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Escaping a prison in real life might not be an experience that you would want to try, but a game few years back by Team 17 called “The Escapists” gave you that chance to try virtually. Check guard patterns, scout the prison, follow the daily regime, don’t get beaten up by other inmates, gather tools, craft them and then escape by utilizing one of the various ways to escape the prison!

The game turned out to be rather popular, as the recently released sequel, “The Escapists 2” keeps up the heat that the old games made you experience in your endeavours to escape from the different prisons and made it even harder yet better all at once!

There is a brand-new combat system to be found in “The Escapists 2”, and that new system makes every prison brawl even more exciting and interactive than the previous from “The Escapists 1”.

In each of the new prisons, you get a little cutscene when first starting. It displays the locations of the cafeteria, gym, sometimes showers, your own cell and a unique weakness to the prison that can be used as the mainstream way to escape! This is brilliant, since in the first game you always had to start from scratch regarding the escape route, but now you have some knowledge about the prison in advance and have a pre-offered choice of a possible escape.

This feature doesn’t ruin the gameplay for you. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. “The Escapists 2” has cranked up the difficulty switch up by a fair amount. Heat goes up by a lot more now, because the A.i is more intelligent on both the inmates`s and the guards` end. In other words, low-end tools aren’t a free outta-jail card anymore, but most importantly you cannot save spam constantly anymore.

You can construct you very own prison with the help of the built-in prison map editor in “The Escapists 2”.

So the only time the game saves is during night-time, more specifically when you sleep. I personally goddamn love this feature. One of the biggest flaws in the original “The Escapists” was the possibility to constantly spam saves, giving access to unlimited attempts to escape with little to no punishment. As a comparison, the old game would still save during nighttime, but in “The Escapists 2,” you can’t load the prison while on the run. You can only load it from the main menu, and you’ve just lost a day’s worth of progress.

There are over 300 customizations to be found in “The Escapists 2”. In other words, there is plenty of stuff that you can do in the game.

So “if” you get caught in the middle of the night in the new game, then you`re boned! All of your items? Gone. Your stored items? Gone. In addition to this, Riot Guards and even Guard Dogs will be released into the prison for a day or two to stabilize the situation and crowd control any further escape attempts. The addition of special units such as the ones mentioned previously was also a highly expected feature by the public. All of it is brilliant by every aspect and really puts the playing in a stressing position when escaping. The only way you can reset your status is to start from scratch or to wait for the situation to cool down and start machinating a new attempt to get out from the facility.

There are plenty of items for you to craft stuff with that could help you with your great prison escape plan.

There are lots more to experience in “The Escapists 2”. Transport prisons in where you are the only inmate on board, being moved from one place to another and have a predetermined time frame to escape through one of the many ways you are offered, multiple variations of co-op and even a versus mode (which works both online and offline). Some prisons even have 2-player only accessible escape routes. It adds a lot more to the game as the first game was strictly a single player game if not for the workshop levels.

You can make your own customized and unique con (s) in “The Escapists 2”. Other than that, you can play the game online with up to three friends at the same time (co-operative and versus multiplayer).

All in all, “The Escapists 2” is a fresh experience from the first installment of “The Escapists”. The game is harder than its predecessor, even the developers acknowledge that by straight-up saying it to you during the first screen of the game. However, it also offers a lot more versatility and enjoyment then the first one. All the escape routes, different prisons, schedules, items and the character customization bring out so many more features that most of the players wanted after finishing the first game; Team 17 truly delivered, and delivered well.

Pros:
+ Improved graphics and game mechanics in general
+ A Co-Op and versus mode
+ Character customization
+ 11 different prisons
+ The new combat system is really cool
+ There are plenty of new ways to escape now
+ The prison map editor adds even more gameplay value to the game

Cons:
– Increased challenge
– “The Escapists 2” is more slow-paced when compared to “The Escapists 1”

tgg grade 5 out of 5

Verdict: 5/5
“The Escapists 2” is a brilliant sequel to Mouldy Toof and Team 17’s original indie smash hit “The Escapists”. You see, the devs have fixed the flaws that it’s predecessor had. Furthermore, “The Escapists 2” offers well-optimized and improved graphics + enhanced game mechanics. So all in all, the game offers tons of fun for you to enjoy on your own or together with friends, and trust me on this. You will enjoy the game for a very long time to come.

Title: The Escapists 2
Developer: Mouldy Toof and Team 17
Format: PC
Genre: Puzzle, Adventure
Resolution: Dependant on monitor, runs on max.
Release date: 2017-08-21
Difficulty: Medium-hard
Spent time: +25 hours
Average grade internationally: 81.67% via Gameratings.com
PEGI age rating: +13
Price: 19,90€