The Escapists 2 - Dungeons and Duct Tape

I have a soft spot for games that dress up systems-heavy decision-making in approachable packaging, and The Escapists 2 does exactly that underneath its chirpy pixel art. Dungeons and Duct Tape is the fourth and final DLC prison for the base game, dropping you into Locke Castle, a medieval fortress converted into a maximum-security lockup complete with a stagnant moat, thick stone walls, and heavily armoured guards who are in no mood for pleasantries. If you have already cleared the main game's prisons and were starting to feel the routine go stale, this is the DLC that squeezes one more genuinely distinct scenario out of the formula. The core loop carries over intact from the base game: attend roll call, hit the gym to raise your stats, do favours for inmates to earn coin, and use every spare minute to craft, steal, or stash the tools you need for a planned breakout. What Dungeons and Duct Tape layers on top is a medieval skin with enough mechanical wrinkles to justify its existence. New prison jobs include working the blacksmith forge, carving stone blocks, and playing the lute for the guards. New craftable items, including the grappling hook, open up vertical escape routes that flat, modern-prison maps simply do not offer. The moat is a genuine obstacle that forces you to plan your exit differently than a standard perimeter breach, and the heavily armoured guard population means that brawling your way to the exit is a much riskier calculation than usual. There are three distinct escape routes: a solo path, a co-op-specific multiplayer escape called Siege the Day, and a perimeter breakout that works for both modes. The multiplayer escape in particular is where the DLC earns its keep, because coordinating a castle siege with friends over split-screen or online co-op is chaotic in the best possible way. From a depth-of-decision standpoint, this is where The Escapists 2's design philosophy becomes clear. Every in-game day is a resource allocation problem. Time spent raising intellect in the library is time not spent digging a tunnel or acquiring contraband. Raising your strength stat in the yard changes the risk profile of confrontations with armoured guards. The crafting system rewards players who read the item descriptions carefully and plan multi-step recipes around what can realistically be stolen or bought without triggering a shakedown of your cell. The secret compartment in your bunk is your most valuable real estate. Lose a lockdown while carrying your best tools and you are starting almost from scratch, which keeps the tension alive even on familiar runs. That said, honest accounting demands pointing out the friction. The game is deliberately opaque: escape objective names hint at what to do but never explain it explicitly, and without community guides or the in-game hint system (funded by doing prisoner errands), newcomers will spend a lot of time on trial and error. The AI guard behaviour has a quirk where alerting one guard flags all of them simultaneously, which can feel punishing and slightly unrealistic. Repetition is the base game's most-cited criticism across community reviews, and even Locke Castle is not fully immune to it once you understand the rhythm. There is also a reported cell-loading bug on this specific map that has persisted for some time without a fix, worth knowing before you commit. For anyone who has not touched The Escapists 2 at all, the Dungeons and Duct Tape DLC is best approached as a capstone rather than an entry point. The base game's introductory prison does a solid job teaching the fundamentals, and the difficulty curve across the main prisons builds the muscle memory you need before Locke Castle's armoured guards start hospitalising you at roll call. The co-op mode is a legitimate draw, with split-screen and online options both supported, and the Steam Workshop's catalogue of over 16,000 player-made prisons means the ecosystem has long legs even after you clear everything official. Medieval castle setting, grappling hooks, lute performances, and a moat to cross: it is a small package, but it is a focused one.

Diego · Scout Team

Strategy & simulation

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