There are many articles in the Community that demonstrate how to create a digital Escape Room or Treasure Hunt or Scavenger Trail using a Canvas Module and the Requirements feature.
When I create my Treasure Hunts or Escape Rooms, I usually use Canvas pages and embed a puzzle feature on to the page from a (usually free) Web 2 tool.
My current "go to" tools are as follows:
Lockee https://en.lockee.fr/
A digital lock site with over 15 different types of locks including Musical, Switches, Patterns and Geotagged. You need to create an account first. On each lock, you can add some feedback when the lock is opened. This can be text, images, sound, video and links which are great for revealing a code to open a room or a clue to go to the next task.
LearningApps LearningApps - interactive and multimedia learning blocks
Another free site with over 20 different quiz types including grouping, number lines, matching, ordering and pairs. each activity uses the same template so very easy to pick up. What I like about Learning Apps is there is no score at the end which makes the activity great for starters or group tasks. The Embed code appear on every template and when you embed on a Canvas page, you can further increase the size of the viewing. On each quiz game, you can write some text feedback which is great for revealing a code to open a room or a clue to go to the next task.
Puzzel.org https://puzzel.org/
This site not free but a year subscription is only $30. The site has over 20 games including crosswords, word searches, cryptograms, Wordle and Sliding shapes. What I really like about the games is they are very easy to set up and there are lots of enhancement features. You also get a separate feedback screen which is great for revealing a code to open a room or a clue to go to the next task.
Puzzle Me on https://amuselabs.com/
I recently discovered this site. You need to create an account to store your quizzes. On the site you can make Wordsearches, crosswords, word flowers (how many words you can come up with), jigsaws and Code words among others. I have only made one quiz on it which is a wordsearch but I really liked the options you were given eg provide picture clues instead of words:
Embedding is straightforward and one embedded, you can update the quiz (in my case - make corrections) at any time and the changes are kept. The quiz also has a separate feedback pop up box which is great for revealing a code to open a room or a clue to go to the next task.
La Digitale La Digitale - Open services for education
This was shared with me on social media. It is a French site but you can choose an EN option. Lots of free resources including the ability to download H5P to make quizzes offline. I have been playing with the digital locks. There are a lot more features that Lockee including ordering, matching, word search and the embedding element is very impressive indeed. The quiz also has a separate feedback pop up box which is great for revealing a code to open a room or a clue to go to the next task.
Have a look at Marie Allirot's wonderful post on genially explaining the different types of locks - Locks La Digitale (genial.ly)
In my last Escape game, I included a Canvas New Quizzes as part of the activity. I knew that you can password protect the quiz in Settings and this would make a great feature to unlock a room:
Students have to enter the password to start the quiz eg
What I didn't realise, was that when the quiz opens, in addition to the password box, you can see the title page with instructions!
I took a digital lock that I made on Las Digitale and then copied the <iframe> embed code into the introduction and wow! You can play and solve the puzzle embedded on the title page and then enter the password in the pop-up to open the quiz!
This certainly adds another dimension and feature when making Treasure Hunt/Escape Room style games.
So a few thoughts about gamification. If anyone has any other free tools they use to embed content on pages, I would love to hear about them. Post a comment below and get in touch...
