
Museum of Mechanics: Lockpicking
Welcome to the Museum of Mechanics: Lockpicking. We're happy to have you! Explore an interactive exhibition of meticulously recreated lockpicking minigames from throughout video game history.
Developer
Publisher
Release
January 13, 2022
4 years and 202 days ago
Steam Reviews
Mostly Positive53 reviews71.7%
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Game contextLatest: IGF Team
| ContextThe evidence factors used to assess whether this game belongs on IndieGame.Fan. | Status | Notes Latest Contributor: IGF TeamEdit notes |
|---|---|---|
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Updated: Jul 13, 2026Publisher scaleThe operating scale of the game's publisher. | ||
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Updated: Jul 13, 2026Creative controlWho appears to retain creative control of the game. | ||
Updated: Jul 13, 2026Release statusWhether and how the game has been released. |
Media
11 itemsAbout the Game
Welcome to the Museum of Mechanics: Lockpicking, an interactive,
meticulously recreated selection of lockpicking minigames from a variety
of genres across the history of games.
This isn’t a game with a story, or an ending; it’s not possible to ‘win’. It is also not a long experience, but one you will hopefully want to return to.
A Word from Designer Johnnemann Nordhagen
As a game designer, you often find yourself doing research on how other games do things - it's a good way to get ideas, see what works and what doesn't, and build an understanding of the space you're solving problems in. Usually this research involves buying a lot of games and playing until you get to the part you want to see, if you can remember the games that have it!
How nice it would be, I thought, if someone collected all the reference for particular ways of doing things in one place. Thus was born the Museum of Mechanics, and the first entry: Lockpicking. Many genres and types of games include lockpicking minigames, so I thought I would do an exploration of a broad swathe of them and gather them together in a single place. This is the result. I hope you'll join me in exploring the different ways this has been done through the history of games.
meticulously recreated selection of lockpicking minigames from a variety
of genres across the history of games.
FEATURES
- Challenge yourself against locks from dozens of game worlds
- Compare your skills with other players via Steam leaderboards
- Unlock the complete set of Steam achievements for mastering all the minigames
- Beat "The Door," a fiendish set of ever-changing locks from every exhibit in the Museum
- Read analysis on each minigame from a professional game designer
- Go deeper into the design of each game with our archived source code, and even implement them yourself, should you catch the lockpicking bug!
This isn’t a game with a story, or an ending; it’s not possible to ‘win’. It is also not a long experience, but one you will hopefully want to return to.
A Word from Designer Johnnemann Nordhagen
As a game designer, you often find yourself doing research on how other games do things - it's a good way to get ideas, see what works and what doesn't, and build an understanding of the space you're solving problems in. Usually this research involves buying a lot of games and playing until you get to the part you want to see, if you can remember the games that have it!
How nice it would be, I thought, if someone collected all the reference for particular ways of doing things in one place. Thus was born the Museum of Mechanics, and the first entry: Lockpicking. Many genres and types of games include lockpicking minigames, so I thought I would do an exploration of a broad swathe of them and gather them together in a single place. This is the result. I hope you'll join me in exploring the different ways this has been done through the history of games.