Guide
How to Play the Online Escape Room
Search every object, read the painting cipher, decode the shelf into the drawer code, use the UV torch under the rug, dial the wall safe, and enter the final door code to escape.
Play the escape roomThe objective
Get out of the locked room
You start shut in a study. Around you are six objects: a crooked painting, a bookshelf, a desk drawer, a rug, a wall safe, and a bolted door. Three of them are locks. The rest hold the clues and the two items you need to open those locks.
There is no way to lose. A stopwatch counts up from the moment the room opens and a par time — roughly two and a half to three and a half minutes — is a target, not a deadline. The run ends when you open the door.
The game is free, runs in the browser, and needs no account. Open the room when you want to play; use this guide for the full walkthrough.
The room
Six objects, three of them locks
Painting — hangs crooked. Straighten it to find a note taped to the back: a number to count back by, and the order to enter digits.
Bookshelf — three volumes sit proud of the shelf, each tagged ①②③ with a number on the spine. Those numbers are enciphered by the painting’s shift.
Desk drawer — a three-digit number lock. Opens to a UV torch and the top half of a key card (the first two digits of the door code).
Rug — lift it for faint marks on the floorboards. Shine the UV torch to reveal four symbols.
Wall safe — a four-symbol dial. Opens to a brass key and the bottom half of the key card (the last two digits).
Door — a four-digit panel plus the brass deadbolt. Enter the full code, and the key turns automatically.
Controls
Tap, type, or use the keyboard
Every method does the same thing. Pick whichever fits the device in your hand.
Everywhere
Tap or click
Tap an object to open its close-up. Tap the keypad or symbol buttons to enter a code, then press the check button. Tap outside the close-up, or the back arrow, to return to the room.
Desktop
Keyboard
With a lock open, type digits directly, Backspace clears the last one, and Enter submits. Esc closes the close-up. H asks for a hint, N starts a new room, and M mutes the sound.
Below the room
Inventory
Items you pick up — the UV torch and the brass key — sit in the inventory bar. When an item can be used, a button appears in the relevant close-up; the brass key is turned automatically at the door.
The four steps
Search, read, use, escape
The room is designed so there is always exactly one next thing to do.
- 1
Search the room
You start locked in a study. Tap or click each object — the painting, the bookshelf, the desk drawer, the rug, the wall safe, and the door — to look closer. Nothing is decoration: every object either holds a clue, holds an item, or is a lock waiting for a code.
- 2
Read the clues
Straighten the crooked painting to find a note taped to the back: a number to count back by and the order to enter digits. The bookshelf shows three tagged numbers. Together they give the three-digit code for the desk drawer.
- 3
Use what you find
The drawer holds a UV torch and half of a key card. Take the torch to the rug and shine it on the floorboards to reveal four symbols — the combination for the wall safe. The safe holds a brass key and the other half of the key card.
- 4
Open the door
The two card halves spell a four-digit code. Enter it on the door panel, turn the brass key, and step out. Your time is compared to the room’s par; a clean, hint-free escape is the goal.
Rules & timer
Everything that governs a run
The objective
Get out of the locked room. Every run ends when you open the door — there is no way to lose and no hard time limit, only a par time to beat and a streak to keep.
The lock chain
Three locks open in a fixed order: the desk drawer, then the wall safe, then the door. Each lock’s contents unlock the next step, so the room always has exactly one thing to work on next.
Clues and items
Clues are read in place — the painting note, the shelf numbers, the marks under the rug. Items are carried — the UV torch reveals the rug, the brass key turns at the door. You cannot pick up a wrong item or use one in the wrong place.
The timer and par
A stopwatch starts when the room opens and stops when you escape. Each room sets a par between about 2½ and 3½ minutes. Beating par, and escaping with no hints, are tracked as separate bests.
Hints
The hint button always points at your current step and never spoils a later one. Each hint is counted; an escape with zero hints is recorded as a hint-free best. Wrong codes are free — guess as often as you like.
Puzzle types
The five puzzles in the room
Each is a staple of real-world escape rooms, scaled to a single study.
- 01 · Painting — a shift to undo
Cipher note
The note behind the painting tells you to count back by a number. Apply it to each value on the bookshelf to recover the real digits, then enter them in the order the note specifies. It is a small Caesar shift — the most common escape-room cipher.
- 02 · Desk drawer — three digits
Number lock
A push-button combination lock. Enter the decoded shelf digits in the note’s order. Wrong codes simply buzz; there is no penalty and no limit on attempts.
- 03 · Rug — needs the UV torch
Hidden-ink reveal
Some clues are only visible under ultraviolet light. Lift the rug, use the torch from the drawer, and the four safe symbols appear on the floorboards.
- 04 · Wall safe — four glyphs
Symbol dial
Four dials, each cycling through six symbols. Match the order revealed under the rug. The safe holds the brass key and the last two digits of the door code.
- 05 · Door — four digits and a key
Final code
Combine both halves of the key card into one four-digit code, enter it on the door panel, and the brass key turns the deadbolt. That is the escape.
Common mistakes
Why an easy room feels stuck
Solving before searching
Jumping at the first lock you see wastes time entering codes you have not earned yet. The room is designed to be searched top to bottom first; the solve is quick once you have every clue.
Applying the shift the wrong way
The note says count back, not forward. If your drawer code will not work, try adding the shift instead of subtracting — or the reverse — and check you wrapped 0 to 9 correctly.
Ignoring the read order
The three shelf digits are correct but useless in the wrong sequence. The painting note spells out which tagged book goes first, second, and third.
Forgetting the second card half
The drawer’s key-card half only shows two digits. The door code is four. The wall safe holds the missing half — open the safe before you try the door.
- Open every object once before you try to solve anything — you cannot plan a route you have not seen.
- Write the painting’s shift number and read order down before you touch the shelf; it is easy to misremember.
- Work the locks in order: drawer, safe, door. If a lock will not open, the clue you need is usually one object you have not fully checked.
- The shift is a simple “count back” — subtract, and wrap 0 back to 9 if you go under.
- Take the UV torch straight to the rug. Nothing else in the room needs it, so there is no reason to wait.
- Both key-card halves matter: the drawer gives the first two digits, the safe gives the last two.
- Save the hint button for a genuine dead end — a hint-free escape is its own record, and most rooms crack without one.
Where you can play
Same room on phone and desktop
escaperoomgame.app runs in any modern browser with no app to install. Progress stays on the device you played on.
Desktop browsers
Chrome, Edge, Firefox, and Safari all run the room with no plugin. Click objects, type codes on the keyboard, and press Enter to submit. Esc backs out of any close-up.
Phones and tablets
The layout is touch-first. The room and its controls sit above the fold in portrait, close-ups fill the same panel, and every code is enterable with on-screen buttons. Starting a new room is instant.
Progress on this device
Rooms entered, rooms escaped, best time, fastest hint-free escape, and your current and longest streak live in local browser storage. They stay until you reset them or clear site data, and they do not sync between devices.
Still stuck on a step? Read the escape room FAQ or jump in and play.
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