Reality Escape Pod - Escape Rooms & Immersive Games Titelbild

Reality Escape Pod - Escape Rooms & Immersive Games

Reality Escape Pod - Escape Rooms & Immersive Games

Von: David Spira & Peih-Gee Law
Jetzt kostenlos hören, ohne Abo

Über diesen Titel

A Room Escape Artist Production

In a world gone digital, doing things in person is strangely revolutionary.

Reality Escape Pod is an interview podcast diving deep with people who make the world’s best immersive games and experiences: ARGs, puzzle hunts, tabletop games, theme parks, and of course, escape rooms. Our aim is to bring together different segments of the gaming world to share ideas between them.

Hosts David Spira & Peih-Gee Law explore immersive gaming from all angles with a unique blend of curiosity, joy, and a deep appreciation of craft. Each episode explores the guest’s philosophy, design approach, and humanity.

About the hosts:

David Spira is an experience designer, co-founder of RoomEscapeArtist.com and Reality Escape Convention. He is the escape room industry’s most prolific leader. In 2014 he applied his professional skills as a digital experience designer to the burgeoning industry of escape rooms, and more than a decade later he has built a community for its creators and consumers.

Peih-Gee Law is most well known for being a fan favorite contestant on the reality show Survivor, where she played first in Survivor China in 2007, and again in a returning All-Star season Survivor Second Chance. In 2025, she launched PG's Playhouse, a fun podcast with brainteasers, puzzles, and trivia. She is also on the official story team for Neotropolis, an annual 5 day immersive cyberpunk festival, where she creates narrative driven gameplay and experiences for thousands of attendees.

Copyright 2026 Room Escape Artist Kunst Reiseliteratur & Erläuterungen Sozialwissenschaften
Folgen
  • Room Escape Divas with Errol & Manda (S11E4)

    Room Escape Divas with Errol & Manda (S11E4)
    Apr 28 2026
    Answer our 2026 Audience Census! "Try to find the delight in puzzles." Amanda and Errol have been fixtures in the escape room community for years, so of course we had to get the OG escape room podcasters on REPOD. This episode is basically a love letter to everything weird and wonderful about playing escape rooms, designing immersive games, and the incredible community we found along the way. From 2016-2022, Errol and Manda, along with their other co-hosts Ruby and Mike, podcasted about their escape room antics. They gave valuable commentary on the early years of escape rooms, and along with Room Escape Artist, really helped shape the community that grew around this new form of immersive gaming entertainment. Not only did Errol and Manda provide commentary on escape rooms, they also helped create some iconic games, including Heist on a Moving Train, the Cryptex Hunt puzzle hunt series, and Present Quest. They have each appeared twice as speakers for our own convention, the Reality Escape Convention. As a Certified Fraud Examiner, Manda gave a talk in fraud prevention for RECON 25. Errol's puzzle design talk from RECON 21 remains one of the most popular from any RECON. Errol and Manda are a joy to chat with. If you enjoyed this episode, the Bonus Aftershow we recorded with them was even more fun. Consider joining our Patreon for even more content! We now have a special offer just for REPOD listeners! Get 70% off your first month at the Bonus Show level ($5/month). Valid now through the end of May. Use code MOREREPOD at checkout to claim this offer. Full Show Notes Episode Sponsors We are immensely grateful to our sponsors this season: REA Patreon Backers, PG's Playhouse, Buzzshot, and the Reality Escape Convention. We truly appreciate your support of our mission to promote and improve the immersive gaming community. Buzzshot Buzzshot is Escape Room Software, Powering Business Growth, Player Marketing, and improving the Customer Experience. They offer an assortment of pre and post game features including robust waiver management, branded team photos, and streamlined review management for Yelp, TripAdvisor, Google Reviews, and Morty. Buzzshot now has integration with the other REPOD sponsors: Morty and COGS. Special Offer for REPOD Listeners: REPOD listeners get an extended 21-day free trial plus 20% off your first 3 months, with no set-up fees or hidden charges. Visit buzzshot.com/repod to learn more about this exclusive offer. Support Us On Patreon Today Love escape rooms as much as we do? At Room Escape Artist, we’ve been analyzing, reviewing, and exploring the world of immersive games since 2014. We help players find the best experiences, and push the industry forward with well-researched, rational, and reasonably humorous escape room and immersive gaming content and events. By becoming a Patreon supporter, you're not just backing a blog — you're fueling a mission to make the escape room and immersive gaming community stronger, more thoughtful, and more connected. Access exclusive Patreon content such as: The Bonus AftershowThe Spoilers ClubEarly access to escape room Tour tickets and REA articles. Your Patreon support goes toward our mission: paying our contributors, funding our infrastructure, and supporting deep research and industry advocacy. PG's Playhouse If you love wordplay, puzzles, and trivia, this is the podcast for you! PG's Playhouse recreates a fun game night, all in a short, 30-minute format. Of course, what’s game night without making new friends? We bring on different guests for the different episodes. Each episode features a puzzle packed with wordplay and trivia, a short chat with the guest, and a segment exploring an interesting topic. I hope you’ll take a listen and play along with us at PG’s Playhouse. Reality Escape Convention Our convention, RECON, will be in Laval, Quebec Canada on August 16th & 17th, 2026. RECON offers a curated collection of talks and experiences exploring the business and art of escape room and immersive game creation. All are welcome at this event that is crafted around professionals and aspiring professionals. Production Credits Hosted by David Spira & Peih-Gee Law Produced by Theresa Piazza Supported by Lisa Spira Edited by Steve Ewing Music by Ryan Elder Logo by Janine Pracht
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    1 Std. und 17 Min.
  • The Future of Storytelling with Charlie Melcher (S11E3)

    The Future of Storytelling with Charlie Melcher (S11E3)
    Apr 21 2026
    Answer our 2026 Audience Census! " A big mistake [is saying] 'look at our thing', instead of 'How do I empower and serve my customer?'" What is the future of storytelling? If you ask Charlie Melcher, the answer lies in "living stories," stories where the audience has a role and participates. Indeed, the subtitle of his new book, The Future of Storytelling is "How Immersive Experiences Are Transforming the World." In the early 90s, Charlie started Melcher Media, publishing books. Even then, he noted that books had a unique tactile physicality. He talks about working on the infamous Madonna photo book Sex, and how they made it into an early "immersive experience," wrapping the book in mylar to mimic the look of a condom. He also produced and designed S by J.J. Abrams, which told a story through elaborate annotations and other media enclosed within a copy of the novel The Ship of Theseus. The book has a very unusual mechanic for storytelling, including postcards and even a cipher wheel. He even did something different when it came to his own book, The Future of Storytelling. He created a unique multi-fold dust jacket so readers could choose the genre and look of the cover themselves. Charlie Melcher has been pushing the envelope when it comes to books and storytelling, so it's no surprise that when he attended his first immersive experience, he was hooked from the beginning. Today, he joins us on REPOD to talk about his vision for where immersive stories are going. Besides having his own podcast, also titled The Future of Storytelling, he has hosted many immersive summits under the same brand. Charlie has so many thoughtful insights about immersive storytelling. We touched on topics from the complexities of scaling intimate moments, to breaking down immersive experiences into the core components of physical, participatory, and emotional immersion. I found this to be an enlightening conversation. And if you enjoy this conversation, I highly recommend you listen to Charlie's own podcast, The Future of Storytelling, starting with the episode where David and I were guests. Full Show Notes Episode Sponsors We are immensely grateful to our sponsors this season: REA Patreon Backers, PG's Playhouse, Buzzshot, and the Reality Escape Convention. We truly appreciate your support of our mission to promote and improve the immersive gaming community. Buzzshot Buzzshot is Escape Room Software, Powering Business Growth, Player Marketing, and improving the Customer Experience. They offer an assortment of pre and post game features including robust waiver management, branded team photos, and streamlined review management for Yelp, TripAdvisor, Google Reviews, and Morty. Buzzshot now has integration with the other REPOD sponsors: Morty and COGS. Special Offer for REPOD Listeners: REPOD listeners get an extended 21-day free trial plus 20% off your first 3 months, with no set-up fees or hidden charges. Visit buzzshot.com/repod to learn more about this exclusive offer. Support Us On Patreon Today Love escape rooms as much as we do? At Room Escape Artist, we’ve been analyzing, reviewing, and exploring the world of immersive games since 2014. We help players find the best experiences, and push the industry forward with well-researched, rational, and reasonably humorous escape room and immersive gaming content and events. By becoming a Patreon supporter, you're not just backing a blog — you're fueling a mission to make the escape room and immersive gaming community stronger, more thoughtful, and more connected. Access exclusive Patreon content such as: The Bonus AftershowThe Spoilers ClubEarly access to escape room Tour tickets and REA articles. Your Patreon support goes toward our mission: paying our contributors, funding our infrastructure, and supporting deep research and industry advocacy. PG's Playhouse If you love wordplay, puzzles, and trivia, this is the podcast for you! PG's Playhouse recreates a fun game night, all in a short, 30-minute format. Of course, what’s game night without making new friends? We bring on different guests for the different episodes. Each episode features a puzzle packed with wordplay and trivia, a short chat with the guest, and a segment exploring an interesting topic. I hope you’ll take a listen and play along with us at PG’s Playhouse. Reality Escape Convention Our convention, RECON, will be in Laval, Quebec Canada on August 16th & 17th, 2026. RECON offers a curated collection of talks and experiences exploring the business and art of escape room and immersive game creation. All are welcome at this event that is crafted around professionals and aspiring professionals. Production Credits Hosted by David Spira & Peih-Gee Law Produced by Theresa Piazza Supported by Lisa Spira Edited by Steve Ewing Music by Ryan Elder Logo by Janine Pracht
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    1 Std. und 20 Min.
  • Gamify the World: Improbable Escapes with Emma Rochon (S11E2)

    Gamify the World: Improbable Escapes with Emma Rochon (S11E2)
    Apr 14 2026
    Answer our 2026 Audience Census! " There's lots of places in the world you can gamify." Emma Rochon and Melissa Eapen were young game masters working at a local escape room company over 12 years ago. They loved this "new" genre of entertainment, and asked the owners how they could get more involved in growing the business or designing new rooms. The owners replied with "There's no growth in [escape rooms]. Also though, if you try to make your own company, I'll sue you". These famous last words spurred Improbable Escapes co-founders Emma Rochon and Melissa Eapen to quit and start their own company. While looking for locations, they mapped out all the known escape rooms in Canada at the time, and settled on the charming city of Kingston. They chose it primarily for its qualities as an escape room wasteland, because it didn't have any notable existing escape rooms. Today, they've certainly built out enough games to put Kingston, Ontario, Canada on the map of any escape room enthusiast. They have built and designed over forty different games and experiences, including escape rooms, outdoor escape rooms, large event "podium games," and even a board game café. They also started a sister company called Visual Menace Creative that builds sets, props, and immersive activations for brands, film, television and music videos. Emma Rochon joins us on REPOD to share her escape room journey in the industry. I was simply mind-blown by these two young women who built an escape room empire out of nothing but sheer determination and passion. I love stories where someone is told "no" and they proceed to prove nay-sayers wrong in the most epic way possible. If you enjoyed this episode and you want to hear more from Emma, she will be speaking at this year's Reality Escape Convention about deconstructing escape rooms, and how to literally think outside the box when it comes to designing interactive puzzle games. Full Show Notes Episode Sponsors We are immensely grateful to our sponsors this season: REA Patreon Backers, PG's Playhouse, Buzzshot, and the Reality Escape Convention. We truly appreciate your support of our mission to promote and improve the immersive gaming community. Buzzshot Buzzshot is Escape Room Software, Powering Business Growth, Player Marketing, and improving the Customer Experience. They offer an assortment of pre and post game features including robust waiver management, branded team photos, and streamlined review management for Yelp, TripAdvisor, Google Reviews, and Morty. Buzzshot now has integration with the other REPOD sponsors: Morty and COGS. Special Offer for REPOD Listeners: REPOD listeners get an extended 21-day free trial plus 20% off your first 3 months, with no set-up fees or hidden charges. Visit buzzshot.com/repod to learn more about this exclusive offer. Support Us On Patreon Today Love escape rooms as much as we do? At Room Escape Artist, we’ve been analyzing, reviewing, and exploring the world of immersive games since 2014. We help players find the best experiences, and push the industry forward with well-researched, rational, and reasonably humorous escape room and immersive gaming content and events. By becoming a Patreon supporter, you're not just backing a blog — you're fueling a mission to make the escape room and immersive gaming community stronger, more thoughtful, and more connected. Access exclusive Patreon content such as: The Bonus AftershowThe Spoilers ClubEarly access to escape room Tour tickets and REA articles. Your Patreon support goes toward our mission: paying our contributors, funding our infrastructure, and supporting deep research and industry advocacy. PG's Playhouse If you love wordplay, puzzles, and trivia, this is the podcast for you! PG's Playhouse recreates a fun game night, all in a short, 30-minute format. Of course, what’s game night without making new friends? We bring on different guests for the different episodes. Each episode features a puzzle packed with wordplay and trivia, a short chat with the guest, and a segment exploring an interesting topic. I hope you’ll take a listen and play along with us at PG’s Playhouse. Reality Escape Convention Our convention, RECON, will be in Laval, Quebec Canada on August 16th & 17th, 2026. RECON offers a curated collection of talks and experiences exploring the business and art of escape room and immersive game creation. All are welcome at this event that is crafted around professionals and aspiring professionals. Production Credits Hosted by David Spira & Peih-Gee Law Produced by Theresa Piazza Supported by Lisa Spira Edited by Steve Ewing Music by Ryan Elder Logo by Janine Pracht
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    1 Std. und 1 Min.
Noch keine Rezensionen vorhanden