Escape rooms keep gaining popularity.
You might have heard of them. The interactive game where you and a bunch of friends, or complete strangers, are locked in a room and have to solve a series of puzzles to get out -- oh, and you only have about an hour.
The scenarios are endless. Think Sherlock Holmes, Indiana Jones or Jail Break.
Patton Doyle is the co-founder of Decode Detroit, an escape room with a tech vibe located in Ann Arbor.
I recently stopped by to check out the game room where the main character is an artificial intelligence named Minerva.
Doyle explains that Minerva is an adolescent AI who's trying to learn more about the world. "Even ourselves, we're learning more about Minerva as the story evolves. Definitely within the escape room here Minerva's story is she wants to escape."
Doyle, who studied physics at the University of Michigan, went on to get a Master of Transportation at MIT, where he learned a variety of things -- from optimizing bus schedules to urban planning.
"I came back to Detroit and Southeast Michigan to be part of the resurgence of the regions' urban areas, not just Detroit, but Ann Arbor and some of the suburbs around Metro Detroit," he said.
Listen to the audio postcard above to hear the story.
(Subscribe to the Stateside podcast on iTunes, Google Play, or with this RSS link)
