Arts Campus | Devlog #19
🔔 WISHLIST ESCAPE ACADEMY 2 🔔 Hey there, Escapists! Today, we’re continuing our Campus Tour series (as I’ve dubbed it) with the Arts Campus! Welcome to the Arts Campus. The Arts Campus is inspired by Spanish architecture, painted stucco walls , terracotta tiles , iron balconies
🔔WISHLIST ESCAPE ACADEMY 2🔔
Hey there, Escapists! Today, we’re continuing our Campus Tour series (as I’ve dubbed it) with the Arts Campus!
Welcome to the Arts Campus.
The Arts Campus is inspired by Spanish architecture, painted stucco walls, terracotta tiles, iron balconies/rails, hand-painted signs, painted brick ground, and paint splash stains found everywhere. At the top of the hill is the Hall of Escapists & Workshop. Built along the steep hillside/ocean cliffside leading down to the quad, the art campus features a layered terraced staircase leading down to a village of studios/classrooms. Hand-painted murals/graffiti and sculpted Escape art litter the campus.
At the Arts Campus, you will learn about the Art of escape, as compared to the history or science of it. Enora Chortkoff rules this domain, and has an iron fist while doing it. On the Arts Campus, you can expect to find Red Herrings, Escape Bucks, Extra Credit, and a narrative-driven escape room we went over previously in our blog “Devlog 17 - Death Of An Artist”! Go check it out if you’re interested in learning more.
Main Attractions
On the Arts Campus, there’s a few different key locations for you to indulge yourself in:
The Monument Of Escape (yes, that one!)
The Costume Shop
The Dance Studio
The Theater
…and even more!
You’ll have to wait to take a peek inside, though.
The Frightening Faculty
This is Enora Chortkoff, the rather intimidating professor that oversees most of the activities on the Arts Campus!
Ever since going to a show at The Showman’s Studio, Enora promised herself that she’d make it to that very stage herself one day. From then on, she spent all her spare time practicing the performing arts of Escape; not even her parents could stop her from spending entire weekends watching plays, writing her own, and incessantly honing her multiple disciplines.
Escape Academy 2: Back 2 School takes place 10 years after Enora’s biggest failure: when she finally got her big break cast as Ruby LeClue in Jacob Surovskey’s famous Murder Mystery “The Death of the Artist”. While being so caught up in her desire to perform perfectly, she forgot to do the one thing that mattered most: performing well.
Terrified to show herself in front of an audience again, Professor Chortkoff was approached by Solange and offered a role as the Performing Arts Professor at the Academy.
Greetings from a Familiar Face
If you have a keen eye, you may have noticed something familiar; we’ve repurposed this environment from the old game with a fresh makeover to fit right into the new campus!
Get ready to have class with Professor Slip again, too! He’s keeping it just as loose as ever, keeping his spot among the student body as “coolest professor”. For now.
There’s tons of interesting puzzles in this section of campus, ranging from hidden ciphers to spot-the-difference style Extra Credit quests. But, I won’t spoil any more for you. Are you ready to explore the Arts Campus, and see everything it has to offer? 👀
That’s All, Folks!
We hope you enjoyed this dive into the Arts Campus, and hopefully your thirst for Escape has been satiated for now. But if not, fear not; you can play the Escape Academy 2: Back 2 School Demo, or hop back into the classic that started it all. We’ll see you again next week, Escapist!
With love,
Coin Crew Games💛💜
Just look at that view!
Meet: Von Bellini.
Von Bellini is known by Solange as the campus lunatic, although the stude bodyt body might refer to him as the “cool professor”. Von Bellini is always down for a fun experiment, hold the supervision. 
But Wait! There’s More…
There’s been a murder in Crime City! You’ll have to use your cunning wits in order to solve this one. You’ll have to perform your lines perfectly in front of a definitely-not-judgemental audience, or face the wrath of….gasp….social ostracization!
If you’re more into picnic-ing than clowning around, that’s okay. We’ve got a little something for everyone at the Academy.
We believe that Escape Bucks will be a super fun mechanic that’ll take you into spaces you wouldn’t expect, and have you exploring unordinary places to make sure you’re cramming your wallet with every Escape Buck you can find 😉
Is that Science Campus I see in the distance? We’ll use the honor system and ask that you don’t look over there - you’re not supposed to know what it looks like yet!
The Cipher Center is one of the many ways we’re injecting school identity into the various campuses throughout the game. Not only do we get to have campus-like buildings with a touch of Escape, but you’ll actually get to walk inside, talk to other students, professors, and truly get the opportunity to feel like a student at the Academy. The Cipher Center is just one of the many doors (ha) that have been opened thanks to our new open-world systems.
Additionally, something we haven’t had a lot of chances to talk about yet is the location of the Academy. It’s known that the Academy is a secret to those who aren’t enthusiastic about Escape, so it must be secluded - 
What could that be?
There’s so much more I’d love to gush about on the topic of the Founders - but you’ll have to wait to get the full story 🤫
Here, you’ll be expected to get on the tram in an ORDERLY fashion. Absolutely no running, jumping, or funny business (😉). In here, you’ll get familiar with the control scheme, puzzle interaction, and more!
It’s not too challenging, but we think that’s perfect for something like a first level. It gets you familiar with the interaction system, and allows for an opportunity for us (the developers) to catch the player off-guard with the sudden intensity immediately followed.
Don’t worry - Turmeric has plenty of business left on campus, and she hasn’t disappeared from the Escape scene just yet.
We won’t spoil any of the juicy narrative details just yet (sorry gang, you’ll have to play the full game to figure that one out 😉) but in true devlog fashion, we’re excited to jump into the nitty-gritty of what you can expect from this level.
Turmeric is in trouble! We’ve gotta help her!
Marble puzzles are making a comeback in 
As you travel through RAT, Turmeric will make her journey all the way around this space, eventually making it back to the start. (Not before indulging in several different means of transportation to accomplish this, though!) Choo choo!
Seen above is an early concept sketch of TOW - shoutouts to the art team!
