EXIT: The Game – The Polar Station

What’s the game about?

A wonderfully mild morning in the Arctic — just -15° Celsius!

You are part of a large team of researchers divided into several groups. In Group IMB-Q-12, you are researching climate change at the North Pole. It’s all top secret, and you have no idea what the other groups’ missions are. You have seen and heard nothing from Group IMB-Q-13, for example, for weeks.

Suddenly, the evacuation alarm goes off! You run to the door, but it has already locked automatically. Through the window, you can see your colleagues from the other groups racing to the helicopters. You are the only ones left behind …

You are able to climb through a ventilation shaft into the neighboring section. Here, too, the door is already locked. The laboratory is absolutely destroyed, and you wonder what could have happened here. Then you find a notebook and an odd disk.

Everything in the room is secured with combination locks. And you realize: Only if you can crack all the codes in time will you be able to escape.

If not, this will surely be your end.

Game Materials

• 84 Cards:
  • 24 Riddle Cards
  • 30 Answer Cards
  • 30 Help Cards
• 2 Strange items
• 1 Book
• 1 Decoder disk

Additional Materials Needed:

• Something to write with (ideally ball-point pens, pencils and an eraser)
• One or more sheets of paper
• A watch (ideally a stopwatch), to keep track of the time
• A pair of scissors (optional, will make the game easier to play; otherwise you can just rip the materials with your hands)

Game Setup

1. Get the book and decoder disk ready on the table.
2. Leave the “strange items” in the box for now.
3. Sort the cards into three piles in accordance with what is written on their back side:
   • Riddle Cards
   • Answer Cards
   • Help Cards
4. Check to be sure that the Riddle Cards and Answer Cards are arranged in ascending order according to their letters or numbers.
5. Sort the Help Cards according to their symbols, and then place them on the side of the table. Place cards with the same symbol, one on top of another, such that the “1st CLUE” card is on top of the “2nd CLUE” card and the latter is on top of the “SOLUTION” card.

Be sure not to look at the front sides of any of the cards.

Where is the game board?

This game has no game board! You will have to figure out for yourselves what you have to find in the game and what the rooms look like. At the beginning of the game, you will have only the book and the decoder disk available to you.

As the game continues, you will add the Riddle Cards — either to be found in illustrations, or referred to in the text. Whenever this happens, you can pick the corresponding cards from the Riddle Card pile and look at them.

Likewise, you can only use the “strange items” in the box when explicitly told that you have found them. Until then, leave them untouched in the box!

Course of Play

Your goal is to escape together from the polar station as quickly as you can.

That would definitely be easier if not for the fact that every lock in the room is secured with a riddle. As soon as the game starts, you may look at all the pages of the book. During the course of the game, you will keep finding objects that are locked with a three-digit number code. To open them, you will have to figure out the matching code and enter it into the decoder disk.

At the edge of the disk, you will see 10 different symbols. Each symbol stands for a code to be cracked. But you will have to figure out for yourselves which symbol belongs to which code. You will want to be sure to pay attention to every detail.

If you think you can crack a code, enter it under the corresponding symbol on the disk. Then, look through the viewing window on the smallest wheel to see a number.

This number indicates the number of the Answer Card that you are then allowed to look at. If the code is incorrect, you will have to keep searching for a solution or switch to another riddle for the time being. If the code is correct, the Answer Card will tell you how to continue.

Checking Codes

➜ Is the code incorrect?

If so, the Answer Card will tell you. In that case, simply return the card to the pile and take another look at the riddle that you failed to solve. Maybe there’s something that you overlooked. Or it may be that you simply don’t yet have the hints that you need to solve it. Then you will just have to continue someplace else.

➜ Is the code possibly correct?

If so, the Answer Card will look like this:

➜ Where will you see the code symbol?

Good question! To answer it, you will have to take a close look at the pictures in the book or on the Riddle Cards.

All possible locked objects can be found in those places. All of these objects are marked with a symbol. Our example involves the green drawer with the symbol on it.

To continue with this example scenario: Next, you will take a look at the Answer Card next to the green drawer and see that you should now retrieve Answer Card 21 from the pile.

NOTE: You have to see the object with the symbol on a Riddle Card or in the book in order to be able to open it. You cannot open something that you have not found — just like in an actual room.

➜ Is the code really correct?

If so, the Answer Card will tell you how to continue. You will find one or more new Riddle Cards which you will be allowed to pull from the pile and look at immediately.

➜ Is the code actually incorrect?

Well, in that case you must have made a mistake. You will just have to think about it some more and come up with a different code.

One Final Tip

Any game materials that you successfully used to help solve a riddle should be set aside, but not put away. You might need some materials again. But this way, you will be able to keep track of the materials more easily and won’t get them mixed up. For some of the riddles the only things that you will need are the illustrations of the rooms.

The Game Begins

What are you waiting for? Start the stopwatch and escape from the station before it’s too late! Now you are allowed to look at the entire book and begin solving riddles. If anything is unclear, don’t be shy about looking something up in the manual during the games.

Need Some Help?

Of course, the game can provide you assistance if you get stuck. For each code, there are three Help Cards that can be recognized by the symbol on their back sides.

• In addition to giving you an initial useful clue, each “1st CLUE” Help Card also tells you which Riddle Cards you must have found in order to be able to solve the corresponding riddle.
• The “2nd CLUE” Help Cards will give you somewhat more concrete assistance in finding a solution to the corresponding riddle.
• The “SOLUTION” Help Cards provide the solution to the riddle.

So have a little patience — some of the riddles can only be solved with the help of several Riddle Cards. You won’t always have all of them available to you right away. Sometimes, you will first have to grapple with other riddles to get more cards. But don’t be shy about using Help Cards if you get stuck.

Once you have used a Help Card, place it on a discard pile.

When does the game end?

The game ends when you have solved the last riddle and escaped from the station in eternal ice. A card will tell you that. Start a stopwatch at the beginning of the game so you know how long you needed.

You can look at the table on the next page to see how well you did. When calculating the number of Help Cards used, only the ones that gave you new hints or solutions should be counted. If a Help Card only had something that you knew anyway, do not include it in the calculation.

Scoring Table

CERTIFICATE

Share your Exit experiences using #exitstrategies

The following players:

1. ____________________
2. ____________________
3. ____________________
4. ____________________
5. ____________________
6. ____________________

on _______________ in _______________

successfully escaped from the station in eternal ice.

What an outstanding accomplishment, and how fortunate that they now won’t have to remain locked forever in the station!

• To do it, it took them: _____ Minutes and _____ Seconds
• They used a total of: _____ Help Cards.
• This earned them: _____ stars in the assessment!
• The coolest riddle was: ________________________________________
• The trickiest riddle was: ________________________________________
• The player who solved this riddle was: ________________________________________

The Authors

Inka & Markus Brand live with their children Lukas and Emely in Gummersbach, Germany. They have published many children’s and family games together and won numerous prizes. Of course, they are avid riddle and escape game fans.

Inka & Markus Brand and Kosmos thank all the test players and rule readers.