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Escape from Paradise City

I can't hear the lamentation of their women...

The only area where I was disappointed with the game was the audio. The soundtrack seems to be so subtle that I barely noticed that there was in fact music playing in the background. All it really accomplishes is that the player doesn't notice the lack of catchy tunes, but this might be different in the full version. The voice acting seemed to be a bit all over the place too, ranging from dull monologues from Angel, to the hilarious outbursts of Rocco, a gang-leader that Angel has to protect, such as my favourite "You looking at me? I will smash you, you piece of s**t!".

Final verdict

Overall I enjoyed this game quite a bit. I didn't have very high expectations, but I must say that I had a lot of fun with it. If you are a fan of RPG games, or the whole gang-war setting, or if you just like fun, well-crafted games, and don't mind not seeing the latest and greatest visuals, then this game should suit your needs, even if your PC isn't equipped with the most cutting edge hardware. With the promise of a multiplayer component allowing players to battle for the control of the neighbourhoods against each other in the full version, things will get even more interesting.

Summary of YouGamers Hardware Testing

The publisher of this game state the following specifications for their minimum and recommended requirements:

To learn more about how YouGamers performs its hardware testing, click here. Through our extensive gameplay and hardware testing across the full spectrum of PC configurations, YouGamers suggests that one should use the following guidelines for an appropriate minimum and recommended setup:

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Review Update

The initial review was based on a limited gameplay sample that only contained some of the single player levels and offered an incomplete analysis of the multiplayer aspect. We has since tested the final release and provide the following comments:

After having played the full version of the game for a while, it is obvious that very little has changed since the preview version. The only thing that really improves is the plot of the single player campaign, which instead of simply focusing on the three protagonists alone, actually follows a greater scheme of events, in which all three characters have some part to play. Whilst the story isn't going to be anything revolutionary, it will keep things moving. One of the aspects of the game later on that seems a bit weak are the higher tier skills, which can range from basically useless to incredibly overpowered, so the game definitely needs more balancing.

A good example for this would be Angel's skill of inflicting an open wound, causing the target to bleed in junction with another skill of hers that inflicts damage worth 50% of the target's total hit points in a single blow, given that the target is bleeding. This means that against her, every boss has a 50% HP disadvantage, and that's an understatement considering the rapid HP drain of bleeding in itself. The weaponry feels a lot more satisfying later on in the game (rusty knuckles are replaced by broadswords, and rusty handguns by higher end real world guns), but this was to be expected; what really does make it more interesting are the pieces of extra equipment the characters can use, ranging from quicker health regeneration to the reduction of bullet spread, their constant mixing and matching can easily give the player the edge in an otherwise tight situation.

Unfortunately the aspect that I had the highest hopes for, the multiplayer, is let down by the fact that I couldn't find a single other player online, after trying countless times. However, if you are interested in playing it with a buddy online or over LAN, then there is a lot of extra fun to be had there. The core gameplay remains the same (although there are 3 game-modes to choose from), with the main difference being that an opposing player can also resort to using all the extra power and character skills, allowing for some pretty varied battles. Overall the conclusions from the preview version still hold up, besides the practically missing online gaming part (since no one seems to play the game), but then again this may change.

Andreas Iklody (9th January 2008)

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