Prison Break: The Conspiracy video game review

Format: Xbox 360 (tested), PlayStation 3, PC
Developer: Zootfly
Publisher: Deep Silver
Released: Out now
Score: 2/10

I loved Prison Break. I did. I even have all the DVD boxsets. From the thrilling, genuinely good telly of its opening season, right through its ever-increasingly daft sequels, I enjoyed every moment. OK, it was a TV show that jumped the shark very early on in its second season and never really recovered, but it was ruddy good entertainment. Tuning in to see the wacky adventures of Michael Scofield and his crazy super-brain was always a weekly highlight.

It’s over now, of course, Prison Break left our screens for good last year. So it’s odd to see a video game tie-in appear now, recalling a TV show that most people have since forgotten. Originally pegged for release during the Prison Break's final season, The Conspiracy had a rather tumultuous path to release after its original publisher went bust, hence the ostensibly odd timing. Smartly, the game takes place during the franchise-best first season. “Well, this is great news!” I thought, relishing the prospect of returning to Fox River.

‘Blind optimism’, I think is the term. Being a fan of the source material is always a double-edged sword when it comes to video game tie-ins. On the one hand, your fondness of the characters and setting can see you through some ropy execution; but on the other, there’s a heightened expectation of getting that familiarity right. No matter how big a Prison Break fan you are, no matter how forgiving you can be, The Conspiracy is an abject failure on all counts.

You play Tom Paxton, an agent of the nefarious ‘Company’, a shady organisation that has framed Lincoln Burrows -Michael’s beefcake brother- for murder. The Company has got wind of an escape attempt by Michael and Linc, and wants you to step in and make sure Burrows makes it to the electric chair. A man with a comedy Irish accent sees to it you’re incarcerated at Fox River to snoop on the scheming brothers.

It’s a solid concept in theory, allowing Zootfly to build Paxton’s story around the flashpoints of the first season, adding to series lore without interfering too much established continuity. At the same time, it should allow you to soak in the atmosphere of Fox River Penitentiary and interact with the series characters you know and love (or hate).

That’s the theory. The reality is wholly, depressingly different. As Paxton, you will spend the majority of your time on your own, sneaking through nondescript areas of the prison on tedious fetch-quests. Prisoner records, medicine, guard uniforms, all tucked away in some bland, uninteresting area of Fox River. One of The Conspiracy’s biggest crimes is that it barely even toys with the idea that you’re locked up in a prison, staging the game’s missions in storerooms and sewers; ugly, grated, gridded areas swarming with moronic guards.

Getting past these dribbling idiots involves stealth of the most boring, lazy and mechanical kind. Guards are locked to rote routines, so it's a simple case of learning by trial-and-error as they walk and act on their uninterruptible loop. Cooks in the kitchen will wash their hands for hours on end, while janitors clean the same area of floor forevermore. Occasionally, you will reach a certain area to trigger a change in behaviour so they can get in your way again, but there’s no takedowns, no distractions or diversions, just a strictly linear path you’re funnelled down by robotic routine. Occasionally you’ll have to turn off a fuse box to cast the area in shadow, but it’s always on a prescribed route. To make things worse, being spotted is tragically erratic. Sometimes you can be close enough to steal a guard’s shoes without them cottoning on, but other times they’ll have a sixth sense, literally catching you through eyes in the back of their head. Being spotted means an instant game over, although checkpoints are generously placed.

This is almost the entire game. The tedium of sneaking around is sporadically punctuated by a punch-up, but the fighting is just as terrible as the stealth. Again, it’s painfully simplistic, but still hopelessly executed. Despite most fights being with burly inmates, there’s no sense of connection or weight to your wild flailing, the shoddy animation and hit detection reminiscent of two Play-Dough figures trying to slap each other. Eventually, you can trigger a laughably animated finishing move. Lucky you.

The game is desperately unattractive as a whole. As well as the bland environments, character models have an unusual bloat and nearly everyone looks like an angry jacket potato. Much as that might be entirely accurate for Lincoln Burrows, the root vegetable look stretches too far across the game's cast.

Prison Break fans might have been able to grin and bear such sloppy mechanics if the story held interest. But any interaction with the series’ characters is fleeting and insubstantial. John Abruzzi asks you to get him a shiv, and then asks you to get him another one later on. You get into a couple of scraps with T-Bag before he disappears for hours. Sucre and C-Note pop up just so you see their face. As for the brothers, they seem the most evasive of all. Most of the cast return to lend their voice, but they clearly weren’t getting paid by the hour, judging on the phoned-in quality and how little you actually hear them opening their mouths.

Occasionally there will be the mildest thrill of recognition as one of the series’ set pieces kicks into gear. But you never feel involved in them. Paxton celebrates the riot Michael instigates by getting into a couple of rubbish fights, before sneaking off round the back. The flashpoints pass you by as tediously as the rest of the game, with you little more than observer to a bad facsimile, Paxton a speck on the periphery of a much more interesting yarn. Call me crazy, but you might just be better off, you know, watching the DVD.

Other flaws add further cracks to an already broken game. Badly directed QTEs crop up every so often, but even these are horrendously executed, with no connection and erratic recognition of your button presses. And the whole thing is so trite; tiny little fences –supposedly designed to keep in some of the world’s most heinous felons– are painted in bright yellow, screaming “CLIMB ME”, while pipes and ledges form convenient paths for Paxton to clamber across. This all allows Paxton to move almost freely among the prison’s numerous, identikit outbuildings. Maybe Michael wasn’t so bright after all; given how easily Paxton infiltrates every nook and cranny of Fox River, you get the feeling that massive tattoo and elaborate plan was just a big old waste of time. Just follow the yellow brick road, Mikey, you'll be out in time for tea.

Given Zootfly’s reluctance to even attempt to break out of this remarkably narrow and tedious formula, you get the feeling they had about as much fun making The Conspiracy as you would have playing it. There’s no enthusiasm in its make-up, no flourish, there’s not a single idea that makes virtue of an evocative prison setting. It’s cheap, ugly and -in failing to provide anything of worth to the Prison Break canon- ultimately pointless.