The results are in!
For our second Escape Simulator 2 Build-a-Room Competition, we challenged builders to answer one simple question: How did the world end?
We received 30 wildly different answers, from alien invasions and mysterious outbreaks to abandoned facilities and reality-bending disasters. The creativity, technical skill, and puzzle design on display made judging incredibly difficult.
After playing, discussing, and judging every submission, we’re finally ready to reveal the winners!
And most importantly, our 1st place winner becomes the official backstory of the Escape Simulator 2: Apocalypse DLC.
1st Place - Crystal Convergence
Made by Popo 434
Crystal Convergence is the full package - a collection of clever puzzles, technical tricks, fun storytelling, strong visual design, and even its own Darkest Puzzle.
It’s a well-rounded and balanced room that takes clever inspiration from existing Escape Simulator 2 puzzles while remixing them in its own unique way. It manages to blend seemingly anachronistic assets into a cohesive experience where nothing feels out of place.
A true must-play! As our grand prize winner, Popo receives USD 1,000 and 4 Steam keys for the new Escape Simulator 2: Apocalypse DLC. The room also becomes the official backstory of the Apocalypse DLC.
2nd Place - Catliens Attack!
Made by Bartololomeow
Bartololomeow’s signature style returns, combining a charming cartoony aesthetic with custom modeling, rigging, and animations.
Featuring primarily language-themed puzzles, it uses a Metroidvania-style progression system complete with several quality-of-life features, including teleporters, a map, and a tablet with clues.
It’s a cleanly designed puzzle experience with charm to spare.
3rd Place - Project Orion
Made by Dr Krank
Project Orion impresses with its grounded realism and brooding atmosphere. The room has you exploring the halls of an abandoned mansion while uncovering the story behind Project Orion and the last sanctuaries of humanity.
A cleverly designed progression ties everything together into the final puzzle. Despite featuring a larger environment, the room’s clear objectives and strong design always steer you in the right direction.
4th Place - The Decay
Made by Duc
You are tasked with investigating a bacterial outbreak in a mysterious underground lab.
There’s a great variety of puzzles on display, requiring you to focus on both small details and the larger environment around you. With solid puzzles and brilliant moments that horrified us, shocked us, and left us laughing — often at the same time — The Decay is an unforgettable experience in a bite-sized package.
5th Place - P.I.N.E.
Made by KirbyDee
This room features an incredibly clever game mechanic that we had never seen before in Escape Simulator — and discussing it would be a huge spoiler.
This central mechanic is used throughout the room in different ways, asking you to think outside the box and immersing you in the experience like few other rooms manage to do.
Definitely play it with as little information as possible — and especially avoid reading the comments beforehand. It’ll be worth it.
6th Place - Vestiges
Made by Brushstroke
Vestiges is a fantastic 2-player co-op experience, though it can also be played solo, with puzzles built around good communication between players.
It keeps both players together in the same environment throughout the experience, leading to some surprising and clever interactions. The environment is meticulously crafted, with great attention to visual design, while also featuring an ambitious story and high-quality voice acting.
Honorable Mentions
It was hard not to list every entry here — each one is worth trying to see if it suits your taste.
Still, we wanted to highlight a few rooms that stood out to us in one way or another.
Last Call
Infiltrate a futuristic electronics factory to steal confidential data. A well-balanced room from start to finish. Metro City: Phase II
Retrace the steps of a city-wide evacuation. Features a great atmosphere and strong worldbuilding.
The Guardian Foxes
Save an ancient temple from invaders. A technically impressive third-person experience.
BUSINESS EXPENSE
Can you get rich quick and earn VIP treatment? A cryptic room with a great sense of humor.
Wizard Lair Heist
Brew potions, cast spells, and hack computers to get inside a modern-day wizard’s safe. A bit on the harder side.
Prisoner θ-717
Use your villainous superpowers to escape a containment facility.
Tomb of Doom
Explore a jungle tomb filled with traps and puzzles.
Note: The first puzzle currently needs to be solved on the first try, otherwise it can break.
Who’s Left?
Use the clues around you to fill out a valid ticket for an escape shuttle.
DEIMOS-7
Power up an abandoned space-mining facility and analyze rock samples.
28 Minutes to Midnight
Navigate technically ambitious army-themed puzzles at a doomed military outpost, culminating in an explosive finale.
KEYSTONE: Site 54
Explore a mind-bending office building featuring impressive, reality-defying visuals.
A huge thank you to everyone who participated in the competition and spent countless hours building, testing, and polishing their rooms.
We had a fantastic time playing through your different interpretations of how the world ended, and we hope everyone gives these rooms a try. All rooms are available directly from the in-game menu.
And if you haven’t jumped into Escape Simulator 2 yet, now is a great time: the game is part of the Steam Autumn Sale and is currently on sale!
-Pine team