Advert: This game was gifted in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are ours.

The Mystery Agency has contacted you to help with an unsolved mystery from their archives: The case of The Vanishing Gambler. Can you crack a case that’s perplexed police and discombobulated detectives?

The Mystery Agency is a UK-based company that makes high quality, ‘escape room’ mystery boxes to play at home, designed by Henry Lewis (a co-creator of the hilarious The Play That Goes Wrong). They’ve released 4 mystery boxes to date: The Vanishing Gambler, The Balthazar Stone and The Ghost in the Attic (plus a bonus mystery The Oracle if you own all 3), and the more recent The Man From Sector Six.

Note: This is a spoiler-light review. We discuss the story set-up, some gameplay aspects, and share some photos of the components, but we don’t reveal any specific puzzles or solutions.

Story and gameplay

👥 1 to 6 players
⌛ 60 to 90 minutes
🧠 14 years+

A notorious professional gambler Roy Marshall was arrested for his casino cheating, but has disappeared from his Las Vegas jail cell! No one knows how he did it, and his whereabouts are still unknown… Can you sleuth your way through the story to figure out how he vanished into thin air, and where he is now?

When you open the box from the Mystery Agency you first see a news article from Las Vegas Times about Roy’s disappearance. Underneath, the Agency has provided you with an evidence package containing what was left behind in Roy’s cell… but it’s padlocked. And this is your first task: find the code to unlock the evidence. From there, you’ll have more breadcrumbs to follow and puzzles to solve.

The Mystery Agency includes a secret website where you’ll find your detective desk complete with an old computer, your first clue, and a folder full of hints. You can also choose whether you want to be timed or not. When you think you’ve found where Roy is hiding, you need to enter the answer into your detective’s computer and, if you’re correct, you’ll be presented with a nice little certificate you can print off and stick on your fridge.

Our thoughts

We’ve played two Mystery Agency games now, and the quality – from the design to the production – is incredible. The story and puzzles are the closest experience we’ve had to an actual escape room (the main difference being that you aren’t running around frantically trying to find stuff, it’s all nicely collated into one box!). It’s also resettable, so you can share it with others or sell it on.

It’s clear a lot of care and effort has gone into the development of the mystery itself. The mystery unfolds logically and the components are premium quality – like some poker chips that are satisfyingly clicky clacky! It also looks like some aspects have been done by hand, which is impressive. (Note: I’ve only shown a couple of items from the box in photos to avoid spoiling too much!)

The puzzles are diverse – I think many of them would be classed as decoding/lock puzzles, but they have been implemented in various different ways so each puzzle is unique, and there’s some logical deduction and practical investigation sprinkled in as well.

It’s clear a lot of care and effort has gone into the development of the mystery itself. The mystery unfolds logically and the components are premium quality…

It’s hard to judge difficulty because it varies person to person – and maybe this is why the Mystery Agency don’t put difficulties on their games. For us (who have done a fair few escape games), we found it straightforward there were a couple of puzzles we found tricky. We used the hints once, but it was actually because of a digital puzzle that in our opinion could be designed better – but this was our only real niggle in the whole game.

Spoiler for the niggle for those interested (hover to read): we needed a username, we had the right person but the correct format for the username wasn’t typical for a username (it had spaces!), and there were no clues to help infer that. Plus when we got it wrong, it told us it was the password that was wrong, which threw us off.

Aside from that bug, we really enjoyed the digital integration and puzzles. There were a few websites that were simple but realistic, and it was integrated into the story in a logical way. 

That’s as much detail as I want to go into here, because I don’t want to spoil it for others. But I’m happy to answer any questions if you shoot me a DM on Instagram.

What we like

• The closest experience we’ve had to a real escape room, but at home!

• Amazing quality in the design and components and well structured narrative – the best we’ve come across in any ‘escape room’ game to date.

• The mystery feels logically structured and unravels in a natural, logical way. It’s clear a lot of work has gone into the design and production.

• Each puzzle felt different, and they tied into the story and theme really well.

• The digital elements were realistic and fun.

• You can reset the game (nothing is damaged), which means it can be played more than once.

Considerations

• We know some people prefer their games without digital/app involvement, so it’s something to note.

• We think the ideal player count is 1 to 2 players, with 3 players at a push. Any higher and you’ll have people not having much to do, regardless of the recommended player count (this applied to all escape-room-at-home games we’ve played).

Final verdict

The Vanishing Gambler is the best at-home ‘escape room’ we’ve experienced to date!

The Vanishing Gambler is the best at-home ‘escape room’ we’ve experienced to date! It’s one of the more expensive at-home mystery/escape games, and I want to acknowledge that, but this is reflected in the excellent design of the mystery, the quality of the components, and even using real people/actor(s) in some of the assets. Of the two Mystery Agency boxes we’ve completed (the other being The Man From Sector Six), this one is our favourite so far – we can’t wait to see what the others are like!

If you buy a Mystery Agency box, I suggest not looking through the photos on the product page, because it shows everything in the box, and in my opinion the experience is so much better when you don’t know.