The Key: Escape from Strongwall Prison Review

boardgamequest.com:

We review The Key: Escape from Strongwall Prison, a real-time, competitive deduction game published by HABA games.

You are a detective, trying to solve three cases at once. To complete the game, you’ll need to discover which gang leader escaped the prison by which method and where they went to hide after their getaway.

The Key: Escape from Strongwall Prison is a traditional logic puzzle, with information doled out on cards, maps, and visual clues. You will strive to obtain the three solutions more efficiently than your competitors, rather than more quickly.

This is an “expert” level addition to the series of logic games called The Key. The game is part of HABA’s Family Series, designed by Thomas Sing, with art by Tim Grubing and Benjamin Petzold.  It plays from 1-4 players, with an age rating of 12 and up. It takes about 45 minutes to solve the puzzle.

Each player has a briefcase to screen proposed answers, a dry-erase marker, an investigation file, and a city map. Players will draw from the two decks of investigation cards, one set for the three primary cases, and one set for the secondary puzzle, which is grouping gang members with the correct gang leader.

Since the game has nine variations, the backs of the cards are color-coded with squares. If you choose to play the yellow key, every card you use in the game must have a yellow square on its back. Other coding on the backs indicates what type of clue the card contains: witness statements, lab cards, interrogations, or gang symbols.

The two decks are simply scattered facedown into two piles in the middle of the table. Each player may simultaneously take any card from either deck. Cards you draw are hidden from other players, unless they have a symbol which, when revealed, require you to draw an interrogation card that will become an “open interrogation.” Open interrogation cards must be shared by all.

When you have solved all questions about the three escapes and assigned the remaining prisoners to the correct