"The escape game allows me to combine my passions for manufacturing and gaming".
As Production and Methods Manager at Kryptex, Francis Tschantz is responsible for finding the right subcontractors and organizing in-house production. But with a background in cabinet-making, this escape game player also puts his skills to good use in manufacturing. He looks back at some of his favorite projects.
What is your initial training? What brought you to escape games?
I have an atypical background, which has nothing to do with escape games. I trained as a micro-technician, working in robotics and programming, before moving on to become a project manager in the same field. Then I decided to make a change. I really wanted to design, so I retrained as a cabinetmaker. I've always been very interested in manufacturing in general. I made things in the workshop, then installed them on site. Then I worked as a project manager for luxury fittings in the watchmaking and packaging industries. The escape game adventure began when I met Bruno Pouget, who was looking for a methods manager. It took me out of the luxury sector, and I found it a fascinating field. It also allowed me to combine my passions for manufacturing and gaming. Basically, I'm a big escape game player. And I became passionate about the field. In escape games, there's a multitude of fields all rolled into one. I was able to combine several of my passions and skills into a single role.
What interests you about escape games?
No two days are alike, no two projects are the same. In the escape game business, customers are constantly on the lookout for novelty, new mechanisms, complexity and tailor-made solutions. It's a daily challenge to find solutions that can be achieved within the given budget. As production manager, my role is to respond to these constraints by finding solutions with my team and my network of subcontractors. Alongside this, my role as Methods Manager is to set up working methods so that our teams can work more efficiently and enjoyably, both in project management and in production in general. These two facets suit me perfectly, creating magnificent projects while at the same time listening to the people I work with to put in place processes that benefit everyone.
Which projects are you most proud of?
Le Crime de L'Orient Express is my favorite, since it involved one of my old passions, namely woodworking. I really enjoyed working on Le Cas Mathilda, a horrific escape game. For the first project, the challenge was to reproduce the great luxury of this period train with limited means. I played two major roles in this project: a technical role in the search for the right material, and a role in the manufacture in the workshop and installation on site. I also made a games box, La Prisoner's box, a futuristic box about a temporal rift. I did all the technical design and manufacturing. I had a blast on this project. The Battle Box project, with two twin boxes, which had a steampunk feel and lots of mechanisms. I did the technical design and some of the manufacturing, before the project management took over completely.