Forum Discussion
A Full 60-Minute 360° Escape Room Built in Storyline
This project started during a one-month workation in Portugal.
I was staying in a beautiful little house overlooking the surfers’ beach in Arrifana.
It wasn’t one of those empty, soulless vacation rentals – the house had so much character. The decorations on the walls especially caught my attention because some of them almost looked like clues waiting to be solved.
So, alongside my client projects, I started building something just for fun.
I had wanted to experiment with Storyline’s 360° feature for a long time. I also wanted to see just how many triggers I could possibly squeeze into one project. 😉
Spoiler: There’s one slide with around 300 triggers. Can you guess which one?
But most of all, I had always wanted to build a proper digital escape room – not just a few simple puzzles connected by a Next button, but something challenging enough to give you that satisfying “YES! I figured it out!” feeling.
The scenario is simple: You’re a freelancer in Portugal with an important online meeting coming up. There’s just one problem: the internet isn’t working.
Time to explore the house...
How it works
I deliberately chose a very open structure.
There is no fixed order in which you have to solve the escape room. Instead, there are several interconnected paths, puzzles, items, and chains of events you can discover and work on simultaneously.
The house also changes depending on what you’ve already discovered or which items you’ve found.
And there might even be a second version of the house you can unlock...
But I probably shouldn’t say too much about that. 😉
Behind the scenes
One of my biggest design challenges was connecting traditional Storyline slides and puzzles with the 360° environments without making it feel like you were suddenly leaving the world of the escape room.
Another challenge was creating an inventory that worked naturally with the open structure of the game.
And then there’s the chick game.
That one nearly broke me.
It might also break you a little bit. Sorry! But it took me so long to build that there was absolutely no way I was taking it out again. You’ll just have to be fast. 😉
Technically, however, the hardest part wasn’t any individual interaction. It was keeping track of all the puzzles, variables, dependencies, and event chains – and making sure everything still worked logically when players could explore the house in almost any order.
I also used sounds, visual details, and hidden clues throughout the environment to help players make connections and notice when something has changed.
Making a difficult escape room playable
I wanted this escape room to be challenging. The goal was to create something that actually feels rewarding when you solve it.
After testing it with both experienced puzzle solvers and beginners, however, I realized that the open structure also makes it harder to connect the clues.
So I made a few puzzles slightly more forgiving and added optional hints. You can still try to solve everything completely on your own – but if you get stuck, help is there.
The full escape room takes approximately one hour, depending on how quickly you solve the puzzles.
I’d absolutely love it if some of you took the time to really play through it – especially fellow Storyline developers and escape-room fans.
And I’d love to hear your feedback: What worked? Where did you get stuck? Which interaction did you enjoy most? And, of course...
Did you land the project? 😉
9 Replies
wow - fantastic. Congrats... makes a lot of fun.
Thank you so much! I had so much fun building it, too! And now I kind of want to jump straight into creating the next one! 😂
Very very cool. And what a place! I couldn't get all the way thru it because the sudoku and the chick maze would take me way too long. I completed several of the puzzles and used many of the tools. Really fun. My only comment is about the fish stripes. Very hard to tell which ones were medium or small. So I gave up on that one. Overall, an amazing game. Congrats!
Hey, how cool that you played the room! 😍 Thank you so much for taking the time to explore it and for your lovely feedback!
And wow, if you made it to the Sudoku, you actually got really far! That means you figured out how to use the night vision goggles, which is something quite a few players struggle with! And you even unlocked the TV!
Now I'm curious: Did you also make it to the beach? Did you spot the sailboat from the terrace? Did you figure out what to do with the surfboards? And did the cats appear?
A little tip for the Sudoku: You can actually just guess the numbers! Whenever you enter the correct digit, the field turns green. So you don't necessarily have to solve the whole puzzle the traditional way. 😉
And thanks for pointing out the issue with the fish stripes! I had hoped that the larger square would indicate where the two-digit number goes, but apparently that wasn't quite clear enough. I'll think about how to make that more intuitive, maybe by highlighting the corresponding square. Here too, the field turns green as soon as you enter the correct number.
I really love hearing how people explore the room, which puzzles they figure out and where they get stuck. It's so interesting to see how differently everyone approaches the challenges!
Thanks again for playing and for sharing your experience! It really makes me happy to know that people are having fun exploring all those little details I put into the game. ❤️
ClaudiaSchee726 I reached out via email as well but wanted to say I played this for a full 45 minutes and had so much fun! I loved how atmospheric the rooms were. As someone who enjoys (but doesn't contribute much) to escape rooms IRL, this was such a fun way to showcase Storyline and build something creative!
Wow, thank you so much for your lovely feedback! It honestly makes me so happy to hear that you spent 45 minutes exploring the room and had so much fun!
Just a little hint: You’ll need the dog treats and the key to the locked room to move forward. Feel free to reach out if you’d like any more hints!
I put a lot of love and time into creating the atmosphere and all the little details, so it really means a lot to know that you enjoyed them. And yes, I absolutely love how Storyline allows us to get creative and build experiences that go far beyond traditional e-learning.
Thank you so much for taking the time to play and share your experience! You’ve really made my day!
Wow ClaudiaSchee726 , what a creative build!! I haven't had a chance to play it all the way through, but I love the concept and how you turned your real-world environment into this interactive escape room. How did you keep track of all the variables and dependencies while you were building? Did you map it all out first?
Hey Katie, so cool that you like the room! That makes me really happy!
I actually planned the room in my notebook. It wasn’t exactly a linear process, but more of a creative one. 😂 The good thing was that I had enough time in the house to take additional photos whenever I needed them.
What really helped me in Storyline was giving everything clear names, writing little notes here and there, and building the main parts within a relatively short period of time, so everything was still fresh in my mind.
I’d be really happy if you play the room and share it with others!
Greetings from Berlin!
ClaudiaPS: We'll be featuring this in an upcoming E-Learning Heroes newsletter.
