Sarasota bar puts the reality in virtual reality

Back when I wrote my “best bar games” column series in the summer of 2017, I thought I had considered every option. 

There was pool/billiards, a bar staple since the dawn of time. There was ping-pong, a family favorite. And there was cornhole, a mindless way to socialize with (and make fun of) your friends. The only thing I did not get to do was a “throwing” game, which I rectified when I experienced ax throwing earlier this year. 

I thought that was the end of my time spent in bars for columns. Then I heard about Main Street's Escape Reality Downtown — the sister location of Escape Reality Sarasota, at Lockwood Ridge Road and University Parkway — and I knew that I had one more column left to write. 

Escape Reality, owned by Suzan Ponte and Michael Katzman, had a soft opening on March 1, but officially opened May 24. The place lives up to its name in multiple ways. It has a handful of video game stations chock full of your favorite 1980s and ‘90s arcade classics, plus a mini-basketball shooting station, an air hockey table and other amenities. Soon, Ponte said, the location will soon offer two escape room games, titled “Safecracker” and “The Inside Job,” where teams of two to six players try to break into a bank and walk away with “cash.” The games can be played in sequence (alone) or simultaneously, with teams competing against each other and a countdown clock to get the prize. 

But the main draw is the other part of the bar’s name, the reality part. As in, escaping it. The bar offers virtual reality games and experiences through HTC Vive headsets and controllers. The stations are sectioned off by black curtains, and the whole place is lit with neon bursts of color through the darkness, like an arcade. Esports? Well, it's close enough.

“People will stop and look and say, ‘What is this place?’” Whitney Thomas, the bar’s manager, said. “That’s how we get a lot of our draw.”

Most of these games are single-player — your friends can watch your progress on a television screen — but there are also two virtual reality escape room games you can play with a friend, both from Ubisoft, the maker of acclaimed video games series like Assassin’s Creed and Just Dance. 

Based on the recommendation of Michael Durham, the bar’s VR tech wizard, I tried Beat Saber, the hot VR game of 2019. It’s a rhythm game, one that requires the player to slice blocks with a lightsaber to the beat of a preselected song. The general concept will be familiar to anyone who has played Guitar Hero or Rock Band, but the immersive nature of the Vive’s headset made the experience unique. The bass of the songs pumps into each ear. You feel a vibration when your sabers touch, and each destruction of a block provides a solid oomph. It’s the closest I’ll ever get to feeling like The Hulk. I played on easy mode but I could tell that playing on harder settings could potentially provide a real workout. 

I also tried Nature Treks, a VR journey that places the user in one of a handful of unique environments, like the ocean floor or an African meadow. Once there, you can control the weather and day/night cycles, grow plants, make animals appear and search for ancient relics. While in the ocean, I discovered a wrecked airplane as a blue whale swam overhead, its cry echoing in my ears. This isn’t a game, per se. It’s an experience, and I found it quite relaxing. 

(To help connect this to sports fans: There are also VR golf and table tennis games, plus Rec Room, which features paintball, dodgeball, disc golf and more options.)

If you are itching for something different on a night out, Escape Reality Downtown fits the description. The drink menu features cocktails named after different video games, like the Triforce (from the Legend of Zelda series) and Donkey Kong (self-explanatory). If your last experience with VR was more than a decade ago, you might have a skewed perspective on how far the technology has come, even in the last two to three years. It’s an incredible experience, even if you don’t typically care about video games. And everyone is welcome to try.

“This is a family-friendly place,” Ponte said. “We are all ages. Yes, we serve drinks, but that’s not all we are about. We want this to be a chill, fun experience for everyone.”

For more information, visit escapesarasotavr.com.