Room Escape: Prison Break

This game is good. Tough enough. I played it on an iPad mini which made it harder. You can not zoom in on items in inventory, which made it hard to tell what it was and if you can’t tell what it is then it’s hard to tell what to use it for. I did get stuck on a puzzle for awhile and wish the hint would have just given me a clue, like places one piece of the puzzle, instead it solved the entire puzzle. Longer than I expected. Which is great! Since I played it with long breaks in between and you can’t zoom in on the rooms the hints were great in saving time trying to search the rooms for what you were looking for after you found an item to use. I was getting frustrated trying to find the place I wanted. Hints jump you to the right room. I wouldn’t say they provide much in the way of a “hint” though, but that forces me to stick it out on my own. However so times I was left wondering, was there really a clue I missed that somehow correlates these two things. Overall really enjoyed this game.

Having played this developer’s series of escape games beginning with the fourth game, then backwards to this game, it’s apparent they have improved as the series progresses. This early game has a pretty convoluted pathway of rooms, and combined with many objects in possession at any time, it’s very challenging to remember where objects can be played and how to find one’s way back. Better games will have a player make use of a found object within 6-8 movements. I used a walkthrough when stuck and in several instances, I still didn’t understand the logic of the solution. And as with all this developer’s escape games, the pop-up HINT icon continuously bounces. It’s not only maddeningly distracting, it’s too close to the MAP icon and the lower portion of every scene. I wasted many hints by accidentally touching the HINT icon. I resorted to trying the offer to watch a video in return for three free hints. In 10-15 attempts, it never gave me the hints. I even tried going to the advertiser’s website. No luck. I must be too stupid to use it correctly. ;) Despite these negatives, I generally appreciated the quality graphics and enjoyed the puzzles. I like challenging puzzles that can be solved using logic and patience, but not luck and guesswork. There was a bit of both in this game.

I thought this game would be like the "escape from one room" variety but I was sorely mistaken! This is a game that took me several hours to complete and I never would have finished without purchasing hints and watching walk-through videos. Because of the small screen format, many items were hard to identify and it was difficult to make out needed details in the atmospherically dark environment. You need a good memory to navigate back to previous areas of interest or remember number clues for electronic keypads. The frequent "rate this game" pop-ups were annoying but I got used to them after a while. Not too many full screen ads. Puzzles were great, however I had to finally skip the wooden puzzle because I couldn't get the pieces inserted precisely enough for the game's liking. All in all, I found this game fun and challenging, if a bit frustrating at times.