Ravn may be a recent addition to the Escape Simulator Workshop, but he’s already made a big impression. Hailing from Denmark with a background in real-life escape room design, Ravn burst onto the scene with The Fable of the Frog King, a charming and clever entry that earned him first place in the Rookie Builders category of The Artifact Challenge Build-a-Room competition.
We sat down with Ravn to learn more about his background, what sparked his journey into Escape Simulator room design, and how a simple idea for a friend’s livestream turned into a full-blown passion for building. From winning contests to obsessing over 0.1-second animation tweaks, Ravn shares insight into his design process, inspirations, and what’s coming next.
Let’s jump in and get to know the builder behind the frog.
What inspired you to start creating community rooms?
One of my friends used to be part of a small YouTube gaming channel, and I thought a great way to support them would be to build a custom virtual escape room that they could play together on stream.
That’s how I discovered Escape Simulator in December 2021, and by March the 3-player coop room was done, filled with puzzles based on inside jokes and content from their videos.
The stream had a very rough start. I had forgotten to update the room after making the final changes, so I realized 20 minutes in that they were on a broken unfinished build and would have to restart the game AND wait for me to publish the update. Whoooops! Fortunately, they still seemed to love the experience!
Your workshop showcases a strong creative style. How would you describe your approach to designing escape rooms?
I’m definitely highly motivated by concepts that are unique and fun. For my last two projects, which were both competition rooms, I spent the first few days just thinking about what I could do with the constraints presented by the rules. Once an interesting idea had formed in my head, however, I worked almost nonstop on it.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3266496526
I’m also a bit of a perfectionist. I’ll spend way too much time testing whether an animation works better with a 0.6 or 0.7 second duration and I’ll add features and quality-of-life improvements weeks after a room has been published. I’ve also got the Twitch page for Escape Simulator bookmarked so I can catch streamers playing my rooms and take notes.
Where do you usually start? Do you focus on puzzles first, or do you build a theme and environment before adding mechanics?
Once I have an idea and start developing it, I make a text document and write down all the interactions, elements, themes, story beats, etc. that I can think of and would want to include.
The list is then gradually reorganized and the various items removed, transformed or expanded upon as I build the room. The puzzles then usually create themselves as I flesh out interactions, play around with stuff in the editor, and figure out the flow of the game.
The Fable of the Frog King won first place in the Rookie Category in the 2025 Artifact Challenge. Can you share the story behind this room?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3420204256
I can certainly try (though most of that time is now shrouded in a stress-induced and sleep-deprived haze)!
For this competition, I experienced some rough “builder’s block” the first few days. I had no idea what to do with the 10 artifacts and wasn’t even sure if I’d end up participating.
Eventually my lack of inspiration turned into a source of inspiration when the concept of a writer unable to create a story due to uncooperative material formed in my head.
It sounded fun to be that annoying character that refused to do as the narrator narrated, messed with his bookmarks and changed the story.
The story wrote itself from there, though it did morph quite a bit.
How did it feel to achieve the recognition of the best rookie builder?
Thank you so much! (Quick shoutout to Ubi Popo, whose Pineville Zoo was my personal favourite! <3 )
I was super happy and thankful to win! I was also very surprised, as I wasn’t completely satisfied with the room myself, but I’ve made a huge update to it on May 22nd, adding a bunch of new NPCs, locations, puzzles and a reworked end game.
The room is now about an hour long and a much more fulfilling experience.
Is there a particular puzzle or design element in one of your rooms that you are especially proud of?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3357120383
The Human Institute of Having Hands is definitely my own favourite, and I could mention a bunch of stuff from it. Seeing streamers figure out the catapult puzzle in part 2 and timing their hand gestures is always such a joy, though, so I’ll go with that one.
Are there any builders in the Escape Simulator community whose work you admire or draw inspiration from?
Oh my god, so many people, how long a list can I make here?
I really admire Zesty Mordant’s Devilish Diorama series. It’s already been mentioned by everyone who’s played it, but they’re such masterclasses in game design.
Super fun to play, an incredibly unique concept, mind-bending puzzles that are difficult but completely fair and an interesting story all merged into a tight but cohesive package. It’s basically the room(s) I most wish I’d made.
Wollo makes some incredible stuff - some of the best puzzle ideas occasionally merged with surprisingly emotional stories.
GG3L and apa_games are masters when it comes to coding and Blender and they’re some of the most helpful people I’ve talked to on the Pine Discord.
Cool Cash! is a love letter to game shows, featuring 16 different rooms with themed mini-games inspired by shows like The Price is Right and The Crystal Maze. What inspired you to create a game-show-themed escape room, and did you face any unique challenges you'd like to share with the Escape Simulator community?
I was actually inspired by the big Versus update! I wanted to make a huge open game with a ton of puzzles that players were rushing around to solve as fast as possible.
It may have been a bit too ambitious, considering it was the first public room I made, and it ended up taking 10 months of on/off work to complete.
LUA seemed way too difficult to try to get into at the time, so I decided early on that I wanted to make everything exclusively in the editor. I could probably have shaved off quite a few months of development time if I’d just used LUA…
The Human Institute of Having Hands is designed exclusively for 2-4 players, emphasizing communication and cooperation. What motivated you to create a co-op-only experience, and how did you ensure that the puzzles required effective teamwork?
I’d wanted to make a true co-op experience after Cool Cash, which was mainly made for singleplayer and versus mode, and I generally love the rooms where players are split up and need to communicate to progress.
To be honest, this turned out to be fairly easy (and incredibly fun!) to design. I have two tips; 1) make sure not a single puzzle can be completed entirely by one side. You want players to be active, talking and sharing knowledge, not waiting while the other is working quietly on their own stuff; 2) make the rooms asymmetrical. You want players describing what they can see and do, not able to guess what’s in the other room.
Now that you’ve made a name for yourself in the community, do you have any ambitious projects or ideas you’d love to explore in future rooms?
Oh man, I have more ideas than I have time to build, unfortunately!
I’ve long had an idea for a horror room that involves exploring the dreams of sleeping people, and I’ve also wanted to do a silly room that explores the history and purpose of the Escape Simulator tokens.
A lot of people have been asking about an Institute of Having Feet as well…
I’d also really love to be part of a collab sometime! I considered joining the World Tour late in development, but couldn’t think of an interesting idea for a country.
If you could add a new feature or tool to Escape Simulator, what would it be and why?
The curated lists of recommended community rooms are good, and I'd like to see continued and consistent curation, but there are a lot of features from the Steam workshop I'd really like to see in the game app as well. List of the all time best rooms, votes by users. Browsing with filters. Important game properties being visible (length, difficulty, number of players).
Any advice for newcomers who want to start building their own rooms but don’t know where to begin?
Check out what others have built. Find inspiration, but don’t copy.
Join the Pine Discord, there’s so much help and so many ressources to find there.
Don’t be afraid to ask stupid questions, but also do your best to research first.
Get other people to test your room and your puzzles - test early and often.
Make something you think is fun!
So, whether it's frogs, hands, or high-stakes game shows, Ravn continues to push creative boundaries, and we can't wait to see what he builds next!
In the meantime, check out our playlist of Ravn’s creations.
Wanna be like Ravn and our other Builders? What's stopping you!
Get started with The official ES wiki and make sure to join our incredible Discord community.