On the third floor of the Destiny USA shopping mall, an Easter Island head greets visitors as they enter the Museum of Intrigue, where they can explore a salvaged pirate ship, a replica of a 16th-century dining hall, and relics from Mayan ruins.

However, all is not as it seems at the Museum of Intrigue. Everything is fake. Instead of priceless artifacts, the “exhibits” are filled with props. The artwork are mass-produced prints, the dinosaur bones are models, and the samurai armor is a costume.

The staff seen at the museum last Saturday was an absurd bunch. The desk was manned by the spoiled-rotten daughter of the museum’s founder, whose avant-garde makeup and fashion sense was hard to miss. Roaming from exhibit to exhibit, rearranging the fake artifacts was a man whose fashion sense is stuck in the 80s. Constructing new exhibits, helping guests, and occasionally participating in scientific experiments, was a clone.

The Museum of Intrigue is an elaborate scavenger hunt and live-action roleplaying game set in a fake museum. The Facebook page describes it as “a playground for the mind.”

In this “museum,” there are “exhibits,” and attached to each “exhibit” is a mystery. Visitors choose what mystery they wish to solve. With a series of clues and help from the floor actors, visitors discover why a team of Arctic explorers disappeared, where the mysterious voice in the laboratory is coming from, what is in the ominous crypt and who is opening it every night.

These experiences can be compared to an augmented reality game without the digital aspect or an escape room. An escape room is a life-sized puzzle game in which players must find codes and solve riddles in order to physically escape a locked room.

Supervisor and floor actor Leila Dean said, “We basically took the idea of an escape room and eliminated all the things that made it stressful. You're not locked in a room, you're not timed, you're able to roam around an entire 9,000 square-foot space without being stressed out.” Dean’s character, Sally, runs the front of the house.

“Sally is a character that I play, who is the daughter of one of the museum’s founders and has her job strictly because of nepotism,” Dean said. “She’s lazy, she cuts corners, and she does all she can to sabotage everything.”

Also found roaming about the museum is game and set designer Derrick “Deus” Petrelli Liszczak. On the floor, he is Clone 190. Liszczak has worked at the Museum of Intrigue for almost two years, and he previously worked for Universal Studios’ Halloween Horror Nights.

“Prop-making, costuming, and things of that nature have always been a passion of mine,” Liszczak said. “To have the opportunity and the ability to work in a place where I get to build and play games with people all day—I can’t argue with that.”

The founders and staff of the Museum of Intrigue pride themselves on creating the first business of its kind in Upstate New York. The Museum of Intrigue comes from the creators of Escape the Estate, an escape room experience in Shoppingtown Mall. The former location of Escape the Estate now serves as the creative construction studio for the museum. Co-owner Nicole Ginsburg said the team wanted to break out of the limitations faced in the interactive entertainment industry.

“We were looking for something that we could bring into a larger market and create more accessibility for more people,” Ginsburg said. “The industry is kind of limited to a book-ahead mode, but we were really hoping to do something that people could walk in and experience, plus be able to interact with multiple things, not just a room or two.”

Set builder and floor actor Josh Taylor said, “There’s nothing like us out there right now.” Taylor’s character, Lonnie, loves everything from 1980s pop culture and fashion. He dons band t-shirts and a wild mullet.

The Museum of Intrigue is a family-friendly way to celebrate the upcoming Halloween season. There are plenty of stories fit for families with young children looking for fun instead of fright.

“It’s a cool option if you’re looking for something indoors to do in October, but it’s not scary,” Taylor said. “We’re not really here for the scares.”

The business does offer stories for those looking to get their hearts racing. Beginning Oct. 5, groups of 15 people or more can rent the entire space and complete “A Mysterious Invitation,” an interactive murder mystery in which guests must discover who in their group is the killer.

For those looking for a truly horrifying experience, visitors can go to the Museum of Intrigue on the evening of October 13 to complete “The Rise of the Dark One,” an experience that must be completed in total darkness. Both experiences launch what staff calls Intrigue 2.0, a celebration of the museum’s second anniversary.

Shorter stories, which take about 30 minutes to complete, are $15. Medium-length stories are $25, and the longest stories are $29.

Many experiences are currently under construction to prepare for Intrigue 2.0, but there is no shortage of fun to be had this Halloween season.