Cross Roads Escape Games’ reputation precedes them. I hadn’t made the trek down to Anaheim for The Hex Room, but I had certainly heard about Cross Roads’ inventive, polished spin on an escape room. (A situation I rectified after attending their newest show). The Hex Room isn’t immersive in the traditional sense, but by casting participants as horror movie characters, it toys with the idea.
Now, with The Séance, Cross Roads has jumped into the immersive game. The Séance, is a play on, well, a séance where you meet with a medium to try to contact the dead. Like any good horror movie, your attempt to pierce the veil doesn’t go exactly as planned. And like any good horror movie, The Séance takes its time to build the tension, cut it, and then ramp it up again.
That tension and anticipation is key to what Cross Roads has built here and comes as a result of a clever, tight script and a surprisingly large amount of practical effects crammed into a small-ish space. Madam Ruby (Geovanna Flores for our show, but the part is triple cast) is your guide for the evening through both the spirit world and the actual show. She’ll dole out bits of story and helpful hints as you need them. While The Séance is not an escape room, it does have a few fun puzzle elements sprinkled around that tie into both the setting and common horror tropes.
This is all bolstered by the writing. Aside from a script from Madison Rhoades, co-owner of Cross Roads, that keeps the show moving briskly over the course of its hour-ish run time, it brings in some solid research on the occult, ghosts, and demons. That research lends a texture to the early-goings of The Séance as you acclimate to it that comes into play again later in a way that ties into both the story and the puzzle elements.
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What really makes the show pop though, is those practical effects, which are all run by one actor (!!, Tara Virgil at our show, but the part is quadruple cast). There are the standards including EMF readers (a must for finding a ghost), a chair rocking on its own (a must for any ghost to give you the creeps), and a spirit board (a must for chatting with your ghost friends…or foes). These are all deployed in just the right spots and in just the right amounts to layer the tension on. The music, ambient noise in the room, and lighting design lend a hand here too. I didn’t exactly notice them in the moment, but it gives it all that extra oomph when you realize the lights have come down and there’s a pulsing energy to the room. There are also a few other surprising practical effects in the show, but those are best left for you to discover on your own.
In a sense, The Séance is a natural evolution from The Hex Room. Hex lets you play inside the world of a slasher movie, The Séance lets you live out a classic ghost story. It hits the notes you want any horror movie to hit: it’s got some scares, some fun, and some practical effects.
So, make your way to Anaheim this Halloween season for some delightful tricks and treats.
The Séance runs from now until November 3, Wednesdays through Sundays. Tickets are $45–50 and available online.
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