Salary Man Escape - PlayStation 4 Review

Being a Salary Man is quite challenging

Game Info:

  • System: PS4, PSVR
  • Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment, Oasis Games
  • Developer: Red Accent Studios
  • Release Date: June 26, 2018

Who it Caters to

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Are you someone who finds the life of a salary man to be repetitive at times? Who doesn’t right? Haven’t you wanted to escape that life occasionally and just run for the nearest exit? Here’s another question. Are you tired of us asking these questions and just want to know what Salary Man Escape is all about? If you said yes then we recommend to scroll on down to continue reading about Salary Man Escape and what to expect from this quite literal puzzle game all about escaping the corporate lifestyle that we sometimes can get a bit tired of.

What to Expect

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Salary Man Escape is puzzle game with the focus of literally escaping. Players will lead a salary man to freedom by manipulating his environment in rather unique ways. Salary Man Escape also features two ways to play. Players can don their PSVR headsets to immerse themselves in the salary man’s world or play traditionally. With nearly 80 levels of increasing difficulty and puzzle designs, Salary Man Escape will challenge even the best puzzle game enthusiast. Plus, expect to hear some quite awesome music in Salary Man Escape for the PS4.


Story

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Salary Man Escape puts you into the role of a busy salaryman who must escape his corporate life. Move and shift the blockades in his life to help him run to the nearest cup of coffee and make it to the exit. Along the way, you’ll find that the salary man’s life is filled with challenges to solve and only you have the perspective to see the way out. Will the salary man survive to make it out of his mundane life? Can he find the way out of this nightmarish role he’s been put into it? Find out as you enter the world of Salary Man Escape!

Gameplay

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Alright, let’s be upfront for a brief moment. Working for any company can be quite tedious and at times, we all find ourselves in an inescapable rut. Salary Man Escape is quite literally a metaphor for our own drive to free ourselves from the bounds of working the usual 9-5 shift, but it does it in a clever and silly manner. Salary Man Escape is a puzzle game, but is it a puzzle game worth investing your time and money into or will you find yourself caught in the usual puzzle game clichés? Let’s find out as we don our business suits and review Salary Man Escape for the PS4/PSVR.

Salary Man Escape has primarily two types of experiences for those who play it. You can play Salary Man Escape entirely in non-VR mode or you can play the way we feel it works best and put on your PSVR for a more “immersive” experience. Regardless of the way you play Salary Man Escape, though the main gist of the game remains the same. Escape to the exit—which is represented by a nice white door—by moving blocks.

The idea of Salary Man Escape is to remove red blocks in a level to either shift the balance of your reality—you’ll see that blocks sometimes say things like work and life—to allow the salary man to run to the exit or a specific point. Salary Man Escape is deceptive at first though. The very first several levels are very easy to figure out. If you move this block, it will cause that block to fall and allow for a quick escape. However, Salary Man Escape begins to add various traps and simple ideas that keep your mind constantly thinking where to move next to make for a successful run. Though you’ll also want to be mindful of time as you are timed in each challenge and will find if you take too long to make your next move you’ll end up having to restart an entire puzzle from scratch.

Now you might be wondering this question: How does VR play a role into a game just about shifting red blocks around? Well…that’s where Salary Man Escape falters a bit. The VR aspect of Salary Man Escape allows for the player to use either a controller or move controllers to move around the whole level for a more in-depth look at the puzzle their facing. Ultimately though there’s little VR to Salary Man Escape and it usually feels gimmickier than needed. We do still recommend playing Salary Man Escape in VR though as it allows for better angles on puzzles but you don’t need VR to truly enjoy this title.

Lastly, let us look at the graphics and sound for Salary Man Escape. While the graphics aren’t much to write home about—what do you expect when it’s a game focused on blocks and silhouettes?—the music is where Salary Man Escape took us for surprise. With several different tunes—all of which are Japanese tracks—Salary Man Escape actually sounds pretty amazing. We couldn’t help tapping our feet or wanting to just listen to the music playing and sometimes ended up failing a puzzle because the music was just so catchy. You’ll find yourself quite surprised how good Salary Man Escape sounds folks, trust us on that one. Again though, just don’t expect a title that will push the PSVR to its graphical limits.


Honey's Gameplay Consensus:

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Salary Man Escape is a simple puzzle game with a theme of escaping the usual and mundane by breaking the base it’s associated with. While Salary Man Escape might sound serious, it doesn’t take itself seriously with cheesy quotes like “give coworkers a hand from time to time” and “work your hardest” but it makes for a reason to help your little salary man literally escape to the exit. With nearly 80 challenges—some of which are quite tricky—and some awesome music, Salary Man Escape works to be a fun PS4 title. The VR elements of Salary Man Escape aren’t truly needed but are also recommended to give yourself a slight advantage. For only $15.99, Salary Man Escape is a solid title that we can’t say we didn’t enjoy. We recommend picking up Salary Man Escape if you love puzzle games that aren’t too serious or trying to be.

Honey's Pros:

  • Simple but challenging puzzles
  • Catchy soundtrack
  • Nearly 80 levels to push your mind

Honey's Cons:

  • VR isn’t a really needed element

Honey's Final Verdict:

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Sometimes simple is better as the old saying goes. Salary Man Escape defines this theme by having players just enjoy a simple puzzle game with some complexities here and there to keep the game from growing stale. The later levels of Salary Man Escape really showed us a true sense of challenge and that’s why we know puzzle fans will enjoy this silly title if they pick it up. Are you thinking of grabbing Salary Man Escape? Tell us in the comments below as we always love hearing from our beautiful readers. Remember to also keep returning to our hive for more game, anime and manga related articles—and reviews—curtsey of us here at Honey’s Anime.

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Writer

Author: Aaron

Hey everyone I’m Aaron Curbelo or Blade as I’m called by my YouTube Subscribers. I’ve been an anime/manga fan since I was a young kid. In terms of anime I have watched nearly a thousand shows and have read hundreds of manga series. I love writing and honestly was so happy to join Honey’s Anime to get a shot to write articles for such a wonderful site. I’m a firm believer in respect in the anime community being the most important embodiment we should all have. We all love anime and we have varying opinions of series but we should respect one another for those differences! Life is too precious to spend it making needless arguments in a community that should be the shining example of loving an amazing medium. I hope as a writer for Honey’s Anime I can bring you folks some amazing articles to read and enjoy!

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