The final puzzle sequence is delivered to the player after the brief interlude with the Escape Academy protagonist. It's ranked as the toughest escape room yet, but Escape Academy's true villain is 45 minutes away from success unless the player can solve the puzzles in time.
The following series of puzzles revisit the toughest moments from previous levels, with a surprise twist that serves as the final exam for the Escape Academy. The heightened difficulty and time pressure could be quite daunting for even experienced players, but this guide will outline each step and all solutions.
Start the Final Exam
After departing the elevator, players will see the Headmistress trapped in a containment field surrounded by prospective student pods. Quanty has taken over and offers a time limit, which can be seen by heading up the stairs towards the back of the room.
In order to get some useful guidance, begin by moving over to the statues on the right side of the room; on the statue of the Headmistress is a pair of glasses. Once the glasses are picked up, special messages written in pink by the Headmistress will be visible.
Begin by looking at the lockers; the first one is locked with a dial padlock, but the other three can be opened. On the inside, an order of symbols are visible that unlocks the Headmistress' locker: Start at zero, then move 10 right, 25 left, and finally 15 right.
Once successfully opened, the locker will reveal a testing sheet and pin used for escaping the room. Move to the room's exit, which has a machine next to the door and a display board.
Putting the testing sheet in the machine will allow the player to mark off the first layer like a multiple-choice exam paper. Prudent players will realize the display message ("Only an ACE may enter") means the letters A C and E need to be submitted to unlock the door.
How to Solve the Color Floor Puzzle
The next room is lit up like Quanty's Disco Fever level, but a different method needs to be used for solving. Using the colored squares shown on the screen will show the order that needs to be followed.
The first clue requires the player to start at the blue center square before moving forwards to green, then left two squares. This path will lead to a torch, which, when activated, will also change the clue for the next torch path.
When all torches have been activated, examine the symbols beneath each lit torch. Use the letters and the filled circle symbols beneath each torch to work out the order for the testing sheet.
Before inputting the testing sheet and opening the door, it is possible to examine the shelving units in the vicinity. On one shelf is a dead 12-volt battery, which won't be used until much later but saves the player needing to backtrack.
The solution to this room is B C and D. Input these letters once the testing sheet is in the machine to unlock the next puzzle room.
Solving the Pipe Board Light Puzzle
The next room has a lethal voltage pipe board, much like a previous puzzle. The difference here is that not all bulbs can be lit in one run, so players have to use all of them and remember the order of correct bulbs.
There are multiple ways of ascertaining the correct paths, but once certain bulbs are lit up, they will be green or white. The bulbs that light up green will denote a letter that needs to be used on the resting sheet.
The correct bulbs are A D and E; putting the testing sheet into the machine and selecting these options will open the door for the next room.
Accessing the Hidden Vent
Before entering the next room lit up in orange, a conspicuous vent can be seen. It is possible to unscrew the bolts using the Headmaster's Pin item, which was retrieved from the starting locker.
Inside here is Quanty's mainframe in full, with three chambers that can be used to deactivate him. However, the components for doing so have not been collected yet, so it is recommended to enter this zone after completing the final puzzle.
Solving the Morse Code Pillars Room
The fourth room yields pillars of different heights with blinking Morse Code patterns on them. The main puzzle consists of looking at the blinking light pattern and matching it up to the letter it corresponds to.
Even once each pillar has been identified, players need to match up each pillar's position with the corresponding letter on the ground. The solution pattern goes in this height order (shortest to tallest): C - B - A - E - D.
Once they are in the right place, the top of the pillars will open and reveal a letter. Examine each pillar to see the letters with filled-in circles; the letters B and D only need to be input into the testing sheet in order to proceed.
Sorting the Chemical Crystal Puzzles
The fifth puzzle room presents a logic puzzle for determining the next clues required. There are five canisters labeled A-E with different liquids inside them.
The task here is to locate which canister(s) contain water by examining the combination of crystals when liquids are combined. For example, combining tanks B and C will yield green crystals, which hints that these two tanks are fluorine and cobalt oxide.
Using logic, only tank D can possibly have water (Tank A has Bromine, B has Fluoride, C has Cobalt Oxide, D has Water, E has Fluoride.) This means the only letter to put in the testing sheet is D, which will allow the player to re-enter the starting room.
How to Destroy Quanty's Mainframe
After apparently solving all the puzzle rooms, the timer still doesn't stop, and Quanty urges the player to head back to the student pods. However, looking at the doors reveals the final clue message from the Headmaster: "Poor Quanty. He's given you everything you need to defeat him. And he doesn't even realize it."
Heading back to the aforementioned vent to Quanty's inner mainframe reveals three sections that need to be destroyed with different means: one requires a power surge, the other needs liquid poured on it to cause a short circuit, and the last has a coded message.
The power surge requires the battery picked up from the shelves in the color tile room and a source of electricity to charge it. Once the battery has been obtained, head over to the electrical pipe board and use the dead battery on a nearby Tesla coil to charge it up successfully.
To save further backtracking, it is recommended to pick up Canister D from the crystal puzzle room before returning to the vent. The charged battery and canister are used to dismantle two of Quanty's components; simply plug in the battery and pour in the liquid at the appropriate locations in order to start dismantling it.
The final chamber requires the player to combine the completed test paper with the 5x5 grid of letters. Each marked off answer on the test paper corresponds to the disarm code, which spells out "SELF DESTRUCT" when activated.
Accessing Quanty's Internal System
The malevolent AI has not been defeated yet; shutting it off completely requires hitting the big red button on the mainframe's upper level. This can be accessed by another vent, seen higher up inside the fourth puzzle room with the differently sized pillars.
One part of the orange tracks go right up to the wall below the vent, cluing the player into the necessary next step. By building a makeshift staircase out of the other pillars, players can jump up to the top section and unscrew the vent with the Headmaster's pin.
How to Defeat Quanty's Computer Codes
After crawling through the vents, walk along the pathway to interact with the big red button. This button is meant to shut down Quanty, but a few more steps are required before that can happen.
Multiple screens appear in the center of the room that the player can interact with; each screen code has a series of letters that need to be decoded.
The first code, “PARA(M180O)OUNT (I)S STUDENT COM(P)LIANC(E),” simply means the letters I, P, and E need to be used along with the letter M rotated 180 degrees. This means the first screen code is WIPE.
“TOTAL CONTROL IS JUST THE (STARTOPPOSITE)" is the next code clue, hinting at a 4-letter word being the opposite of START. This is the word STOP, which manages to slow Quanty's processing power even more.
Using the brackets in the sentence “(F3)RIENDS(H7)IP I(S6) A WASTE OF R(E2,5)SOU(R1, 4)CES” denotes the position of each letter in the seven-letter code. Each bracket spells out REFRESH, which is the next clue to enter.
The penultimate code clue is “FUN I(S+2) A FOR(M+1) O(F-2) INEFFICIE(N+1)CY”, which uses a rotational cipher for the brackets to reveal the actual letter code. The word UNDO is spelled out by moving the letter positions forward and back as needed.
The final clue is perhaps the most difficult to deduce due to the combination of previous codes. “(CREAT(E3) THE BES(T+1-5) ESCA(P2,6)ISTS, (N4)O MATTER THE C(O1)ST.)OPPOSITE" uses previous computer codes to get a solution.
Using the numbered brackets like (E3) and (P2, 6) presents the letter order 'OPEN _ P,' and (T+1-5) is the letter U. This spells "open up," but that doesn't fit the space for the letters.
The final bracket encompasses the whole sentence, meaning the opposite meaning needs to be derived. The opposite of "OPEN" is "SHUT," and the opposite of "UP" is "DOWN," and typing in those two words will finally disable Quanty and complete the final puzzle.
Escape Academy is now available for PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.