Summarize the following:
This may sound obvious, but if your ultimate goal is to win an escape room, you should choose your team wisely. Send out an email or group message to people you know who have talked about escape rooms, enjoy games and puzzles, have a sense of humor, or generally work well with others. Keep in mind that it's better to go with acquaintances or coworkers who are excited about the idea and want to win than with your best friend who thinks the idea is sort of stupid or won't play along well with the team. If you can't organize a group to go, many escape room locations offer public bookings, where your teammates will be other individuals or pairs who are strangers. This can work well for a last-minute date idea or if you're traveling. Each escape room has a limit for the number of people who can play the room. Call ahead of time to find out what the maximum capacities are for the escape room you're going to, and plan to book your group at around 70-80% of that number. Filling the room to maximum capacity can cause you to run into a couple of problems, like physical crowdedness, not having enough things for everyone to work on, and trouble keeping everyone up to speed on progress. Some people are great at math puzzles, some enjoy visual puzzles or word games, and others are good at noticing small details or staying organized. It helps to know who can contribute what to the game ahead of time, so try to spend even just 10 minutes discussing what you think each of you will be best at during the game. When you get to the room, you can have a loose plan of what types of clues each person will try to focus on while you play. There are 2 main styles of escape rooms: Japanese style, which uses more observational clues in a large space with many objects, and Norwegian style, which is a mostly plain room centered on the puzzles themselves. If you have an option for room style, discuss with your team which they prefer and choose one that most team members will be happy with. Both styles are challenging, just in different ways. In Japanese style rooms, part of the challenge is finding clues in objects, and determining how they fit together. In Norwegian style rooms, the puzzles themselves tend to be more challenging.
Go with enthusiastic players. Resist the urge to play with the maximum number of people allowed. Discuss the personal strengths of your teammates ahead of time if you can. Choose a room that fits the interests of your teammates.