4-Jul-2002 Can prisons, war and no violence – all notorious non-fun concepts – combine to make a fun game experience? Maybe you like that sort of thing. Can prisons, war and no violence – all notorious non-fun concepts – combine to make a fun game experience? Maybe you like that sort of thing.
Whether it was Steve McQueen jumping fences on a motorbike, or Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood messing about on a cable car, World War II prison escape films used to be an integral part of any Christmas Day.
These days you're more likely to doze off to some soporific kids' adventure, but the gung-ho spirit of Jerry-evading lives on. Codemasters rounded up a load of developers at gunpoint and ordered them to program a prison escape game – the first of its kind.
Taking its inspiration from the remarkable determination and resourcefulness of Allied captives banged up in German prison camps during the Second World War, Prisoner of War is the ultimate distillation of the fashionable 'stealth action' style of gameplay – it's all stealth, and nothing else. So if you're used to, say, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, which encourages sneaking about in hi-tech combat gear, snapping necks and hiding dead bodies in lockers, the complete lack of violence in Prisoner of War will be a bit of a new experience.
You step into the shoes of Captain Lewis Stone, an American Air Force pilot shot down over Germany while investigating dodgy goings-on in prisoner-of-war compounds. And we're not talking about starvation and random beatings, but a plot to develop a new generation of V missiles under the protective cover of hostage-packed stalags. Stone, of course, ends up in one of the very camps he once had a spy camera trained on, and now must escape to victory without recourse to guns, bombs, fists or motorbikes.
So the dilly-o is: Stone is delivered to the holding camp, and in the introductory cut-scene meets the two other inmates (we're starting simply, okay?) who can give hints and suggestions on how to get the hell out again. The five missions, set over three camps including the rural Stalag Luft and infamous Castle Colditz, each have around four tricky objectives to carry out before your eventual escape. This might not sound like a lot of game, but when you consider that one objective can take several game-time days to carry out, there actually is quite a lot to do.
THE DAY TODAY The reason why even simple tasks take a long time to sort out is that each camp has a daily schedule, consisting of roll-calls, meal times and exercise periods. The only times you absolutely, positively have to be in the right place at the right time are roll-calls, which take place first thing in the morning and last thing at night. During the rest of the day, you have pretty much free rein to go anywhere within the boundaries of the camp, as long as you can do it without been seen. If you're spotted in an out-of-bounds area you'll be in trouble, but fortunately there are plenty of ways to evade Jerry. Miss roll-call, however, and a camp-wide search will bring a ton of irate guards down on your ass within seconds.
The other prisoners in each camp will be able to help you with advice on things like the locations of important items and pointers on guard-hassling techniques. If you find a key or some documents you'd like to hang on to, even if you get arrested, then there's a safe hiding place in your barracks that the guards won't touch. Getting things back there, though, can be a real challenge – especially if it's bulky kit like a football that won't fit in your pocket. Should you wish to move things around at night, a Timeskip option allows you to fast-forward to specific times of day without loads of waiting around.
The Ai has Gone AWOL Much hyped by Prisoner of War's developer was the AI of the German guards and fellow prisoners. It must have been misplaced somewhere along the way though, because the prison inmates react with scripted dim-wittedness in most situations, and the guards have very predictable responses once you've learned their patterns. No matter how many times you are arrested and have to attempt a mission again, the same guard will still be distracted by a stone thrown at some bins. If you're dressed in a guard disguise, but also carrying a 'hot' object such as a crowbar, simply dropping it as the alarm is raised is usually enough to get away with it. Being spotted as you climb into a cupboard to hide will get you caught, but most searches are pretty cursory and good cover is enough to stay safe. Other little niggles, like being able to stand right in the path of another prisoner (even in the middle of a field) and watch them just stand there, spoil the illusion that there's any kind of intelligence going on.
Aside from your own actions, getting things done in prison revolves around 'currency', in the form of contraband cigarettes, brandy and other desirable items. If you need to buy boot polish to disguise yourself at night, or a lockpick to break into a storeroom, you'll have to track down the prisoner who acts as a 'scrounger' and buy them. If you can't afford his rates, try your hand at the games controlled by the resident card-sharp. If you need to distract the guards for a while, slip another prisoner some currency to pretend to be sick. If all else fails, one of the guards might even take a bribe to keep quiet or leave a vital door open.
For a game so reliant on accurate sneaking, control feels rather woolly, with your DualShock 2's analog sticks often unable to distinguish between a light press to creep and a full shove to run. This is important, because the game's tense situations require utmost care when moving around guards to avoid attracting their attention.
There can also be short yet infuriating pauses while the context-sensitive controls assigned to X and Square decide what they're going to let you do, which often spoils a smooth escape attempt and turns it into a bumbling, doomed bid for freedom. Hammer X to climb a wall while a guard patrols ever closer, for example, and all Stone manages to do is stand there looking stupid until the game gets ready to let you get on with it.
But while Prisoner of War is often frustrating, it does at least look halfway decent. You get plenty of characters on screen at once, and the two larger camps are rammed with 1940s detail over a very large area. Not much of this can actually be interacted with – usable items are always highlighted – but the result is a convincing period piece.
Stirring martial music reacts to the on-screen action, so it stays calm when you're running about in the relative safety of the prisoner barracks but cranks up to a more tension-inducing pace as soon as you sneak into the Colditz library. We do hope, though, that the faux-German accents are some kind of elaborate joke. If you remember the rubbish BBC sitcom 'Allo 'Allo, you'll know what we're talking about. Liberal applications of 'Schnell!', 'Halt!' and 'Oberjager!' in barking falsetto make you wonder how real POWs ever kept a straight face.
PORRIDGE Being in prison is, actually, pretty boring. Each time you're arrested or shot while on a mission, you need to either go and fetch keys and other items again before you make another attempt, or load the last saved game to rewind a few hours. If you play ultra-cautiously, you might find yourself running out of time, missing roll-call and, ultimately, getting arrested yet again. And while there is a wide degree of freedom in how you attempt each objective – either in the routes you take or the time of day you try it – Prisoner of War remains resolutely linear, with each task only becoming available once the previous one has been completed. Ultimately it's more of a puzzle game than a full-blown adventure, with the correct sequence of actions required to solve each scenario.
The sneaking-about bits in games like Deus Ex and Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty are great because they serve as welcome punctuation to the more traditional gung-ho action, but to get the most of out of Prisoner of War you'll need a real passion for espionage and peaceful disobedience. When you hit Colditz and the tension really escalates as the guards become mystically more competent and the situations more complex, Prisoner of War turns into a game worth spending time with, but the placid early stages might sap your enthusiasm before you reach it.
If the game was an escape attempt itself, it would have dug its tunnel perfectly, then tripped over its shoelaces and dropped its plans right in front of the camp Kommandant. In other words, the slightly bungled execution spoils what is an otherwise intriguing and original concept.
Has some faults but it's a brave attempt at a new idea
Uppers
An original concept – and there aren't many these days Sneaking about is good fun Daily routine adds tension and a big dollop of realism The total lack of violence works, surprisingly
Downers
Guards are stoooopid Recreates tedious monotony of prison life Abysmal 'Cherman' accents Quite linear. But if you had more freedom you wouldn't be jail...
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An original concept – and there aren't many these days
