Prison

About

Prison is a 1989 action-adventure with RPG and puzzle elements set on a desolate penal planet. You play Jag Edwars, a wrongfully imprisoned officer tasked with retrieving a crashed escape pod. Navigate a harsh environment filled with rival gangs and environmental hazards. Combat is real-time and physical, blending hand-to-hand fighting with weapon-based clashes. Resource management and exploration factor heavily, as you scavenge for tools and avoid deadly confrontations. The game’s structure emphasizes both direct confrontation and stealth, with branching paths affecting outcomes. This title stands out for its genre-blending approach, merging arcade combat with strategic decision-making ahead of its time. Running on 1980s hardware like Amiga and Atari ST, it uses chunky pixel art and maze-like level design. While its difficulty curve and dated visuals may test modern patience, retro gaming communities occasionally highlight its ambition in combining multiple playstyles. A niche entry in late-80s gaming, it offers a rough but functional mix of dungeon crawling and brawling.

Storyline

Far into the future, The Galatci Federation is using an abandoned planet as a penal dumping ground for their underisables. A dead planet shrouded in dank clouds, Altrax, is entirely closed to the outside universe. The only way in, is teleportation, the only way out is death for those whom capital punishment is too light a sentence. Jag Edwars is an undercover federation policeman wrongly convicted for a crime he did not commit and teleported to Altrax for life. Inside his cell, Jag is told of a pleasure craft that strayed into Altrax warning beacons and crashed into the planet. You mus recover the escape pod, but we warned! The rival gangs of alien life forms are also looking for the pod and will try to ensure Jag doesn't reach it first.