After meeting in 2015, Laura and Max became so enthusiastic about escape room games that their hobby quickly turned into a shared passion. The first escape rooms they played in Budapest left a lasting impression, and soon they were spending their evenings brainstorming a new kind of concept.
Why should an escape room experience be tied to a single room?
Could the same atmosphere, collaboration, and sense of discovery be brought directly to people's own events?
The first ideas were born during our evening conversations before going to sleep.
Laura brought a service design perspective to the table, while Max explored how technology and game mechanics could be used to build a new kind of experience. Gradually, an idea began to take shape for a concept that would combine:
The goal wasn't just to create a small game to take along.
“We wanted to build an experience that would actually work in different types of events — from small team days to large corporate functions,” says Max.
Founded in 2017, Cryptic Cargo was one of the world's first truly mobile event escape room concepts, and it remains a quite unique way to deliver escape room experiences for various events across Finland.
Once the first games were completed, they were tested at various events.
“We quickly noticed that people threw themselves into it much more intensely than we had expected,” says Laura.
As teams tried to solve tasks under time pressure, a standard corporate event instantly became much more energetic and communal. A competitive spirit emerged naturally; people laughed, got excited, and kept talking about the experience long after the game ended.
The concept quickly gained international attention as well. In 2019, Cryptic Cargo was invited to the finals of the INVIO Experience Technology Solution competition in Copenhagen and advanced to the semifinals of the Nordic Startup Awards in the "Best Creative Industry Startup" category. That same year, the company was recognized at the international Global Hospitality Awards as "Best Mobile Escape Room Experience 2019 – Finland" and placed in the Unikorni 2019 entrepreneurship competition. It all reinforced the feeling that the pair was building something truly innovative.
Around the same time, operations began to grow, and events started being organized all over Finland.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought the growth of the event industry to a halt almost overnight.
Although the situation was difficult, Cryptic Cargo did not want to stand still. During the pandemic, they developed new concepts and, among other things, implemented a custom game concept for Isosaari island in the Helsinki archipelago, which provided a communal activity during an extraordinary time.
At the same time, the development of game concepts continued, and the pair brainstormed how to build event experiences that were even more flexible for different situations.
Since the pandemic years, Cryptic Cargo has returned to a path of strong growth.
Over the years, Cryptic Cargo has:
Today, our games are widely played at team days, Christmas parties, kickoff events, trade fairs, client events, and seminars
…and in constantly new situations that the pair could not have even anticipated in the early years.
Laura sums it up: ”Nothing beats the moment when a team solves the final puzzle just before time runs out and the whole table celebrates their success together.
The best part is seeing how people from completely different backgrounds get excited about working together. Many are surprised themselves by how quickly they get swept up in the game.
Even though our games and events have evolved significantly over the years, one thing has remained the same:
We want to make corporate events more fun, engaging, and truly memorable.”
Today, Cryptic Cargo hosts events all across Finland and is constantly developing new ways to bring shared experiences to corporate events.
Although many things have changed over the years, the original idea remains the same:
The best memories are created in moments shared together.
