Backroom Scape
A first-person escape game in yellow rooms that never end: find the codes, pull the levers and walk out.
- Developer
- GAMEFREEX
- Released
- Updated
- Game engine
- HTML5 (WebGL, Babylon.js)
- Platforms
- Browser (desktop, mobile, tablet), installable app (PWA)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Controls
- Keyboard, Mouse, Touch, Controller
- Multiplayer
- Yes: online race or co-op in one shared zone (quick match or with friends), split screen and turns on one device
- Offline play
- Yes, once opened or saved with Download games for offline
- Price
- Free, no download, no sign-up
- Puzzle16
- 3D16
- WebGL17
- Portrait53
- Keyboard42
- Mouse55
- Multiplayer53
Controls
Computer
- WASD to walk, Shift to run, the mouse to look (click first)
- E or click to use, read and pick up
- F lamp, H hint, Tab inventory, Esc frees the mouse
Phone or tablet
- Left thumb walks, drag on the right to look
- Tap the screen or USE on what the dot points at
- The bag at the bottom is your inventory, ? gives hints
Controller
- Left stick: walk (press it or hold RT to run), right stick: look
- A: use, read, pick up
- X: lamp, Y: hint for the nearest puzzle
- LT: inventory, B: close a panel
- Start: pause
Backroom Scape: how to play, tips and FAQ
Written by the GAMEFREEX team.
Backroom Scape is a first-person escape game set in the kind of place you only half remember: low ceilings, yellow wallpaper, wet carpet, fluorescent tubes that buzz and sometimes stutter. There are no monsters and nothing chases you. The rooms are the problem.
Each of the 120 levels is a zone built from its own seed, cut into two to seven parts by locked doors. Every door has its lock right beside it: a keypad, a fuse box, a row of levers, symbol dials, a card reader, colored buttons, pipes or a valve. What opens it is somewhere you can already walk to, and quite often back where you came from.
The first levels are a key and a code on a note. By level 40 a door wants you to count the water coolers you passed, a key is broken in two and one half sits in a locker with its own code, and the exit room has three exits, only one of them real.
- Observation
- Memory
- Spatial reasoning
At a glance
- Levels
- 120, each built from a seed
- Locks per level
- 2 to 7, plus coded lockers
- Puzzle types
- 12 locks and the locker
- Modes
- Explore, Time trial, No hints, Hardcore
- Hints
- 3 steps per puzzle
- Multiplayer
- Split screen, online race or co-op
How to play Backroom Scape
- Walk with WASD (or the left half of a touch screen) and look with the mouse (or drag on the right). Point the dot at something and press E, click or tap to use it.
- Read everything pinned to the walls. Notes hold codes, posters show lever settings and dial symbols, sketches show which bulbs should be lit, a floor plan marks a hidden spot with an X.
- Items go to your inventory and get used on their own when you press E on the right lock. Broken key halves and the valve parts must be combined first: open the inventory (Tab, or the bag at the bottom) and press COMBINE.
- Some locks are about memory or your ears: the white button plays a sequence of lamps to repeat, an old radio plays a tune for the pipes. Its screen shows the colors too, so it works with the sound off.
- When the last lock opens, find the EXIT sign and walk through. The result screen shows the score; NEXT LEVEL keeps the run going, END RUN sends it to the leaderboard.
Controls, action by action
| Action | Computer | Phone or tablet |
|---|---|---|
| Walk | WASD or arrows, Shift to run | Left half of the screen: a stick appears under your thumb |
| Look | Mouse (click the game first), Esc frees it | Drag on the right half, or the gyroscope (Settings) |
| Use, read, pick up | E, Enter or click | Tap the screen or USE |
| Lamp | F | The lamp button at the top |
| Hint | H for the nearest puzzle, or ? for the list | ? at the top |
| Inventory and combining | Tab or I | The bag at the bottom |
| Keypads | Number keys, Backspace, Enter | The keypad on screen |
The puzzles, in the order they show up
Level 1 has a key on the floor and a door code on a note. Fuses come at level 2 (a fuse box missing one to three), levers at 4 (a poster shows which go up), counting at 6 (the keypad asks how many water coolers, wall clocks, wet floor signs, wall phones or dead plants there are where you can walk), key halves at 9, symbol dials at 12, light switches at 16, the floor plan with an X at 20, the lamp sequence at 24, the pipe tune at 30 and the valve at 35.
From level 14 an item is sometimes locked in a locker with its own code. From level 28 the exit room can hold three exits and a note saying which is real. From level 40 codes can be split over two or three notes, from 45 a light switch can flip its neighbors too, from 50 the lamp sequence can play in a different room from its buttons, and from 60 some wings have no power until you find their breaker.
Score
A level is worth 800 plus 20 per level number, plus up to 2,500 for time (6 points per second under 1.6 times the par) and 150 per almond water bottle or lost note found. Time trial adds 800 when you beat the par. Hints take a share of the score per puzzle: 6% for a nudge, 14% once you opened the second step, 30% for the answer, never below 30% of the total. Each wrong exit costs 150. No hints adds 50% at the end, Hardcore 60%.
A run is the levels you play in a row. Its score goes to the leaderboard when you press END RUN. Almond water bottles also give 3 Freex Coins each on top of the usual reward.
Lamps and almond water
Seven lamps change the light you carry: a pocket torch, a wide camp lantern, a narrow cold LED, a green glow stick, a brass miner lamp, a flickering candle jar and a black light. They cost 150 to 450 Freex Coins and change nothing else. Almond water bottles you find are kept between levels and pay for first hints with no score cost.
Tips to score higher
- Before you leave a part of the zone, read every note in it. Codes for doors three rooms later are often pinned near the start.
- The compass at the top and the hints both use north, east, south and west, so 'about 12 m north-west of the door' is easy to follow.
- Hints come in three steps and only the step you open costs score. Almond water bottles you find pay for a first hint without any score cost.
- In Hardcore your lamp drains over each level. Almond water refills a quarter of it, so pick up the bottles you see.
Common mistakes
- Rushing to the next door. Read the notes in each part of the zone first: walking back later costs far more time.
- Counting only one room in a counting lock. It asks about everything you can walk to before that door, corridors included.
- Pressing E on a door instead of its lock. The door only tells you what its lock wants; the keypad, levers or fuse box sit beside it.
- Taking the first exit you see on a three-exit level. The other two send you back to the start, and in Hardcore they end the run.
Backroom Scape FAQ
Is it scary?+
It is meant to feel uneasy, not to frighten: empty rooms, humming lights, far-off sounds and a few dark wings. Nothing attacks you, nothing jumps out, and there is no blood. The worst a wrong exit does is send you back to where you started.
Can every level be finished?+
Yes. Each of the 120 levels is solved by a script that plays it with the game's own rules, reading only what a player can see (notes, posters, the radio's tune, the props in the rooms), on a 25 cm walking grid. The par time of each level comes from that run.
What do the modes change?+
Explore is the normal game. Time trial adds 800 points when you beat the par time. No hints locks the hints and multiplies the score by 1.5. Hardcore plays levels in a row with one life: your lamp drains, and a wrong exit or an empty lamp ends the run, for 1.6 times the score.
Can I play with friends?+
Yes. 2 PLAYERS splits the screen for two people in the same zone (player 2 needs a controller). Online, the host of the room picks a race on the same zone or co-op in one shared zone where a door opened by one is open for all. On one device, Multiplayer on the game page lets players take turns on the same zone.
Is my progress saved?+
Yes. Unlocked levels, best scores and times, found bottles and notes, almond water and lamps are kept in this browser, and in your account when you are signed in, so they follow you to another device.