Rhiannon Elizabeth Irons
Last time I wrote an article of this magnitude, I tackled the special episodes of QUIZarenaLIVE, ranking them on their enjoyment, both as someone who appeared on the shows, but also as a viewer.
Now, I’m taking on the special events that QUIZarenaLIVE have done – most notably Escaping Halloween, and the Xmastravaganza.
Like last time, I’m going to break down the good, the bad, and the ugly of each of these special events where Richard Lovegrove invited past QUIZarenaLIVE guests to participate in a virtual escape room and rank them accordingly.
If you haven’t seen the episodes, I will issue a spoiler alert right now. And I’ll also link you to each special event for you to enjoy at your leisure.
Airing October 31, 2021, The Underground Murder was the first tentative step into the world of virtual escape rooms. Richard Lovegrove teamed up with special guests Steve Maresca, Robert Woods, Piotr Wasilewski, and QUIZarenaLIVE’s Season One reigning champion, Rhiannon Elizabeth Irons (yeah, this was before I became a member of the cast full-time) to help solve the puzzles that had littered the subway. And if we just happened to solve the murder at the same time, great.
Being relatively new to the whole virtual escape room concept, I was happy when Piotr took command alongside Robert. They were writing down codes they had found while Richard, Steve, and myself flittered around in the background. I spent a good portion of the beginning of the escape room reading the notebook aloud so everyone could hear what the witnesses said and who our main suspects were.
The room was challenging, and even upon watching the playback, I’m still miffed at how we took so long to solve the puzzle at the ATM. Or the locker just inside the maintenance room.
Did we manage to escape? We did. With 3 minutes left on the clock, we solved the mystery of The Underground Murder.
There’s a lot to like about this first special event. The lure of the unknown made for compelling viewing. At the beginning as Richard introduced everyone, he asked if we had ever done an escape room before. Most of us had, and a lot of us had been unsuccessful in our attempts.
The team that had assembled worked well together. Robert was in Perth, while I was up on the Gold Coast. Steve, Piotr, and Richard all call Sydney home. But despite these distances, there wasn’t much lag, or at least noticeable lag.
There are a couple of quiet moments, where we were all deep in thought. At the end, a five-question quiz takes place to determine who would win their own chance at an escape room thanks to our sponsor for the night.
Overall, the enjoyment factor of this first QUIZarenaLIVE special event was quite high. You can watch it here!
Rating: 9/10
Airing on December 16, 2021, Expedition North Pole was next on QUIZarenaLIVE hit list for virtual escape rooms.
Once again, Richard assembled a team together of past QUIZarenaLIVE guests including Cameron Dunn, Michael Woodbridge a.k.a Woody’s Here, and yours truly to head to the North Pole and help Xander Klaus with his organisms and find our friend, Felix.
After completing The Underground Murder, it’s safe to say Richard and I were a little more confident going into this one. That confidence would soon come crashing down around us when it was realised that math would be involved.
Together, we managed to crunch numbers and made our way through the room, following the clues left behind by Xander Klaus and Felix. We managed to get out with 29 minutes to spare, eclipsing our time it took for The Underground Murder.
To be honest, this is probably my favourite escape room we’ve done so far. I enjoyed the story aspect, and I found it challenging. Even with my mathematical brain, there were moments where I was genuinely concerned that we wouldn’t be able to get out, especially if I did any of the math wrong.
Aside from the escape room, we also implemented a 15-question quiz all about QUIZarenaLIVE. Prior to the live show, I had gone over all the previous episodes of QUIZarenaLIVE to find fun facts about the show that I could write into a final tournament. And this proved to be the highlight of the show for me. I was struggling to maintain my composure as Richard read out the questions and Cameron and Woody answered.
If you want laughs aplenty, this is the special event to watch. You can watch it here!
Rating: 10/10
Airing October 31, 2022, Artifact Isle saw a group of QUIZarenaLIVE castaways stranded on a desert island. If that wasn’t bad enough, the island is sinking. Richard assembled the cast consisting of Cameron Dunn, Jason Spindlow, and yours truly to work our way through the mysteries of the island.
Firstly, if we ever find ourselves on a desert island, we’re eating Cameron first! Secondly, Jason is a very valuable asset when it comes to solving puzzles. And thirdly, totem poles are the bane of my existence.
Attracted by the colourful imagery of this escape room, we were all excited for this event. Exploring the beach was great. Finding a notebook early on meant we would have clues, although in comparison to both The Underground Murder and Expedition North Pole, the notebook wasn’t as fruitful.
The island had four areas to explore. Once we made it through Camp Coconut, it was off the land of the totem poles, a.k.a the end of my “no hints” reign. During the 42 minutes spent dealing with a totem, we ended up caving and asking for 2 hints. Which, might I add, were not remotely helpful.
But once we moved from that part of the island, things picked up again as we were able to find the secret treasure within the time period. And despite being stuck for a considerable amount of time, we managed to exit this room quicker than the two previous ones.
Like previous special events, there was a quiz all about QUIZarenaLIVE. Armed with 20 questions this time, including an additional 5 for Richard to tease everyone with. Unfortunately for me, it also included a very embarrassing blast from my past.
Overall, this is a quite enjoyable episode, although the hold up at the totem pole does bring the show to a grinding halt. Overlooking that, there’s plenty of laughter to be had and many hilarious moments. You can watch it here!
Rating: 8/10
Airing December 23rd, 2022, a ragtag band of misfits found themselves stranded in Detention. Richard Lovegrove hosted the event, roping in newcomers Kristian Fletcher and Claire Fitzpatrick, as well as seasoned veterans of the escape room variety, Cameron Dunn, Piotr Wasilewski, and Rhiannon Elizabeth Irons in a desperate bid to reduce his Saturday Detention time.
This is without a doubt my least favourite special event that we’ve done so far. Anything that could go wrong, did go wrong. Gizmo struck the stream repeatedly causing many dropouts. The virtual escape room was bugged with many elements missing, askew, or just simply not working. And because of these issues, Richard was highly distracted and having to keep an eye on the stream to ensure we were still recording.
There are two version of this special event available. One that was the live stream, complete with dropouts. The other runs for an hour longer and shows a lot more of the escape room that was recorded from the Zoom meeting that took place for the contestants.
Were we able to escape? Yes, we were, but it wasn’t without frustrations. To help ease the blow of the live viewers missing out on the escape room due to technical errors, Richard played a game of Best of Three before unleashing random trivia questions about QUIZarenaLIVE on the guests.
True to form there was a final tournament of 15 questions all about QUIZarenaLIVE and afterwards, Richard asked five questions about Christmas movies to bring the theme of the Xmastravaganza full circle.
Personally speaking, the room itself was quite challenging. There was even something that we unlocked through the puzzles but weren’t able to get to. I would love to take another crack at it, preferably without Gizmo trying to help. You can watch it here!
Rating: 2/10
Airing October 31st, 2023, the wild west beckoned. Richard summoned his motley crew of Mike Lewis, Jason Spindlow, Claire Fitzpatrick, and Rhiannon Elizabeth Irons to investigate the goings on at The Saloon.
The room was a vast step up over the previous attempt of Detention. Immediately, we began working together as a team to help solve the puzzles. We did have a totem pole flashback moment with a sliding puzzle that seemingly took forever to solve, but as we worked through it together, and managed to solve it with greater ease than we did with the totem pole in Artifact Isle.
The room had its moments, but in comparison to some past escape rooms, it wasn’t as challenging, and this became the quickest solve we had done so far.
True to form, a final tournament of 20 questions about QUIZarenaLIVE was on offer. This provided hilarious results.
I have mixed feelings about this special event. On one hand, I really enjoyed the company and the event as a whole. But on the other hand, I was a little disappointed by the room. Also, due to other engagements, both Claire and Mike had to bail early, leaving Richard, Jason, and myself to finish up.
Overall, The Saloon is a fun watch, but after another viewing, I have to say it’s not making my top 3. You can watch it here!
Rating: 6/10
BONUS SPECIALS
Richard and Rhiannon rang in the new year with a live stream, showcasing the fireworks over Sydney Harbour as well as the Brisbane River.
Talking about the year that had been as their hopes for the future, viewers got to know the QUIZarenaLIVE hosts intimately.
Completely devoid of trivia, this special event was more of a celebration of QUIZarenaLIVE and those who helped bring it to life. You can watch it here!
Richard and Rhiannon rang in the new year with a live stream, showcasing the fireworks over Sydney Harbour as well as fireworks shows from around Australia as the country celebrated saying goodbye 2022 and hello to 2023.
Richard and Rhiannon shared their goals and resolutions for the upcoming new year, as they reflected on the year that had been and gone.
Again, this special event was completely devoid of trivia, but it didn’t take away from the enjoyment and magic that is QUIZarenaLIVE. You can watch it here!
Richard and Rhiannon join forces with QUIZarenaLIVE competition winner, Logan Flores, and Terrifier 2’s Casey Hartnett to take on The Underground Murder.
Filmed on March 13th, 2023, this special was a joint celebration of our competition winner and my birthday.
At Logan’s request, we found ourselves trying to solve The Underground Murder. Working together to solve the case, it is a great special event to both have been a part of and to watch. You can watch it here!
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