Review: 1 Hour to Escape

RATING: 3 Keys RESULT: Win REMAINING: X:XX / $1.4 Million

I guess it’s time to let the cash out of the bag: we are amazing bank robbers.

Story

Have you ever wanted to be a part of a Bank Heist? A disgruntled employee of the Lewisville Bank has reached out to you, offering to be the inside man for an elaborate bank robbery. After months spent casing the joint and assembling your crew, the time has come to make the hit. Armed with only your wits (and high powered explosives), how much cash can you collect before the cops arrive and foil the heist?

At this point, we’ve become quite the experienced bank robbers, so we know we have the right skills for the job. Our mission? To infiltrate the vault, loot as much money as we can, and make our great escape before the cops show up. It sounds simple enough.

Bank Heist has an easy to follow story with an interesting twist. Instead of trying to escape as quickly as possible, it is our job to collect as much money as possible. The narrative occasionally falls flat, but the final moments create a sense of urgency that (we think) would be present in a real-life heist.

Scenic

Initially, we enter an ordinary looking bank lobby. It has many of the things you’d expect such as a teller desk and a place to fill out checks. There is even a window to the outside world. Nothing particularly stands out about the lobby, and there is no reason for anyone to be suspicious of our motives at this point.

Once we gain entry to the vault, there are many numbered safe deposit boxes that each require two keys. There is also a small notice that the area is under video surveillance, which is a nice touch because it gives an in-game reason for the game master cameras to be there. Again, nothing really stand out, but it does feel similar to a real safety deposit room – albeit with fewer security measures in place.

Things start to get more interesting as we hear the police approaching. Luckily, our getaway driver arrives just in time, and we are able to flee the scene inside an armored truck.

Puzzles

Our first course of action was to gain access to the vault. Some of the activities in the lobby fit the narrative such as scanning the schedule of on-duty guards, but many actions felt like puzzles for puzzle’s sake.

The bulk of Bank Heist’s content takes place inside of the vault. Many of the activities ultimately lead to a numbered key that unlock a safety deposit box, where we would receive a new puzzle, cash, or sometimes both. This causes the game flow to sometimes feel repetitive.

1 Hour to Escape does a good job in rewarding more money for increasingly more complex tasks. While most of the puzzles are enjoyable if viewed individually, there’s no getting around the fact that many of them simply do not fit the narrative of robbing a bank. They are merely used as a means to collect more money. Thankfully, Bank Heist ends with an explosion as we make our way out of the back of Lewisville Bank and jump into a getaway truck.

Overall

1 Hour to Escape has previously shown us that they can produce fun and fair rooms, and Bank Heist is no different. We commend them for taking a risk and steering away from the typical time-based mechanic and creating a point-based one instead. While we have played other point-based games, it is great to see one added to the Dallas market.

Bank Heist is an overall enjoyable adventure and has enough content to be assured that you will get a full sixty minute experience. While we did not always feel like we were playing the role of bank robbers, the ending had us scrambling as we evaded jail time. The only question now is how will we spend all of this money?