Antwerp (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – The Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp (KMSKA) introduces escape game entertainment for visitors. The game requires players to solve encrypted messages while searching for a missing artwork.
The Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp (KMSKA) has introduced an innovative escape game called “Museum Mysteries,” allowing visitors to solve puzzles and track down a “lost painting” within the museum. On Thursday evening, the game started offering an experience where people explored art combined with puzzles, which led participants to decode messages and discover deep artistry in selected masterpieces. One to four players can experience this escape game at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts by paying €49.90 with their museum admission fee in advance, up to three hours before their visit.
The Kobe Heleven escape game allows participants to solve riddles and puzzles through their smartphones to navigate the museum. Players view enlarged artwork pictures before they must search through museum rooms to find both word and number decoding elements. “This assignment is super difficult,” remarked a group of friends attempting the game, highlighting the challenge of decoding Morse code to collect correct letters. Keshia Vleminx, KMSKA’s hospitality manager, emphasised that the game aims to provide an immersive experience, potentially attracting new audiences while encouraging a deeper appreciation of the museum’s collection.
“We want to offer our visitors an extra experience,”
Says Keshia Vleminx, hospitality manager of the KMSKA.
“Perhaps it will attract certain target groups that do not yet come to the museum. But the game also makes you look more deeply at certain works of art.”
“So it’s not exactly like an escape room,”
Says developer Kobe Heleven.
“The last thing you want is for everyone to walk around and break things. You play the game with your own smartphone. You can download the game on it after you buy it. And then you have to solve puzzles and riddles in the museum.”
“For example, you get to see highly zoomed-in images and you have to find them in a specific room, in specific works of art. In this way, you can find words or number codes that can help solve the mystery.”
What is the history behind KMSKA’s escape game?
The Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp (KMSKA) has introduced an escape game, “Museum Mysteries,” to enhance visitor engagement and attract new audiences. The game costs €49.90 per group with a four-person capacity while running for 90 minutes through advance reservations made up to three hours beforehand. The experience is open to people who are ten years of age or above, but they must join with an adult supervisor.
Among its 8,400 artworks, the KMSKA displays two major masterpieces by Rubens and Van Dyck. The initiative demonstrates the increasing popularity of educational experiences blended with interactive formats that Belgian museums now implement. Statistics from Statbel indicate that people in Belgium visited museums in greater numbers, 12%, in 2022 compared to previous years.
