We work in the field of communications. We've got this. That was kind of the thought – or at least my thought – as we prepared to enter an escape room at the newly created Twisted Limits in McHenry. It's all about working together, communicating, they told us as they gathered the five of us in a small, dimly lit room. A closed door awaited us.

“Just so you know,” Twisted Limits co-owner Keith DeSmet said with a smile, “we’ve had 130-some groups through here.” His voice grew quieter. “Only nine have made it out,” he said in a whisper.

Pshaw.

Of course, I had no concept of what exactly an escape room was and how I’d get out, but I had the ultimate faith in my coworkers here at the Northwest Herald. I glanced around the room. They looked, uh, a bit amused, or is that confusion?

“It’s definitely a brains over brawn activity,” DeSmet was saying. “Nothing needs to be ripped off a wall. If you play by the rules, you’re going to have a great time.”

“We see all sorts of crazy stuff in there,” the other Twisted Limits co-owner, Joe Panek, was adding. Something about clues everywhere, puzzles...

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I was focused on the door. Let’s do this.

A video prepped us. A spiky-haired, tattooed female hacker named Jackknife told us she’d be helping us break, enter and search the “Executive Disorder Room.” Our mission, she explained, was to infiltrate the private office of Gov. Curt Castle and secure evidence that confirms his ties to a criminal conspiracy. We’d have an hour to outwit Castle’s safeguards. The clock is ticking toward failure or victory…

Uh, yeah, we failed.

Another hour or 10 and we would have had it. I just know it.

Completely designed, created and built by DeSmet and Panek – who transformed an office space at 3735 W. Elm St. in downtown McHenry into two escape rooms with plans to eventually offer seven rooms and a corporate lounge – Twisted Limits is believed to offer the only escape rooms in this area.

Called “Behind the Curtain,” Twisted Limits’ second room challenges visitors-turned-investigators to work a dead-end case. An unexpected report of a disturbance leads them to the abandoned Reverie Theater.

“The Reverie isn’t quite as abandoned as its decrepit exterior would have you believe…” And so the adventure begins.

The earliest escape rooms – basically adventure games in which players are locked in a room and have to use elements of the room to solve a series of puzzles to either figure out a mystery, find hidden objects or escape within a set time limit – began overseas in about 2006.

“They’re called escape rooms, but they’re not always about escaping,” Panek said.

The rooms didn’t really find their place in the United States until about 2013.

Just a year ago, there only were a few in Illinois. Now the state has more than 20, with several in Chicago and the surrounding suburbs, Panek said.

DeSmet first approached Panek with the idea for a room a few years back.

“It was right up our alley,” said Panek, who’d worked with DeSmet on previous endeavors, including a haunted trail in 2009 in McHenry.

The two eventually visited escape rooms in Wisconsin and elsewhere. They didn’t start building their own until last summer. Unlike others, they said, they offer a more professional atmosphere with a lobby, free snacks and drinks for visitors and plans for the lounge, or party room, to include a pool table and other perks for companies and large groups to hang out.

Although Twisted Limits began offering its two escape rooms to the public in late March, a grand opening is planned, possibly for October, when a third room is expected to be finished.

Set in a classy high-rise condo on New Year’s Eve, the third room is more about actually escaping than the others, Panek said. “Things take a little bit of a turn, and you’re kind of in a race for your life,” he said. “Without saying too much, it’s more of a thrill.”

The rooms cost $30 a person to take on and are recommended for ages 10 and older, although 7-year-olds have come to Twisted Limits and enjoyed it, the owners said.

“We’ll help them along the way, but we still have that level of entertainment and adrenaline running,” DeSmet said.

Groups with at least three people and no more than eight are recommended.

“It’s not like a law or anything,” Paneck said of the size. “We capped it at eight people a time in a room, just for the overall experience and having everybody being able to enjoy it.”

Those who want to try it out are asked to book a room at www.twistedlimits.com or by calling 815-331-8857. Walk-ins occasionally are welcome, with strangers paired up if need be, and groups smaller than three and larger than eight have done it.

“It’s happened,” Panek said. “Somebody might walk in, and they’re curious. We’ve had couples come in insistent on doing it [alone] as a couple, and we can adapt.”

Speaking from experience, once you’ve done it – and failed (likely if you’ve succeeded, too, although I don’t know what that feels like) – you’re ready to adapt yourself – into more of an escape room expert. Whatever that is. I guess what I’m trying to say is you want to do it again.

Man, we should have found that clue, figured out that lock, opened that secret door...

As Panek puts it, “You can’t really duplicate that adrenaline rush when you get a lock open or solve something.

“I think people like it because it’s something different,” he said. “Everybody’s used to the same ol’ things. ‘Let’s go bowling or to a movie.’ But I think it’s the interaction, the social aspect of it, of being able to go out with friends or family. It’s a bonding experience that can happen.”

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s nice. But it’d also be nice to figure the dang thing out next time.