Inescapable: No Rules, No Rescue Review

As someone who always finds themselves heavily invested in visual novels, it’s an understatement to say that I was excited to finally get my hands on Inescapable: No Rules, No Rescue. In fact, I was more than thrilled to get involved with the social thriller. While there are some aspects to the title that I found charming and immersed me in the game, at times things felt too real, and not for the better. From the characters, story, gameplay mechanics, and yes even the multiple endings present in the game, Inescapable creates a memorable experience. However, some may want to escape from it after a few hours.

Inescapable: No Rules, No Rescue takes place on a tropical island resort. The main character Harrison or Harri has been kidnapped and forced to participate in a twisted reality TV show with 10 other strangers. The goal is to survive 6 months, which is about 160+ days, to receive $500,000. For starters going into the game, it’s fair to say that I was expecting something more along the lines of a Danganronpa-styled killing game to take place. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case. Yes, people can die, but it all depends on which end you decide to take. No spoilers will be said during this review, but just know that there is one ending where deaths are frequent. The whole “survive” premise is an interesting take for a reality TV show, but it also proves to be the game’s demise.

Inescapable: No Rules, No Rescue has you playing out days on the island meeting and talking with a wide variety of characters. On the island, you slowly unlock pretty basic mini-games that add some type of entertainment value. But once you play and beat them, there’s no point in accessing them again, leaving you with talking to the cast every…single…day. The conversations themselves can be pretty interesting at times, but much like in real life, they can drag on. Not only that, but on some days characters aren’t available leaving you with ones that you might not care about. For my first run, I got to know the social media influencer Eva, who’s a pretty interesting and lovable character. On certain days I couldn’t talk to her or we would do the same thing over and over again which was go to the pool or to the sauna. It gets pretty tedious and most times conversations would be dull and drag on. It’s not just with her character either as the same sentiment is shared among other characters.

The cast of characters and their voice actors/actresses is what I believe to be Inescapable’s saving grace. Every single character is unique in their own way and their VA’s have done a phenomenal job at bringing them to life. My personal favorite definitely has to be Naomi as she screams nothing but insults and profane language to the characters. Without them, talking to characters for about 160+ days would be somewhat impossible for me to do without losing my sanity.

The story itself is another problem that I have with Inescapable. While I would’ve preferred a killing game scenario, I humored the idea of having to survive 6 months on an island. At the end of my days, I was not only upset with how the story was handled, but the main character Harrison as well. You make choices in the game that can influence the story but the type of ending you receive is determined by who you talk to on the island. No spoilers, but my initial ending made zero sense to me while playing as I had no say in the matter on the outcome during my playthrough. Having this happen felt like bad writing and just a way to add shock value to the game. All visual novel games don’t need to have a happy feel feel-good ending, but the latter shouldn’t feel rushed or forced. The other endings in the game are apparent to this as well. As I previously stated, an ending is dependent on who you talk to, which irks me as I play. Some are better than others so their having variety is a plus.

Conclusion

In all, Inescapable: No Rules, No Rescue isn’t a game that I would see as a thriller. It’s more of a social sim that spans over 160+ days. The moment things start heating up you would have to put in at least 3 hours, and that’s if you can endure all the constant days where you force yourself to make boring conversations with the other contestants. The writing itself feels very boring/rushed, the endings feel unfair to the characters in terms of how to reach them, and the story itself doesn’t prove to be exciting to me. It was as though I was only playing filler in order to reach pieces of the main course. After my time playing, the colorful cast and VA’s were the saving grace during my island experience.

This game was tested and reviewed on Xbox Series X/S. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.