Line #16 VideoGame/EscapeFromStMarys


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/escape_from_st_marys.png]]
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3	2005's ''Escape From St. Mary's'' casts you as John Noronha, a student in a Catholic [[HighSchool school]]. You supposedly want to just escape math class and get something to eat, but you somehow run into a whole series of adventures before doing so, all without leaving the school grounds. These include a trip through time, a government-sponsored alien search, a kung-fu battle and other archetypes of boyhood fantasy.
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5	Author Ryan Menezes based the school on an actual school in UsefulNotes/{{Dubai}}, duplicating the real location's geography; the game includes an optional commentary on the real-life school and city alongside its skewed world of in-school ogres and cannibals, adding new information as you progress. The game's playable [[http://www.rinkworks.com/adventure/ online]] at Website/AdventureGamesLive.
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7	----
8	!!The game contains examples of:
9	* AcademyOfAdventure: There seems a disturbing density of reality-bending adventures going on at this small campus.
10	* AdultsAreUseless: The teachers at large offer little help when you ask them about the deadly problems erupting in the school.
11	* AlienAmongUs: Mrs. Luanty thinks there's one. She's right...
12	* AllJustADream: A discussion on whether this is an acceptable story twist sparks a battle between two English teachers. [[spoiler:Both endings invoke this trope for the entire game, although the "better" one goes on to turn it into OrWasItADream.]]
13	* AlmightyJanitor: Agnelo doesn't speak much English, but he's one of the few characters who actually seem to control the school.
14	* AsleepInClass: A couple of times, including the opening scene.
15	* BathroomBreakout: This is your first attempt at getting out of your classroom.
16	* BathroomStallGraffiti: You never see it, but it's allegedly horrific.
17	* {{Bookends}}: Murughesan's classroom.
18	* ButThouMust: Parodied when you open the fuse box and are given the option to turn off the power to any room in the school... but there are various humorous excuses for why you wouldn't want to turn the power off in that particular room for all of them except one.
19	* CatholicSchoolGirlsRule: The students of the school put on a fashion show, with the identical uniforms described as "eveningwear" and "lingerie."
20	* ChainOfDeals: Completing each adventure gives you an item required for another adventure. The exception is [[spoiler:Mrs Desai's]] mission, which has the intangible benefit of [[spoiler:emptying the chemistry lab of everyone in it, in case you need to bring something conspicuous to another location later on]].
21	* ChemistryCanDoAnything: You make them in the chemistry lab, but they border on magic potions.
22	* ClubStub: No one in the school seems interested in joining the poor website team. And your contribution leaves them still worse off.
23	* CoolTeacher: Mr. Anand spends his class playing the computer games that his students wrote.
24	* DevelopersForesight: There are a few possible solutions to puzzles which aren't correct, but the player might reasonably think of, such as using the [[spoiler:sheet of glass as a "cover" for the voodoo potion]] which give you a special result rather than the standard "you can't see how that would help" text.
25	* DumbJock: Gary, with his vague relation to reality.
26	* EducationThroughPyrotechnics: Mrs Desai is convinced that's why you're looting the chemistry lab. You do end up with some explosions - in various other labs.
27	* ElevatorSchool: It's a high school for the most part, except for one quest which reveals the school teaches much younger students as well.
28	* EverybodyHatesMathematics: Your hatred of math sets you off on your journey.
29	* FoodEnd: There's your anticlimax right there.
30	* GameWithinAGame: One of the quests involves completing an interactive fiction game written by another student.
31	* GoodiesInTheToilets: The means of accessing the secret area is hidden in the toilets.
32	* GranolaGirl: The Artist shows a bit of this.
33	* GuideDangIt: Several of the puzzles, such as how to sharpen the scalpel, aren't exactly intuitive.
34	* HighSchool: Wholly contained in one.
35	* HollywoodVoodoo: A book called ''Voodoo Through Chemistry'' offers some instructions that, though helpful, don't quite ring true to traditional voodoo.
36	* HumanAliens: The aliens you're searching for may not be the preserved man-in-a-jar that originally catches your eye.
37	* InventoryManagementPuzzle: You can open the bottle of juice, and the bottle and the bottle cap will be marked as separate items in your inventory. If you later use the bottle to carry anything, you need to remember to put the cap back on so it doesn't leak out a few turns later.
38	* InvisibilityCloak: The cloak [[HalfTruth confers invisibility]]... in that it blinds the wearer.
39	* KlingonPromotion: This is how the chemistry department operates.
40	* LightAndMirrorsPuzzle: You have a mirror. You have sunlight. You have a bunch of exposed eyes...
41	* MadScientist: The game has scientists in four different labs, but Dr. Paul and Dr. Miranda, the omnicidal physicists, seem to qualify best as mad scientists.
42	* MultipleEndings: Your ability to reach a "secret area" within the school determines whether, in the end, you actually do escape from St. Mary's.
43	* NintendoHard: One of only two games on ''Adventure Games Live'' to be given the highest possible difficulty rating.
44	* NonIndicativeDifficulty: Although the game has a lot of quests to complete which all run parallel to each other, its ChainOfDeals nature means that once you manage to complete the first one things can fall into place quite quickly; it's one of the more complex games on Adventure Games Live, but it's not as hard as ''VideoGame/ThePerilsOfAkumos'' (the other game given the top difficulty rating) or even ''VideoGame/TheGameOfTheAges'' (considered 2 points easier).
45	* NoobBridge: This game has a unique (for ''Adventure Games Live'') inventory system: selecting an item from the inventory gives you a sub-menu with a list of options. Some players who don't realise that can get stuck in the very first room.
46	* OnlyIdiotsMayPass: The GameWithinAGame you have to beat includes a maze, the solution for which is hidden somewhere else in St Mary's. Entering the sequence will only work if you've found the solution (as well as making the connection between it and the game); [[YouShouldntKnowThisAlready if you discover what the solution is before your character does so in-game]], it won't work.
47	* PermanentlyMissableContent: If you trigger the game's endgame [[spoiler:by jumping off the roof]] before you find the secret area, then it's no longer accessible. More annoyingly, there's an item required for the secret area that you get from Sr. 1C which is ''very'' easy to miss as it's not obtained by solving the quest but becomes unobtainable as soon as you've completed it.
48	* PointOfNoReturn: [[spoiler:Jumping off the roof]] locks off most of the game's areas; as mentioned above, this makes the secret area inaccessible if you haven't already found it.
49	* SchoolNewspaperNewsHound: Averted - dozens of interesting things happen in the school, but the reporter does not care. She instead writes about what she eats for meals, sure that no one will even read the article.
50	* TheStarscream: Mrs. Desai is determined to seize control from her superior... by any means necessary.
51	* SmartPeoplePlayChess: The A-Level students seem to believe this.
52	* StableTimeLoop: The physics teachers explain this nature of time in detail, and your own adventures prove it true.
53	* TakeYourTime: Played straight with some elements such as the English teachers' fight, and for the game as a whole as time never seems to pass in spite of your whole goal being to get out of school early. However, this is occasionally averted; when trying to get someone to drink a cup of tea you've just warmed up in the microwave, you only have a certain number of moves to get to them before the tea gets cold again.
54	* ThrowingTheDistraction: This gets you out of the game's first room.
55	* TitleDrop: During the closing screens.
56	* TrickShotPuzzle: This is how you topple the books and move Mr Castro.
57	* UnexpectedlyRealisticGameplay: On occasion. Getting a picture of the English teachers' fight also gets you [[spoiler:the photos from the fashion show as they were on the same spool]], and they remain in your inventory despite serving no purpose, and when trying to deliver [[spoiler:the sleeping kid to Mrs Awatif, you have to put him down, put the Perma-Tie on and pick him up again one move at a time because "you've only got two arms" and can't put the tie on him whilst he's slung over your shoulder.]]
58	* VideoGameCrueltyPotential: You pretty much spend the game breaking stuff and making people's lives miserable.
59	* WhatTheHellHero: The game calls you out for [[spoiler:trying to deliver one of the Sr. 1C kids to Mrs Awatif without any defence.]]

Context VideoGame / EscapeFromStMarys