Recent reviews by Cleover

This is going to be somewhat of a review for the game, along with my thoughts and feelings about it. Since I have a lot to say, I'll split this into sections to make it easier to read.

To clarify the "Recommended" review, this is only if you know what your getting into in my opinion.

I've aimed to keep things mostly spoiler-free. I won't mention specific events, but I will touch on how actions can impact the game and alter the story.

Inescapable is fun if you know what to expect. However, the game's marketing as a "Dangan/Zero Escape-like" experience is misleading. It excels in creative direction but lacks the gameplay depth of those titles. If you set lower expectations, you can enjoy the well-written dialogue, even though it feels somewhat repetitive due to the limited gameplay.

The game's fast-paced structure hinders character development. It's similar to "World End Syndrome" in gameplay, but lacks the same depth. While it spans several months, the story moves too quickly, making character evolution feel abrupt. The absence of feedback on your choices and the absence of meaningful gameplay mechanics are also notable drawbacks.

I think it's already been said a lot by others, but the price for this game was too much for what was delivered. While the number of hours you get out of the game does somewhat make up for it, the quality of things in those hours is lacking. Given its quality, it should have been priced in the $30-40 USD range. It's priced higher than comparable games like Dangan and Zero Escape, which offer more content for less.

I touched on this already in the opening section; however, the game is too much of nothing in terms of gameplay. It's a "click where to go 3 times a day and talk to people" type game, with only a few (very small and copy-pasted) events thrown in the middle. There is no "break" in this game to make it less jarring, like most other games in this same genre have. Dangan has the benefit of the detective sections as well as the sections which come after, and 999 has its puzzles, whereas this game has 5-minute multiple-choice questions a few times in the game, with nothing new to offer from one to the next. It's basic and unrewarding.

One of my biggest issues with this game is how little feedback we get on the actions we take. I constantly felt like everything I did either had no effect, or that I wouldn't know for hours if anything I did mattered. From the start, I had characters I liked and wanted to "max" out in terms of friendship, etc., but despite spending "days" in the game working towards this, I felt like I was at the start even with the people I visited almost every day. I didn't see them any more than anyone else, and they reacted to me as if they didn't care at all most times. I know that the game aims to have many choices of who you can see, but has limited dialogue depending on what you do due to how much variety in how people will play, but it makes it hard to feel like anything I did mattered.

I liked how the game handled having multiple characters with differing backgrounds. Having everyone be from a different nationality was a great way to be "different" and make things honestly really fun. I loved how everyone broke into their native language every now and then, and how their experiences and personality were heavily based on their environment before the game.

Some characters also felt a bit too much of an "haha funny/weird" character. Sasha and Eva are very strong examples of "meme-ish" characters which feel too forced. While I liked them more after I got to know them, at the start they were just cringy and annoying.

I honestly grew to hate the MC more and more as time progressed. While at the start, he felt like a bit of a blank slate, he just suddenly flipped one day, becoming an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ in the first route I did. This is likely the fault of the lack of feedback; however, I didn't even think I was doing things to cause the MC to become an ass. I frequently (and desperately) wanted more clear choices to say, "No, don't do this ♥♥♥♥♥♥ thing!!!" but they never came. It felt like I had zero control over this character, and I wasn't able to figure out what I was doing wrong until I looked at the steam guide page, and someone explained what changes the "route" you're on.

Continuing where I left off with the playable character, the choices in this game are pointless 50% of the time, which would be fine if there were a lot, but there isn't. I think the game changes a lot depending on who you see and when, but I just wanted to see the characters I liked a lot at the start, and expected choices later which would change the outcome of the game. These never came despite the fact I waited for hours to be able to do something to change my characters' actions. I wanted to scream at the game to let me speak up in some situations or shut up in others, but I lost all control of the main character after the first bit of the game it felt like.

Despite all this, I don't hate the game. I think it's just held back drastically due to it being marketed as a "Dangan/Zero-Escape" inspired game, as well as the price. I think the amount of hours it provides makes it feel more "worth it" even if a lot feels like filler. The price may have more justification if it's due to the art, programming, music, and such, and due to expecting lower sales compared to something like Dangan/Zero-Escape, but I don't feel like the price reflected the quality we received.

Great game, is about a 30 minute experience, but for a free title released by valve in 2022 ill take what I can get :)