The mafia has kidnapped you. You aren't even sure why, but you know you need to get away before they make you sleep with the fishes. If you played the original Mafia Escape from Wild Harmony Studio then you've made it out of the interrogation room. Now the studio returns with a sequel that takes your escape farther along as you make your way out of your prison and towards freedom.

Much like the original Mafia Escape you are presented with a location and a series of puzzles you have to solve in order to escape the location. This time we go from the cavernous hall we saw at the end of the first game into a series of basement rooms. Each door in the basement is locked with a bizarre puzzle that must be unlocked in different methods. One requires the player to find hidden keys, another is about color sequencing (which you also have to find a key to discover the right pattern), another is about selecting the right sequence of shapes. Along the walls the player will see the scrawled names of famous Mafioso movies which also tie into one of the puzzles.

Navigation in the game is a bit awkward. The previous game gave you a sidebar on each side that would help you turn left or right to face other walls. This time you click where you want to go and get a small arrow on the bottom of your screen to back up. It's still not very instinctive, but the player can get used to it relatively quickly.

The biggest problem the game has is that the curser doesn't change from its usual appearance. That means it's easy to hover over an item that you need to pick up and not even realize it's there. A lot of the items are easy to miss in the game's small frame, especially since items like keys and gems are ridiculously small. I'm forced to admit that, on one screen, I wound up randomly clicking along the game screen in hopes of finding something (and wound up picking up a key and gem that I had never even seen). The backgrounds of the game are detailed, but it's easy to miss essential items within that detail. I'm hoping Wild Harmony will improve upon this in later installments or future puzzle games. Some sort of indication that you've hit upon something would be worlds better then the random clicking I had to resort to.

The other issue I have with this sequel, and it was an issue I had with the original game as well, is that the puzzles are rather nonsensical for the environment. You're a prisoner in a Mafia dungeon, and these gangsters had time to figure out color-coordination locks and sequence puzzles for the doors? These are some bored mobsters who probably aren't putting in enough family time, if you know what I mean.

The problems were enough to put me off from the game at the start, bringing back nightmarish flashbacks of the original Mafia Escape that required me to resort to walkthroughs and tips (this game also offers a "walkthrough" button that doesn't take you to a walkthrough as much as a message board where players are helping each other figure out the solutions to the puzzles). Once I got into it, however, the gameplay became quite compelling. I would get frustrated with a puzzle, but finally figuring out the solution to any of the puzzles would spur me forward - I was not about to be defeated by these goons and this game! As a result, the game turned into a bit of a time sink as I refused to give in until I beat the game. As usual with this sort of puzzler, the ending feels a bit unsatisfactory after all of the effort put into the game, but just solving the puzzles winds up being a decent reward on its own. You have to decide whether the joy of solving puzzles is enough to move you through a game like this.

Mafia Escape 2 is a stronger follow up to the original game. Although it shares a lot of the problems of the original game (hard to find items, nonsensical puzzles for the environment), the game play itself is compelling enough to make this game a lot of fun for people who like puzzle games, and the length of the game feels a lot more satisfying this time around. While the story behind the game doesn't necessarily suggest a third title will be coming in the future, I'll continue to look forward to puzzlers from Wild Harmony Studios, especially if they find ways to improve upon the small game play complaints most people have.

Play Mafia Escape 2 at WildHarmonyStudio.com

Final Score: C