Today there are escape rooms in almost every city in the world, yet this phenomenon is less than twenty years old. Here is how it was born and how it has evolved.
Origins: video games and adventure games
Escape rooms have their roots in the point-and-click video games of the 90s and early 2000s, where the player had to escape a room by solving puzzles. Flash “escape the room” games were hugely popular.
Japan, 2007: the first real room
The company SCRAP created the first physical escape game in Kyoto, inspired by those video games. The idea was simple: lock a group in a room and give them one hour to get out.
Global expansion
- Hungary and central Europe: escape rooms arrive in Budapest around 2011.
- United States: first rooms in San Francisco and New York.
- Spain: the first ones appear in 2012–2013, led by Barcelona and Madrid.
Where they are today
Rooms have evolved into immersive experiences: movie sets, complex stories, technology, live actors and adjustable intensity. It is no longer just about opening padlocks; it is about living a story.
That is the Red Dopamine philosophy: in Awaken · The Cursed Chapel the group enters a cursed chapel with real actors, and in Achijira · The Forbidden Cave explores a forbidden cave.
Book your escape room in Barcelona
At Red Dopamine we have two rooms with live actors and movie-grade sets, for groups of 2 to 7 players: Awaken · The Cursed Chapel, our 90-minute horror escape room, and Achijira · The Forbidden Cave, a 100-minute adventure. Check the prices or book online.