Escape from Ever After

Escape from Ever After comes from the small indie developer Sleepy Castle Studio in Montreal, Canada, and is a charming little satirical action role-playing game inspired by games such as Paper Mario and Born of Bread.

At the heart of the adventure is our hero Flynt Buckler, who for years has been trying to defeat Tinder the Dragon, who has entrenched himself in a large castle - a castle filled with unimaginable riches and treasures. The battles against Tinder the Dragon have been intense, but Flynt has never managed to defeat the dragon. Now he makes one last attempt, but when he once again stands in front of the familiar castle, he discovers that the once terrifying fortress has been transformed into office space.

The castle is now filled with mindless, coffee-sipping office workers, as well as characters from other fairy tales, and Tinder the Dragon is nowhere to be seen. It turns out that fairy tales are apparently an untapped market, and the mega-company Ever After Inc. has decided to take advantage of this. They have developed a method whereby they can jump into different fairy tales, suck all the value out of them, hire the now unemployed characters for the company, and leave the rest in the gutter.

Ever After Inc. has taken over Tinder the Dragon's castle as their new headquarters, they have thrown Tinder into his own dungeon, and the company is determined that every history book in the world should be theirs. Of course, this cannot be allowed to happen, so now Flynt Buckler and a decimated Tinder the Dragon must join forces, and they quickly realise that the smartest thing to do would be to get a job at Ever After Inc. and fight capitalism from within.

After attending a job interview with Mr. Moon, Flynt Buckler and Tinder the Dragon embark on an adventure where they visit various more or less well-known fairy tales where Ever After Inc. operates. The first fairy tale, for example, is an interpretation of "The Wolf and the Three Little Pigs," where it is actually the pigs who want to raze the very friendly wolves' village to the ground because it is located on land that the pigs need to build a larger apartment complex. The wolves have even been promised a 5% rent reduction for the first year in the new building, but the wolves really like their little village and have no intention of leaving it.

Along the way, several characters join your small party (including the Big Bad Wolf, who plays the amateur musician and attacks with his guitar), and they all have different abilities, strengths and weaknesses. The battles are turn-based, but also timing-based, which means that when you want to attack the enemy or block their attacks, you do so by performing a series of timed button presses or movements with the joysticks. The way you attack works fine, but it's a different story when it comes to blocking.

All enemies have two types of attacks, each with different timing, and it is simply frustratingly difficult to block these attacks. Some attacks are easy to read, so you have a fair chance of blocking them, while others are almost impossible to read, so you can't really avoid taking damage when they are used. This is all exacerbated by some rather lengthy boss battles with unpredictable attack patterns and a boss that attacks several times in a row. Since you often take damage due to the challenging blocking system, you have to use several of your own turns to replenish your magic or heal yourself, so these battles end up feeling almost endless.

There is an auto-block feature that can be enabled in the settings, but this essentially removes all challenge from the battles, as it then becomes a matter of simply striking the enemy until they die and nothing else. It is somewhat unfortunate that one half of the combat system ends up being so frustrating, given that it is such a central part of the game. Apart from the somewhat questionable combat system, Escape from Ever After is otherwise a nice little adventure with good and well-placed humour, some funny cultural references and quite solid puzzles, but since the combat system is central to the game, the overall experience is somewhat hampered by this.

The graphics are beautiful and colourful, and all the characters are cute 2D. The visuals work well, but certain platform sections are hampered a bit by the fixed camera, making it difficult to judge distances. The sound is okay and as you would expect in a game of this type - but it's not something you'll remember after you've turned off the game.

All in all, Escape from Ever After is a nice little Paper Mario-inspired role-playing game. The game's strongest points are the well-written dialogues, the good humour, the nice puzzles - and half of the combat system. The other half, the defensive part, quickly becomes frustrating, which unfortunately affects the entire game. I had a hard time enjoying it when it sometimes felt like rolling a dice to determine whether or not I would be hit by the enemy's attack. It simply seems unfair and frustrating.

If you're into simple and enjoyable role-playing games, take a look at Escape from Ever After, as it's sold at a good price, but be prepared to struggle a bit with the combat system.