helpful throughout our game. Thank you Bishop for letting us play despite having us walk in! Would do this again!!

Olga was super nice and helpful! We had a birthday party with 7 kids. Everyone had a lot of fun. We did a 8/10 escape room. Although we didn’t make it out on time, we got really close, only three steps away from getting out. Next time we will use the hint quicker. Will come back again!

Fun experience with the crew! Olga was amazing and did not doubt us! Lol we made it out just in time! Definitely recommend for a fun time with friends or family!

TJ was a great game master! We had a lot of fun and he helped us with some great clues that didn’t give too much away. Would definitely come back

Bishop was fantastic helping make my daughter's 13 BDay so special and fun! He let them have unlimited hints which they took full advantage of and they were able to escape at the last moment. I highly recommend this escape room and Bishop!

First time at Red Door and was excited to try their escape rooms! My friends and I try to do at least one escape room every month or two. For our first game we chose Prison Break and because we were celebrating a birthday they allowed us a free hint! Love that there area options when it comes to hint giving such as classic mode which is standard, nudge that helps you along if it looks like you need it or the difficult mode that puts you on the leaderboard but only 3 hints. The gameplay for Prison Break was pretty fun, love the multiple rooms and the attention to detail. Everything flowed well and nothing about the room was too confusing or out of place once we figured the puzzles out. Keys and items found in the rooms worked without issue and the aesthetic was pretty on theme and felt sturdy. I liked that you could see the timer on the screen as well as hint descriptions instead of them being walkied to you. My party was able to escape with time to spare, we did use some hints but were pretty much on the dot with most of them and needed to really use our tools to the best of our ability, better luck next time! The game master and staff was informative and made the experience fun and were very helpful. I think it's neat that most of the rooms have characters and connecting lore according to the game master which makes me want to try the other rooms out! Def will be back whenever we are in the area.

Came here with a group of 5! Each of us had some prior experience with escape rooms and we wanted a challenge so we chose "Confinement." We didn't finish it and probably still had about 3-4 more locks to break before reaching the end. We asked for a couple hints throughout the game and did the trick or treat version so it was fun to get candy. I personally prefer the creative challenges over a room with like 4 locks that you need to put numbers in and would've preferred a bit more continuity of the rooms and the storyline. It wasn't clear how the storyline really impacted the room itself. Maybe I'm salty that we didn't finish the room so I'm rounding up my 3.5 to 4 stars. I'd be interested to check out the other rooms and give this spot another try!

It took a while but we have finally attempted every 60-minute escape room at the San Mateo location for Red Door. We decided to skip the 30 minute one. We booked the rooms in the order of the listed difficulty: Once Upon a Time, Prison Break, Fair Game, The Gift, Confinement. What we wish we knew that sometimes the game master forgot to tell us: -There are unlimited hints if you don't care about trying to make the leaderboard (limit 3 clues, +1 clue if you guessed the answer to the riddle of the day). -Once you open the door to a room, you can wave at the black button with a hand sign inside another room that has a door connected to the room you already escaped from so you don't have to run back and forth. -Double tap the top of the directional lock to reset it. The Games: I played the first 4 games with my bf with just 2 of us, we have only done 2 escape rooms before in groups of 4 and we struggled a lot with Once Upon a Time. It was a long one with a lot of puzzles and we did not escape. I recommend to do this one somewhere in the middle of the other rooms. I actually recommend doing Prison Break first, it flows a lot better and we were able to escape that one with 18 minutes left with several hints. We proceeded to escape the next two. For confinement, we played with 5 people and we did not escape. Maybe 93% of the way there according to the game master. He said only 12% are able to escape Confinement, it is their hardest room. Confinement was probably our least favorite room, followed by Once Upon a Time. The Staff: 5/5 overall for our game masters, we enjoyed that the staff were enthusiastic about our successes but also are our hype men even when we don't escape, telling us our close we are. They're patient to explain the puzzles after and answer any of our questions about the room.

We came here for Halloween and it was so much fun! I love how they late they open and the staff were also very nice. I recommend checking this place out if you're just getting started for escape rooms - it's a great place to have fun with friends.

Service: 5/5 Breakout rooms: 4/5 The staff at Red Door are very kind. I've done 4 escape rooms at this location. Honestly most of them were pretty hard. A lot of the rooms are very well decorated. I truly enjoy my time here. I think some levels could benefit from a better balance between locks and puzzles. I've been in a room where it was 90% locks. We had to unlock 10+ locks in a room. I'd prefer to spend more time solving creative challenges and brain teasers, rather than just dealing with locks.

A great time! I bought tickets online a day prior- Because of our availability, CAPTAIN MANIACAL had the time slot we wanted Its a 30 minute room which clearly states on the website Mind you, this was our very first escape room ever and had an amazing experience All of the staff were super informational and friendly At the end when we finished, Lauren came in and took photos for us She also answered any questions that we had and provided us information on the 20% off if we schedule for another escape experience or purchased a gift card (which we did!) Can't wait to come back and try their other rooms! They have other locations as well so I will look into that **

Awww really fun time at Red Door! Great staff, really accommodating, and super fun. Our game master Stevie was really knowledgeable and helpful. He answered all of our questions and was awesome. We had so much fun we booked for another date.

Updating review! Adding a star for a much better experience this time around, mostly due to our fantastic game master - he was engaging and explained everything well! We almost beat the gift room- I enjoyed the creativity of this room, would return to do the other puzzles - which I found out are connected in story!

Ok I'll admit it, I had a lot more fun than I expected to have being that I was going for a work event and potentially had to be locked in a room trying to escape with coworkers from some crazy clown room or something like that. We went with a large group (40ish people) that they handled in two different time slots ~ so that was kinda a bummer but ended up working out being that the facility is only so large, it accommodated about 20 of us per session and we took up all the rooms... which allowed us to sign up for what room we wanted (pending space per room). I along with others were a bit apprehensive about getting stuck in a room with clowns & coworkers (who we may or may not have "liked") so was excited to sign up for the easiest fairytale room just to try and get through it! I got super lucky with the group I was with and the room which made all the difference! Since we didn't make it out before the time was up, We ended up asking what we missed for future reference and it ended up that we would have needed another 10-15 minutes to escape since we kinda lagged in the first bit due to some miscommunication on instructions. Although we didn't escape (only one team out of everyone escaped) we had fun doing it and it was definitely a team building experience. *pro tip: do the online waiver before you come in especially with a large group so it doesn't hold up the intake process! They had some lockers (not enough for everyone so we kinda shared by the team) to leave your stuff in so you could be hands free. Note you cannot use your phones inside while playing. I hadn't been to this mall in forever and it's changed so much so I had no clue where this place was located & ended up parking on the ground floor and having to walk up and find it, but was easy enough. At least I didn't park on the complete opposite side! Parking was easy both on the ground floor and top floor (closest). Also a plus that it's close to a bar for once you get out lol

Came here to do an escape room with my colleagues at work and overall loved the experience. [[ Location ]] I think this place is really well located since it's inside the Hillsdale Mall. The location is also near the open plaza and food court so it's a nice view on the 2nd floor looking down while you wait for your game to start. It's also pretty close to the parking lot so you can directly walk from the parking lot onto the 2nd floor location if you want to. Since it's my first time here, I actually went through the mall and went up the food hall escalator to get there. [[ Experience ]] Overall things went well but I did not really enjoy the check-in procedure for large groups. Before we went, we signed an online waiver for liability purposes which is fine. However, when you check-in again, they make you physically write your name down on a piece of paper and then check that you signed the waiver one-by-one. For our group of 22+ people, I think this took over 15-20 minutes which I thought was pretty crazy. Other than that, the actual venue is quite nice/clean and the game we tried (Once Upon a Time) I thought was really fun. Since I'm a "noob" compared to seasoned veterans of escape rooms I thought it was pretty difficult even though this is the easiest game they had there but the game master was great and having 3 hints is helpful. [[ Overall ]] If you haven't ever done an escape room, I definitely coming here for a first experience. Great one to start with!

This is specifically for the room CAPTAIN MANIACAL. While booking the only available room at the time, i wasnt aware it was only a 30 minute escape room. The puzzles were too easy and didnt require much thought. Finished the room in less than 10 minute. Did not feel that this room was worth the price paid. It felt like it should have been provided for free and as a training room to explain how an escape room works. You can guess the answers and by the way the room is set up, youll get it right. This is the first escape room in my life that ive done that was this short. Not because im really good at it, there was nothing to it. Difficult states 6/10. But really, its like 1/10. The puzzle was as difficult as those baby toys that ask you to put a certain shape into the box. There was no challenge. There was no excitement. If i could ask for a refund, i would. Avoid this money grab of a room.

The Red Door Escape Room was so much fun. This was my second escape room and I loved this experience. I went for my birthday and they gave me an additional hint for my bday. We did the Prison Break room with 5 people. It was very fun and our game master Alejandro was very nice/helpful. There is no phones allowed or open drinks so don't get coffee/drinks before you go because you will have to leave it in the lockers. It was nice they have lockers for jackets/purses/etc and they are free. We are already planning our second game!

We did the 30 mins room and it was supposed to be 6/10 difficulty, which actually felt like 1/10. Doesn't feel like it was worth the money. Front desk told us to wait for them but never came back to check on us. The staff were quite rude, the lady at the front desk appeared very inpatient when we were checking in. I had an unconventional name and she made it seem like it was my fault that my name wasn't easier to spell.... Ehh not going again.

Came here with a group of 7 for my birthday. It was a lot of fun! We did Fair Game, ended up using all 5 hints and escaped with just 2min to spare. The staff even wrote me a birthday card which was very sweet. Would recommend the birthday package to anyone looking for a fun way to celebrate!

The best hosts and game masters ever! The room was thrilling and we had a great and scary time. We escaped confinement and it was well worth repeating a second time to try again because the first time we didn't make it. I highly recommend getting the 20% discount on a future game!

Super fun. I highly recommend. We can for a team outing and I'm dying to try the other rooms!!!

just did an escape room tuesday night & i really enjoyed it! the game master priscilla & the front desk worker were v friendly when we arrived! priscilla was v helpful throughout the game giving us nudges & hints & letting us know to try again if a part of the room didn't work. she answered all our questions afterwards & she was so enthusiastic the whole time, i hope to get her as a game master again the next time we go! we enjoyed our first experience w/ the other game master last year as well when we did confinement!

We had a great time trying to escape the prison break room. We love doing escape rooms and trying different spots when we travel. We decided to do a mini vacation this weekend and decided to try red door. This one was pretty difficult. Kind of wish we'd had a few more people with us. But the game host said we were actually very close to the escaping. Would definitely visit again if we lived closer. They also have a set of rooms that are all part of an episode story line. That would have been fun too if we were able to come to this location more regularly.

After spending hours trying to figure out where to go on a date in San Mateo, I stumbled upon Red Door Escape Room, and thought it would be a fun way to test our wits. So, after booking a room and signing our waivers, we headed in. A bit ambitious, we ended up booking the hardest room they offered, with essentially no escape room knowledge. Shortly after meeting our game master, Gabby, we headed into our room "Confinement". This thriller theme was fantastic and with its surprise twists and turns we ended up burning through the time not being able to escape in the hour we were given. The puzzles and clues were super creative and though we needed a lot of hints, we were able to make it pretty far in the game. With a larger party this game would be much more possible, but the jumps of logic and reasoning clearly require a lot of experience in escaping. Regardless, it was such a fun time and our game master was super helpful. The jump scares were pretty frightening though.

Fun place for a friends meetup. Good groups 3-8 but would not go over that. Our group of 4 did Prison Break but were not able to escape. You really have to be on point with communication in this room and work through the clues. Luckily they have one use clue policy or we wouldn't have had a chance. Lots of padlocks and hidden combos. Minus one star cause we paid $185 but we all felt it was a little overpriced for a one hour game.

2.5 stars We did the Prison Break scenario. 5 people. I've done about a dozen now and this room was lackluster. It's not very memorable due to unimaginative puzzles. There were no moments where you'll go: 'whoa! So cool'. It's a shame. There is usually at least one puzzle or mechanism that makes a puzzle room stand out, but not this one. Production value of the room is pretty bare bones too. With a prison cell theme, you can get away with low budget decor. As far as difficulty, I would rate this a 3/10. We went through it under 25min. We only needed one clue where you had to assemble this serpent. Turns out there are multiple ways that thing could be assembled without rhyme nor pattern. You just had to get lucky in assembling it right ...eventually. If this is your first Escape Room, it's decent and a good start for beginners. But if you're a seasoned vet like me, $45/person is way too high of an asking price for what it's offering. This is the second scenario I've done with this company and the experience is still 'meh'. I'll be avoiding any future rooms from them until I get a testimonial from a real Escapist.

Ive gone twice now, and both times have been fun & challenging! The last experience from today was fun, however, in the middle of our game a female worker in a mask came in to tell us to stop "banging on everything" my son was checking to see if the compartments in the room were hollow or not as we needed one more piece to finish. I respect the rules, but are you also interrupting other players telling them to stop screaming and making noise? It felt really rude and she also took up time on the clock.

Horrible escape room experience. Nobody was watching us in the escape rooms. We hit so many technical glitches and the host was not there to guide us. When the game ended there was a completely different host than the pne we started the game with. Not sure if this was a one off major quality issue but I would never recommend this place to anyone.

If you are looking for a rainy day activity, Red Door Escape Room is a good choice. We did the Once Upon a Time, which supposedly has the easiest puzzles. The puzzles were not difficult, but they were also unnecessarily long-winded (1 star off). Without spoiling the actual puzzles themselves, I will just say that it is like trying to go through a nonsensical multi-step process where unrelated things are forced to be relevant in order to solve a puzzle...just to get to another unrelated puzzle. There is no way anyone can solve all the puzzles without clues (because a normal person would never associate the unrelated things together), so my advice is to ask for as many clues/directions as you can early in the game. *ahem* Gentlemen, my last comment was for you. :) Actually, if you don't ask for clues/directions, the game master will feed you clues anyway at the end, but why would you want to struggle longer than you have to?

We did the Gift as a group of 6 on a Sunday afternoon~ We arrived on time and they were quick to bring us in. The game was decent and I was hoping for there to be more rooms and more complexity in the room. It was as challenging as I would have hoped and we got through pretty quickly. My main gripe is that the few times we asked for clues, they would give us clues for things that we had already solved. Anywho, we can notably say we escaped the room in 45 minutes and we used no clues!

My friend group of eight completed "The Gift: Christmas". In comparison to other escape rooms, I felt as though this room lacked alot of story building and flow. The mechanics of the room were very finnicky so parts of the puzzle would not work even if we completed them correctly. The staff was not very attentive during our time there. The rooms were not set up correctly and we entered a room we were not able to access yet. They did not come for over ten minutes to correct the mistake. Throughout the time, we requested clues and they did not provide ones that pertained to the puzzles we were working on. We would have to repeatedly press the clue buttons several times to receive clues as well. Since this room is seasonal, maybe guests will have better luck with their other more well developed rooms!

Once upon a Time, a group of seven of us decided to work overtime. It's exciting for us to get together to play a game in the nighttime. Why not play this game at the Red Door escape room while, we are still all in our prime? Book in advance because sometimes, there's really not much time. They open the doors at our scheduled appointment so much sure you arrive right on the dime. Sophie was our Game Master for the our "Once Upon a Time" theme. You are given a clue button for you to have the opportunity for 3 clues for you and your team. The Once Upon a Time was like a fairytale theme, so if you are a Disney fan, you might feel you are in a dream. As you try to solve your way through this theme, be careful what you touch because you might scream. There will be surprises here and there so make sure you pay attention and use that flashlight because you'll need that light beam. Remember to get from room to room, you must work together as a team. Even if you don't succeed, don't lose your self-esteem. How did we get out? That's for you to find out ! This place is surely fun, and that's without a doubt! Maybe next time we'll try to find out what "Confinement" is all about.

We did Fair Game with 8 people. The good things: the staff is friendly and enthusiastic. The room had some interesting and unique puzzles. There's also a water fountain/water refilling station. We arrived on time and when our game master was about to let us into the room, she immediately backed out and said the room wasn't reset at all! She hustled to get a couple teammates to fix the problem. We only had to wait maybe 5 minutes. I get that it happens, and I was actually impressed at how quickly they fixed everything. However, as I'm looking at other reviews, this seems to be a recurring problem -- and we are lucky that our game master realized before any of us went into the room. The lighting in the rooms was pretty awful for reading some clues and opening some locks. Darkness doesn't add anything to the theme or the puzzles and it was very frustrating to have to struggle with that for no reason. I think the room was pretty linear. There was one particularly frustrating puzzle that only needed 2 people, and everyone else could only stand around and wait. We even asked for a hint at this point just to see if there was something else we could do...there was not. I also hope they can oil the mechanisms because the squeaking noises were pretty unpleasant. I wouldn't mind trying another room here, but it wouldn't necessarily be my first choice.

Red Door is a great family experience. The staff is always friendly and helpful. The rooms are well kept and clean. We have completed almost all of them.

I want to love this place... But fool me twice, shame on me. I originally went to Red Door Escape Room in Concord and had a GREAT experience there. Thinking that the chain is the same at each location and this San Mateo location is more convenient for my friends and I - I booked two game rooms here on separate occasions. The first game room I did was back in March. We did the Gift Shop. Upon arriving, they were super busy and short staffed. However, the staff members were super unprofessional, eating chips while checking people in and out at the front desk. Something about it calls for unsanitary to me. We looked past that and was just excited about the game itself. The game master was super friendly, however when we played the Gift Shop there were more than one instances of technical difficulties. While we were in there, a few members would enter to "reset" the elements since they didn't properly do it prior to our scheduled time. That really upset me because it ruined the vibe and made us feel like time were lost since each escape room was only limited to 1.5hrs. Since we escaped, I wrote this off as a one time thing. I came back here in June to do The Confinement game room and have decided that this location is just awful. Without spoiling it, the clues and puzzles to solve is extremely unnecessary/long winded or just doesn't make sense with the theme. There was a part of a room with a lock on it that looked like it wasn't apart of the game but ended up being a part of the game. There were also multiple locks in one room with no clear indication of what clues went with each lock. And spoilers alert -- there is a completely dark room session that required two to three people to solve one puzzle at a time since you would need to carry a flashlight around. I think that the minimum players for this game needs to be increased from 3 to 5, or the time to escape needs to be increased from 1.5hrs to 2hrs. So 1 star is taken off for poorly thought out game rooms with multiple technical difficulties. An additional star is taken off for fair customer service. The game masters were friendly, but no one there was really attentive. We had to ask multiple times for someone to take our photos at the end of our visit... Last but not least, an additional star is taken off for the price alone. If you're going as a group of 3-4 people, it's roughly about $45 per person. Which, I think is quite hefty, especially for the generic game rooms offered. This location gets only two stars from me for being in a convenient location. and being easily accessible within the Hillsdale Shopping Plaza with ample parking.

We just happen to have an escape room located in Albuquerque NM on San Mateo St. After I inadvertently booked our party for the one in San Mateo CA, I immediately (within 5 minutes) called the manager/owner who said the best they could do is give me a credit. Like I'm going to fly to California to redeem the credit. Rude and crappy business practice.

Tried my first escape room here and now have been to here a few times. It's a lot of fun and great for office team outings. There's different levels of challenges and they're all really interesting - apparently they all tie together to form some story. They do ask you fill out an online waiver before entering the room and it can be filled out as early as you book. There's free lockers provided to store your belongings. There's a short briefing on the room you selected and then you're put in the cage to fend for yourself. The game master provides up to 3 hints with a bonus 4th hint if you solve the riddle when checking in. Mini games (30 minutes) are also offered. At the end, you get a discount on your next game there as well. For first timers I'd recommend the Prison Break room. For an impossible challenge, go for confinement!

This escape room was great! Stevie and Bishop were awesome in getting my party situated and informed on how to play. Definitely coming back!

Came back for my 4th visit to Red Door with my husband and friends visiting from Switzerland for "The Gift." Our game master was Diane (I hope I got her name right!) We had a BLAST. Without giving any spoilers to the game, it was challenging, but there were enough parallel puzzles so that everyone had something to work on. With four people with some (but not much) prior escape room experience, we were just barely able to escape the game. There was no way we could have done it without Diane's help. She was VERY fast to respond when we asked for clues. The game went smoothly, except when a party member had trouble using a combination lock. He had the correct combo but did not use the lock properly. Thinking it was a bust, we lost some time there. I highly recommend that prospective escape room players make sure they know how to use a combo lock, or have someone else try the lock after an unsuccessful attempt just in case! "The Gift" is a very well made escape room. We got sucked in to the experience and the theme/décor/setting looked the part. Even the intro video was made with care to get you into the story! "The Gift" is challenging, but rewarding. Try it after you've had a few escape rooms under your belt with other experienced players. So to recap, "Captain Maniacal's Lair-bratorium" is a good intro to escape rooms. It's smaller, with fewer puzzles, and you have a shorter time limit to solve the room as well. My husband and I were able to solve this one with time to spare. I would say this one is good for younger participants. "Fair Game" has a carnival setting and looks very cool! The puzzles are not too difficult, but unless you have at least one veteran escape room player in your group, I would not recommend it for beginners unless you have a larger group 4+.

My friends and I did The Gift. We had so much fun looking for clues and solving the puzzles. The clues were on the tv screen, and we had to press the button if we needed clues. Our gamemaster was accommodating. The front staff was also welcoming. The vibe of the place was just to have fun. The room was challenging and well put. It required everyone to contribute by looking for clues or solving a puzzle. All of us were busy doing something, which was a first. We were stuck in one of the clues for a long time because we read it wrong several times. But the game master was great at assisting us, so we eventually got it right. We managed to escape with several minutes left. The room was immersive and exciting. Everyone in our group had an awesome night. I highly recommend this place for escape room enthusiasts or even if you're a beginner like us. We will visit again and try their other rooms.

2021 was the year escape rooms became a thing for me. Go figure ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ After discovering Red Door Escape Room at the Veranda in Concord, I found out about their newest location at the Hillsdale Mall. With it being their latest location in the Bay Area, I was hoping they would have different themed rooms (no duplicates) from Concord, however, it wasn't really the case. This location has 3 of the same themed rooms (Fair Game, Once Upon a Time, Prison Break), 1 sequel (The Gift to Warrior's Way), 1 mini game (Captain Maniacal's Lair-Bratorium), and 1 challenging one (Confinement). After speaking with the staff, there are some slight differences between the two locations with the same themed rooms like different puzzles and some decor design. For example, Fair Game looks like it has a lot of fun colors (black light) experience at this location compared to Concord. We might do the other rooms just for kicks :) On a random weeknight, my fiancé and I spontaneously ventured over to check this place out. When we walked in, we met the front desk guy (forgot his name!) and he was pretty chill. He gave us a break down of the place, the rooms, and was able to answer our questions that we had. We decided to start with The Gift escape room. This room had some really unique puzzles in it, definitely some we've not come across after doing over 20+ escape rooms. We got stuck on the last puzzle (it was a good one!) and didn't make it out in time :( but it's forever got a spot in our hearts as being one of the more fun rooms we've tackled! What I like about Red Door and this location is the production value, the rooms aren't worn down (yet - lol), there are several "trigger" effects with the puzzles you complete as opposed to a bunch of lock & key puzzles, and the staff is just great all around. They're friendly but the ones we met the first time provided the best experience (if I could only remember their names...). Now each Game Master is different. We've had at least 5 different ones for the 3 rooms we've done here. What took away from the experience was starting with one Game Master and then finding out at the end we have someone new. The only time we had the same Game Master was for The Gift and he definitely didn't give us any nudges, which seemed kind of refreshing. Keep in mind you can let your Game Master know if you would like nudges or not for your game. Most recently we completed the Confinement room. It's a bit of a depressing story room but it has its challenging puzzles in it. This room is the only room with some loud sounds that could give you a jump scare from time to time - you can advise the Game Master if you would like them or not. This was a fun element to it, especially seeing your friends jump! Keep in mind - there are no live actors in the room with you. I liked this room but felt a couple of the puzzles could have been more straightforward because there are moments where you could lose a lot of time due to the placement of things. Also one of the puzzles wasn't reset so that took off several minutes of our time. Fun facts - After completing a room, you could book another escape room with a 20% discount. This only applies to booking on the spot. Also, if you solve the riddle up front in the reception area, you can earn yourself an extra clue! I'm giving this 5 stars - overall had a great experience here and would definitely recommend families and friends to visit for a fun activity to do together! Have fun!

My fiancée really like Red Door Escape Room. We started getting hooked on escape rooms last year and have done a total of 35 escape rooms now. We started out at Red Door in Concord, and did every room there except Prison Break. We came here to try out the rooms that Concord didn't have (The Gift, Confinement, and Captain Maniacal's Lairbratorium) San Mateo is a newer location and has slightly better production and aesthetics because the inventors had more time to refine the game. I like Red Door because their set design is great, they have decent sound design (pay attention in your rooms; it could be a clue), and especially love their triggers when you solves puzzles. It's not your old school lockbox escape rooms. You get a genuine modern escape room experience here. The puzzles are challenging at times, but it feels so great once you solve them. The Gift was my favorite room. You really feel like you're in the streets, then inside an antique gift shop. The design elements are absolutely wonderful!! My fiancée and I played this room by ourselves, we got to the final puzzle and time ran out. It sucked to not pass, but it was okay because we were so mesmerized by the room. (still sucked not passing though LOL) I'd really recommend any escape room enthusiast like myself or anyone at the Hillsdale Mall looking to kill some time check out Red Door. Tip: There's riddle out front in the lobby. If you can solve the riddle, you'll get an extra free hint for your escape room! They rotate out the riddles every week. You could just come in check out the riddle if you don't want to do an escape room. Pro Tip: Red Door usually offers 20% off your next booking after you complete a room. I suggest doing their mini-escape room, "Captain Maniacials Lair-batorium" then booking another full room. It's about $20 for the mini-game and $41 for the full games. So if you play the $20 mini game, you can save 20% off the full game afterwards if you really want to try their other rooms. The mini game is 20min long compared to the usual 1 hour long full games.

3.75 stars Hillsdale Mall adds another way to burn time with this Escape Room! Our escape artist (or...worker? lol) was Nick and since it was a small group of 2, we decided to do "Captain Maniacials Lair-batorium". We were shown the safety and background videos in a hallway (which was kind of distracting) and then we were shown into our new home for the next 60 minutes. The puzzle wasn't too hard and had some really cool elements in it. At one point we got stuck and pressed the button for help but NO ONE CAME! WAS THIS SMALL ROOM MY NEW HOME FOR FOREVER?! No...I just forgot to check a corner of the room and found the clue. Good thing we weren't really stuck or else we would have failed. Overall, pretty well though out game rooms with questionable response times for help.

My family and I had an amazing experience in Red Door Escape Room in Hillsdale mall. All the staff we outstanding from the check in, master, other staff. There are plenty of escape room theme and we did the "Confinement". The rooms was fantastic and the scare jump/sounds are a must for the full experience. Range of my family are from 7-40+ and we highly recommend it. It's great way for a spending time with each other. We will definitely come back.

I won't say which escape room we did so I don't ruin the experience for others, but this escape room was okay for us. My husband and I went with a couple friends as a group to try something new and different. We had a reservation for 12:15 and so we checked in at 12 thinking maybe we had to get there 15 minutes early...we did not. So we were fine just hanging out while we waited for our turn since the employee said they like to start when it's closer to our start time. 15 minutes pass...another 15 minutes...we didn't start our escape room until almost 12:50 which is disappointing. I would say that the escape room we did could have things be fixed in order for one to escape. First off, there was a lock that looked like a part of the puzzle and turns out it was only for the employees to get into certain things....wish they would have put a sign on it so our team wouldn't focus so much on it. Secondly, there were blocks we had to use to solve the puzzle that needed UV lighting and unfortunately, the writing on the blocks were faded so we couldn't even read the letters! Other than that, our game master was great and helpful throughout the game.

I had a great time visiting red door escape room for the first time! It was also me and my bf's first time doing an escape room in over a year and a half! (boo the pandemic) So it was so fun working out our brain muscles after all this time. We booked The Gift room and it was sooooooo fun! I highly recommend it to those who have done escape rooms before because I believe it is medium. Our awesome gamemaster Nick said it has only a 20 something % clear rate! I totally didn't mean to book a medium difficulty room lol, the storyline was just so intriguing! But I'm so glad we can say that after all this time we still got it! You'll have a great experience here. The rooms and presentation are such nice quality. It's very professionally put together. I think they're a pretty large franchise so makes sense. So happy one opened up here in San Mateo! Can't wait to try all the other rooms!

We finished our final room today and want to finally leave a review. The atmosphere of these rooms is amazing. The game masters are extremely helpful and friendly. Shoutout to Olga who was our GM tonight. She made our experience great by being super attentive and having a very friendly personality. You should all have an amazing experience at Red Door!

Awesome escape room featuring some clever ways to unlock solved puzzles! Came here for a work function & tried the spooky Confinement room, which was challenging but really fun. Can't wait to come back & eventually try another one of these rooms. Great job, Red Door Escape Room - y'all left us wanting more!

Our group of 8 played Confinement to celebrate a birthday. Everyone at this location is super friendly like Alvin at the front desk and Diane who was our game master. Confinement is the hardest room here at Red Door Escape Room but we did end up escaping! I recommend this room if you are into thrillers, because we opted in to get jump scares in this room, which added more to the experience.

*DO NOT READ IF YOU DO NOT WANT SPOILERS FOR ONCE UPON A TIME* my group and i did once upon a time and our game master was very nice but the game was very faulty and it took away from the experience - the sword in the stone was not secured properly. we were able to pull it out easily, the next room opened, and my group was in there for a minute until the game master had to come back in, get us out, and close the door. it took away from the surprise and it did not feel as fulfilling to open the door a second time - there's a blue cabinet full of potions that is supposed to be locked until you get a red gem to put in the wall to complete the set of gems. but it was unlocked the whole time, so we spent a good amount of time trying to figure out what the gem was for. if we knew, we could've used that time to focus on other puzzles instead of trying to figure out the purpose of the gem - we had a wand that pushed into the wall and kept pushing and nothing happened. we even lined it up with the corresponding symbols and still nothing. it was only after we asked for a hint that the game master told us to put it in the wall, then the wand worked to advance us in the game. - there are supposed to be four bottles of sand and my group was only able to find three throughout the whole game. those four are supposed to make up a code but because we only had three, my boyfriend had to guess the last number. we forgot to ask our game master about it at the end of the game but he never brought it up when we asked for constant hints idk why nothing was working but i wish my group was offered compensation for the constant technical difficulties. i've played other escape rooms at other places and they've always offered something in return for the inconvenience but the employees at red door just did not care that obviously we didn't really have a fun experience. what i can say is that this red door would not be my first pick if you wanted to play an escape room in the bay. you're better off elsewhere

I've been waiting to visit this escape room for quite a while! I'm a little sad I wasn't more aggressive about booking while it was still 50% off, since the prices vary from 36+tax to 41+tax per person :( We finally booked a room today, super last minute, for part of a fun day. They book out over a week in advance (unless you wanna play at 10pm, I'm too old for that now), so I'd recommend planning further than we did for sure! The people working there were very friendly, and extremely encouraging and complimentary! They have a limited number of small lockers to store your stuff in outside of the rooms. We did prison break today with two people and barely made it out (2 min left?). The puzzles were really fun and tactile and they use an end buzzer which was surprisingly rewarding! I also liked the props for immersion sake (luckily, despite how gross things are in a "prison", they didn't FEEL grimy. Such a relief, especially during covid times). I fully plan on coming to do the rest of them, maybe with more people so that we don't need any hints :) I'd say this is one of the more difficult "first timer" escape rooms I've done in the past, and I've done quite a number of them. (I appreciate the difficulty, don't get me wrong!) Other things: this is located on the second floor of the north block outside area of Hillsdale Mall. There's plenty of parking around the area, especially on the second floor. Very close to the food court! They also have two gender neutral bathrooms that are pretty clean, and a water fountain (although I did not use it because covid). They didn't mention it today, but on their site they say that we can remove our masks once we're alone inside the room, which is good to know for next time.

Great little spot! For two people, the CAPTAIN MANIACAL'S LAIRBRATORIUM was a good option. We finished just in time. Excited to go and try the other escape room options.

Arrived here on a Sunday evening at 6:30 pm for our scheduled escape room. Super convenient location with parking at the Hillsdale Mall! The staff member working us, Jasmine, was welcoming and accommodating as we were running behind with 2 members not present yet. Loved the Halloween decorations, so festive and fun! They have lockers available for you to put your stuff inside. Phones can be stored in the lockers or stuffed in your pockets- as long as you don't take videos or captures in the rooms. Once we were rolling with everyone, our game master, Alejandro, gave us a wonderful intro to the game theme and the rules of the venue. The fun began! The rooms were well designed that fit the fairy tale theme with cool interactive objects and challenging, fun puzzles. We managed to escape with 5 minutes to spare, so definitely puzzling with our 6 brain cells!! We had a great time with the room, the staff, and the experience!

Olga is fantastic! She is so incredibly sweet! We played Once Upon a Time which was the last room we needed to complete. Me and my boyfriend were celebrating six months together and we got an extra clue! Olga was our game master and she was so nice! She gave clear and concise instructions and helpful hints. She took photos for us afterwards and they came out great! Thank you Olga! :)