A year after Swiggart's departure, the estate was still entangled in settlement proceedings (see Swiggart's Last Will). Before the last of the worthy heirs could be settled, there was one remaining task to complete. The room that was earlier used for vetting Swiggart's true friends was remodeled, returning it to its original, functional state. Previously sealed doors were restored, clutter was cleared, and staged furnishings were added. The room, the house, needed to be put on the market.

Ads were generated, the yard sign was posted, and a reference was added to the local listing service. There was a lot of early buzz, calls from interested parties flooded in. The executor to the estate was convinced that it would go in a heartbeat. It didn't. Weeks passed without even a hint of an offer.

Potential buyers came, and all were initially excited about the prospect of owning such an amazing little home, however when they all left, the level of enthusiasm had visibly faded to a sense of unease. It appeared to be a universal sentiment. After a few too many unsuccessful showings the realtors went fishing for feedback. Several potential buyers moved on without comment, refusing to relive the experience in their heads. A few respondents simply said, "It just didn't feel right." What was going on?

Finally, after some coaxing and prodding, one couple provided this insight... "The house is nice, and all. Actually, really nice! However, there were some strange happenings in there. First, the front door locked behind us when we entered. We weren't sure we were ever going to get out. Then, as we were making our way through the different rooms, trying to work out our escape, odd anomalies began to occur. We thought we were caught up in the Twilight Zone. Objects disappeared and reappeared. Things moved, seemingly on their own. We even felt, on several occasions, that we were being watched... Are you sure the previous owner is deceased? It was as if someone didn't want the house to sell!"

Players become potential buyers trapped in a haunted house, racing against time to escape by uncovering secrets, finding and using objects, and solving puzzles. Will they survive the spookiest open house ever - and still want to make an offer? Unlike traditional escape rooms, this adventure immerses players in a fully staged property where every room holds new surprises and interactive challenges.

Explore

Swiggarts house includes six elaborately staged rooms - six that we know of - and a long, picturesque hallway.

Search

Hidden within the house are twenty distinct objects that are necessary for escape. Some objects come in multiples.

What does one do with all this stuff?

Solve

A variety of puzzles and games stand between players and a timely escape. Beyond deciphering the purpose of scattered objects, they may face a fiendishly tricky twelve-piece jigsaw puzzle, a slide puzzle with a missing tile, or a high-pressure timed matching challenge. They might even need a little music theory to crack a code. Twists and turns hide surprises around every corner—including a few cleverly concealed secrets. Will anyone uncover them all and achieve the elusive perfect score of 300?

Our Story

GeWaLy Art began as an independent, small business owned and operated by Gerald and Jill Lynch. They started as Art and Craft providers. Initially they had art offerings on Fine Art America, and Art Pal, in the form of stipple and pointillism, art and architecture. They later transitioned that body of work to Etsy; their first shop on Etsy was called "GeWaLy Art". A second Etsy shop was opened with offerings that included custom-made/custom-designed quilts. The shop was opened in honor of Jill's grandmother, Stella, and it was appropriately called "Stella's Legacy". While going down the quilted path, it became clear that the artistic style, stipple, or pointillism, that was the basis of GeWaLy Art, could easily transfer to the quilting world by way of pixelation. Eventually they produced several pixel quilt patterns, and transformed the first Etsy shop into a sister entity to Stella's Legacy. Ultimately, they created two shops, a quilt shop, and a quilt pattern shop. Both shops are still alive, and still thrive, on Etsy, both retain a 5-star review rating.

Gerald also had a background in the computer world and over time became familiar with several programming or scripting languages, including VB, Java, and several web-based languages, e.g. HTML. With an art background and some knowledge of computer languages, Gerald decided to dive into the arena of PC Gaming. Several PC games, puzzle and maze related, were created, including a popular escape game called Swiggart's Last Will. Moving into PC Gaming seemed like a natural next step for the business. Many of the games produced by GeWaLy Art can be found on common gaming venues, such as Steam, Itch.io, and OperaGx. Some of the games are available for a nominal fee while others were provided free-to-play, simply for fun.

That brings us to our current offering, Escape the House that Swiggart Built. Coming off the heals of our somewhat successful release, Swiggart's Last Will - more than 100,000 plays on OperaGX - we decided to go bigger. More than an escape room, it is an escape house. The game includes better graphics, better design, more rooms, fun objects, and amazing games and puzzles. Some six months in the making, our newest game will not disappoint.

Coming soon to Kickstarter

Our game is currently available on Itch.io as a single player, Windows based, game. We would love to expand in a couple of ways: First, we would like to put the game on Steam, we are also looking at Google-Play. Beyond that we would like to know that it would get the support it needs from either of those platforms; Additionally, we would like to create the game cross-platform. We would like to create versions for Mac, for Linux, and for Android; Also, we would like to enhance, improve the graphics to make the game more visually appealing; Finally, we have other games, other ideas for games, that we would like to implement. Some of this takes money, and all of this takes time, which we all know is also money. That's why we are looking for a little kickstart.

Come, join the journey!

If you are interested in pledging when the campaign launches, send us an email by clicking on the button below. We would love to add you to our contact list. We will only use the list to provide updates and announcements for the Escape the House that Swiggart Built campaign.