The Escapists 2 will be released on August 22, according to the pre-order and release date trailer found on Team17’s official YouTube channel.

The trailer shows the prisoner (the character you play as) at the beach, recalling how he managed to get there. In The Escapists 2, the player will dig holes, unscrew vents, wire cut fences so that they can make a clean escape from jail. The player can also recruit other prisoners to help them on their journey for freedom. Players can disguise themselves (in the trailer, knocking out a guard and taking his clothes is one way that is shown) so that they aren’t caught by the prison guards.

If the player is caught, they will be sent back to their jail cell. When not trying to escape prison, the player will partake in activities such as peeling potatoes, interacting with cell mates at lunch, showering, and roll call while also planning their escape. Guards aren’t the only enemy, though, since dogs will hunt down the player to be caught.

Other features of the game include multiple prisons to break out of, a new combat system, more methods to escape prison, singleplayer and multiplayer gameplay (either co-op or versus), deep character customization, and new items to build (these features were found in the description of the trailer).

Along with these features, players can customize a The Escapists 2 character online by going to The Escapists 2 official website.

The first game of The Escapists franchise, The Escapists, was released back in 2015. it has over 10,000 very positive reviews and 500 recent very positive reviews on Steam. Many of the reviews praise the overall entertaining gameplay of The Escapists (some say it helped them escape from prison in real life, although I’m not sure if that’s actually a good thing), while others say that the game gets too boring quickly.

On Metacritic, The Escapists received a score of 71 for PC and PlayStation, a score of 74 for Xbox One, and a score of 80 for iPhone and iPad. One PC reviewer from Games.cz gave the game a score of 70.

“An escape from a prison can be quite a fun. The tactical strategy The Escapist is almost-perfect simulator of chronic runaway hero, and it is just up to the players to overcome their own resistance to the archaic look of the game and accept some of its controversial rules,” said the reviewer from Games.cz. The full review of The Escapists on PC can be found here.

An iOS reviewer from Gamezebo gave The Escapists a score of 80.

“Quite cute and charming in its way, it might be lightweight in tone — but there’s plenty of depth within this prison sandbox strategy game. Control issues let it down a little, but it’s still a rather fine mobile adaptation,” said the reviewer from Gamezebo. The full review of The Escapists on iOS can be found here.

The Escapists franchise’s developer, Team17, has also published games such as the Worms franchise, Yooka-Laylee, Overcooked, Sheltered, Beyond Eyes, LA Cops and more. The official Team 17 website with more information on the developer can be found here.

The Escapists 2 pre-order is currently available on Steam and will be available2 for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 when it launches and be made available for the Nintendo Switch later on. The game will cost $19.99 and players who pre-order will get an extra prison named ‘The Glorious Regime’ for free.

The Escapists 2 already shows more potential than it’s predecessor and seems to give the player more options on how to live in prison while also trying to escape. Are you ready to escape prison again?

Featured image via The Escapists 2 Steam page.