The Escapists Reviews
If you're going to buy The Escapists, do your research first and make sure you know what you're getting into.
On one hand, I ended up feeling gratified and at peace doing menial mini-game-like tasks, including exercising and laundry duties. On the other, it seems like Team 17 and Mouldy Toof Studios don't want you playing the role of a prisoner at all.
It may have its minor frustrations but there's nothing here that really spoils what is an otherwise delightful and endlessly surprising game. It won't be for everyone, especially those who are unwilling to meet the game halfway and learn through trial and error, but those who welcome its open-ended challenge will find that a long stretch inside proves surprisingly enjoyable.
The Escapists is a break out success for Mouldy Toof studios. A must-play for indie gaming fans with a little patience.
[A failed attempt] will either steel you for the next attempt, or cause you to put the controller down in anger. If you're in the former group, the sheer wealth of options available to you, combined with the art style and the occasional laugh-out-loud moment, mean that The Escapists is definitely recommended.
Escaping prison should be more exciting than this. Strategizing is fun, but the amount of repetition gets tiresome
The Escapists makes breaking out of prison as hard as nails, yet soft as taffy.
The Escapists is a game for a very niche audience, as it doesn't provide much in the way of variety to deliver enough entertainment for long periods of time.
The Escapists is an interesting premise for a simulation-style game that offers numerous ways to tackle situations and lots of routines to keep track of. However, the cumbersome interface may impact the enjoyment of anyone playing with an Xbox controller, and with the promise of further updates and additions on the PC side, interested players may want to consider grabbing the game off of Steam instead, if possible.
Prison life isn't easy, that much I have learned from my time playing The Escapists. This game can be frustrating, make you angry, and want to quit altogether. That is, until that one thing you've been missing finally hits you and you make your escape out of a prison. It's a satisfying feeling that I haven't had from playing recent games. That feeling of accomplishment is one that a lot of mainstream games have lacked for some time. The Escapists, if you have the patience to figure it out without using walkthroughs, will leave you feeling a bit frustrated, but incredibly gratified. In a sea of ID@Xbox titles, The Escapists is one not to be missed.
You're enjoyment while planning the big escape in The Escapists depends on how much you enjoy building out your own fun in a sandbox prison environment. Watching a plan unfold is undoubtedly satisfying, but putting the plan in motion can be tedious. According to the developers, the game will eventually allow gamers to create and share their own prisons, given you a reason to keep the game installed long after you've escaped the included eight prisons.
The Escapists is an interesting concept and one that works well as a game. The visual style’s colourful and cute nature juxtaposed with the violent and gritty subject matter gives the game a dark comedy vibe not unlike games like Worms and Flockers.
. The concept behind The Escapists is strong, and the strategy is there. But I move at my own pace and care more about the atmosphere of a game than its underlying machinery, and I wish I had a shallow end to wade in for awhile instead of getting hurtled off the high dive.
The prison theme is under-represented in games, and a welcome change from the more oversaturated motifs we're often subject to (war, I'm looking at you). 'The Escapists' does have a lot of good ideas. It can't quite deliver on many of them due to a slow interface, weird AI and other design choices. It's a charming indie game that is welcome on the Xbox One but falls short overall.
The Escapists is an interesting game with very solid mechanics and enjoyable visuals. It can feel repetitive after a while and frustrating in certain moments.
Methodical and oddly compelling incarceration
The Escapists is a "deeper than appears" puzzler that will take some getting into, but the pay-off is worth it.
The Escapists can be hours of fun for those who enjoy a good challenge in a unique setting, but abundant troubleshooting can make this a hard sell for a mainstream audience.
The Escapists is excellent at what it does, there's no doubt about that, and it's cornered a market that nobody else dares to touch. It's generous with content, it's deep, and, at times, it's extremely satisfying. Still, it can be very tedious, and as such, unless you're actually in prison and have time to kill, there are probably better ways to spend your limited gaming hours. If the premise intrigues you then by all means give it a go – otherwise, you may want to refrain from spending your time behind bars.
The Escapists holds the methodical tedium of a prison life simulator with some escape mechanics built in, rather than a thrilling game in which you plan your escape. More focus on teaching the intricacies of the mechanics in-game would have done wonders for The Escapists and actually hatching and carrying out a master plan for escaping confinement, because at its core The Escapists is a thrilling concept. Instead we get stuck going through the motions like it's The Sims: Prison Life as we realize we're two months into our sentence and no closer to being on the other side of those bars than the day we got thrown into the joint. Time to hit the showers, boys!