Don't Escape: 4 Days In A Wasteland Review

Armor Games Studios presents the latest from Polish developer, Scriptwelder; a point and click survival title called Don't Escape: 4 Days In A Wasteland, where you'll need to overcome the odds and face the broken wasteland. In the wasteland, every choice matters and every second counts. Can you survive?

The Basics

DE:4DW is a puzzle heavy point and click survival game. You click on where you want to go and double click to move your character along faster. You have an inventory that can hold a certain amount of items, and if you're carrying too much you'll have to drop something or come back later. Items can be used on the environment and some items can be combined in the inventory to create something new. Everything you do brings you one step closer to nighttime, and often, your own death. It's up to you to prevent that from happening.

Story & Flow

Visions of the future. A horrific death. A never ending struggle to survive. You are David, lone survivor in a world ravaged by mutated spiders and the collapse of humanity. You must brave the wasteland, but when night falls, the spider (and god knows what else) will come for you. You need to prepare and fast, as every second counts. To give away more would be to spoil the amazing story crafted by Scriptwelder, but that's the basic premise.

In Don't Escape: Four Days in a Wasteland, every move you undertake, every decision you make is aimed at preparing for night, when the dreaded, hideous entities attack, in a dynamic cycle that is somewhat similar to Darkwood. Every precaution is calculated and accounted for, from the number of barricades you set up, to the item or items you choose to defend yourself with. And if you fail and die, you are sent back to before you initiated the night, which allows you a Groundhog's Day-like redo so you can spend the daylight hours differently and try something else to survive.

There are plenty of things to find, and lots of items to use to both defend yourself and solve puzzles. My only real gripe with this is that some of the items are absolute requirements; basically, you will be forced to use an item for a specific reason or task. Usually that makes perfect sense, but for example, I have to specifically find a hammer to tap nails into wood, despite having a crowbar or a wrench that can accomplish the same thing. It's a nitpick for sure, but for a game where you are scrambling, doing whatever it takes to survive, this rigidity actually brought me out of the immersion a  bit. If I was rushing through a task that could save my life with darkness descending, I would smash the hell out of that nail with whatever it takes.

Beyond items, you have the timer. Any given action of the game take time to accomplish, and every major action requires even more time to complete. Traveling between locations, building or breaking something down, fixing a car; all of these take away from a very limited allotment of time available to you. It's up to you to manage your time and make sure that the action you are completing is imperative to your immediate survival. In this game, there's nothing worse than knowing exactly what you need to do to make it through, and not having the required time to do it.

Another problem I had was that, looking back, it seems that there was a very "set" way to win. Despite not really being aware of it in the moment, I realized that after I won, there wan't much diversity in the methods of my survival; once you reach the point of absolution you realize that it was the only way to get there. This is an odd critique, since it's very close to criticizing something that was purposeful, but it felt a bit like reading a choose your own adventure book, only to realize there was just one path to take after all. 

There are plenty of puzzles in DE:4DW, and they are pretty damned good. The puzzles are thoughtful and engaging and none we came across felt cheap or contrived; they all have their own logic. To solve puzzles, you'll need to use critical thinking, travel around, collect various items, all while keeping an eye on the clock, knowing that a deadly surprise awaits you when night falls. Once you win, you will be compelled to play through again (trust us) and fresh puzzles await you in the New game + mode.  NPC's are also interesting and involved, and paying attention to what they do and say is always worthwhile, whether its helping you in-game, or just from a pure entertainment standpoint.

One gripe that I ran into is the fact that it's easy to back yourself into a corner if you don't know what you're doing, or you accidentally undertake an action that you wished you would have saved for another time. The game often has a slow-burn pace, so starting over to get back to where you were can eat up a lot of time and be quite frustrating.

Graphics & Sound

Don't Escape: 4 Days in a Wasteland is presented in a pixelated, yet detailed style. The characters have a  minimalistic design but the background and set pieces are extremely well put together. Although a little odd in the beginning, the art style really grew on me.

The music and sound design reeks of atmosphere, with moments of peril cranking the auditory tension up to 11 amidst the long moments of spooky quiet. Top marks for audio.