When most games start giving you some serious motion sickness, what do you do? Look for alternatives that don’t require head and camera moving, of course!
In my email rounds I came across a press release for Without Escape, a point-and-click horror adventure by Bumpy Trail games. With the premise of a “hellish plane of existence” and a comparison to Myst, they had me convinced to try it out. Without Escape begins much like most stories, with a seemingly uneventful day. You arrive home after a tiresome day, but no one is there since your parents are away (it rhymes and it’s true). You have dinner, you watch some TV, and go to sleep a bit earlier than usual. A seemingly normal evening, until strange sounds wake you up in the middle of the night, and you decide to investigate.
In traditional point-and-click adventure fashion, I was left to click my way out of the bedroom in search for clues as to what to do next. I found myself in dire need of some direction at first though, since I didn’t have a clue if there was an inventory, how to get to it, and at some point how to combine items in it, should that be a possibility.
As you explore the house and discover clues as to what the sound might have been, and strange things begin to happen. Little clues here and there will hint at what to do next, some of them are a bit more obvious than others, a few really leave you thinking “and now what?!”, and at times you might find yourself completely lost and wandering aimlessly checking everything again and again, because you keep trying to do things that aren’t actually possible. It’s cold out, can I wear this coat and go out? No… Can I open this door? No… This clock is pointing at… nope.
Hint: the clock DOES point at something, I just kept missing it.
After some progression, I discovered the bathroom had been turned into something that could have very well be Silent Hill, and the lost and confused feeling was replaced by a constant uneasiness that something was going to come at me and shred me to bits. Also at some point, the game managed to convinced me that it crashed and froze… Just as I was about to press ctrl+alt+del, it loaded me into that Silent Hill-esque type of alternate reality.
I don’t want to spoil too much, since the story and respective developments are what make the game interesting, particularly when you have to jump between realities to progress.
I really enjoyed my experience with Without Escape. Some of the puzzles really left me… well, puzzled, really, while others were pretty straightforward to solve. The final puzzle with all the math involved, go figure, of all things, that one was a no-brainer to me. But it all came down to investigating every single thing, sometimes more than once until eventually – lightbulb! – there is the solution!
Without Escape has no voice acting whatsoever, but still manages to convey a pretty good horror and mystery atmosphere throughout with its sound and music. Granted, it’s a short adventure, but it does offer some replay value in terms of achievements and multiple endings. The story is worth experiencing, and even more so because it remained a concept for years, and was a long time in the making. I recommend you don’t miss the extras, and learn about how Without Escape came to be. Personally, I am glad the creator didn’t give up on making this game a reality.
You can watch one of my playthroughs of Without Escape in its entirety in the video below.