Puzzle lovers have a chance to try one of the most perplexing team challenges when the Eden Project launches a live ’escape room’ on January 14.

Eden Escape: Alien Rescue is an interactive game where players are locked in a room for 45 minutes and have to solve a variety of puzzles and obstacles to save an alien from extinction.

The experience runs on selected dates from January 14 to February 19.

Escape rooms are growing in popularity for their challenges that test participants’ teamwork and puzzle-solving under time pressure. This is the first time Eden has introduced the experience.

Alien Rescue has been devised by one of the country’s top escape room design teams, Dean Rodgers and the Tom Sawyer Effect, who worked on London’s escape game Time Run and The Crystal Maze live experience.

It is supported by the Wellcome Trust and linked to the Invisible You­ – Human Microbiome exhibition in the Core and a new Invisible Worlds exhibition opening at Eden in 2018. 

Players have to act as scientists to work out the cure to save an alien and its species from extinction. If they fail in their mission, the alien could be lost forever and the players could be trapped.

Eden Escape: Alien Rescue can be played by groups of three to five aged eight and above. Two groups of five can also book to play at the same time.