Laura E. Hall | |
Other Names: | L. E. Hall |
Occupation: | Game designer, puzzle designer, author |
Laura E. Hall is an American immersive artist, puzzle game designer, and writer. She has written several books about video games, immersive entertainment, and escape rooms.
Hall co-created one of the first escape rooms in the United States. In 2022, Hall was the subject of a documentary about solving an alternate reality game puzzle 14 years after it was set, called Finding Satoshi ("Japanese: "謎の日本人サトシ" ").[1]
Hall began participating in alternate reality games in college, and played Perplex City. She became invested in puzzles after moving to Portland and attending Puzzled Pint events.[2]
After Perplex City's completion in 2007, Hall continued to work on a puzzle that was still unsolved, Billion to One. The puzzle focused on exploring the concept of Six degrees of separation by presenting a man's photograph and his first name, "Satoshi", asking players to locate him. In 2020, Tom-Lucas Säger used image recognition software and located Satoshi, reporting it to Hall, who ran the website tracking information about the hunt.[3]
In 2022, Hall was the subject of a documentary about the Billion to One puzzle, Finding Satoshi.[4]
In 2014, Hall and five friends opened the first escape room game in the state of Oregon[5] and one of the first 22 escape rooms in the United States.[6] [7]
She has since created escape rooms and immersive experiences around the United States[8] and the world.[9]
Her installation art and games have appeared in the Portland Art Museum,[10] XOXO,[11] and the London Games Festival.[12]
Hall writes about films, games, and culture for Letterboxd,[13] Dan and Dave’s Art of Play,[14] A Profound Waste of Time,[15] and The Atlantic.[16]
In 2018, Hall published Katamari Damacy with Boss Fight Books about the creation of the 2004 video game Katamari Damacy, featuring interviews with creator Keita Takahashi.[17]
In 2021, Hall published Planning Your Escape: Strategy Secrets to Make You an Escape Room Superstar with Simon & Schuster, about the history of the immersive entertainment genre and a toolkit for new escape room players.[2]