Your country is in chaos. Death squads and gangs rule the streets. Your nearest relatives have been killed, and you fear you will be next. Selling your last possessions in exchange for passage on an unseaworthy vessel, you risk your life travelling across the world in search of a new beginning. But when you arrive, you are locked away in blatant defiance of UN laws. Those who have locked you away are acting illegally, but it is you who are treated as a criminal… As a detainee at the infamous Woomera Detention Centre, you have a limited period of time in which to try and gain asylum, or if all else fails, plan and execute your escape into an uncertain world beyond the razor-wire fence. Time, bureaucracy and the mind, body and spirit-sapping conditions of this harsh and unforgiving environment place are ranged against you. The only real weapon at your disposal is hope. Utilising the familiar environment of a first person, 3D action-adventure game, Escape From Woomera invites gamers to...
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It's interesting how medias can be used in creative ways. While some focus on giving us entertainment on the proper medium that is video game, some prefer to rape it and bore us with silly speeches. Escape from Woomera is the perfect example.
You are introduced as an Iranian who is forced to leave his country because the Iranian Secret Services is after your blood. Why? What did he do? Any piece of background behind it to consolidate the speech? No. Just like any good leftist without a cause, devs offer us a heartbreaking story without knowing the subject themselves. Anyway, you arrive in Australia and get placed in a camp like a criminal (according to the game). You then hear you will be sent back to Iran (which mean you will die there) and therefor try to escape.
And here comes the fun: the mechanics. The game basically consists of talking to the right people (FPS/RPG style) in the right order. It mostly revolves around luck since the writer apparently was absent: most of the lines dialogues are the same. What's even more annoying about a story-driven game is the lack of background (as mentionned before) and logic. It seems like the game is pointing you somewhere in term of background story only for you to discover that it's bland at best. The part where a woman tells you that a guard threw her koran book to the ground instead of giving it back after reading it was just laughable. Gameplay-wise it's not much brilliant. There is one part of the game where you recieve important items to advance in the game by mail. How well-thought! The writer apparently went on vacation before the end of the development.
As for the stealth part, it lasts about 2 minutes (enough said). Past that point, it takes a discussion to end the game.
Hurray! 10 minutes of gameplay to realize through this broken game that... uh... Oh well screw the message. It's not worth your time.