The Escapists vs Tiny Armies
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
The Escapists
Experience life behind bars in this unique prison escape sandbox game. Use strategy and cunning to craft tools, bribe guards, and plan your breakout from various themed prisons. Survive the daily routines and outsmart your captors to achieve freedom.
- Craft tools and weapons
- Steal and trade items
- Bribe and fight guards
- Recruit fellow prisoners
- Over 6 themed prisons
- Adapt to prison routines
- Increase strength, speed, intellect
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The Escapists, you’ve done the crime but can you survive and do the time? The Escapists is a unique prison escape sandbox game where you get to experience a life behind bars and barbed wire fences. You’ve had a life of crime but now you’re caught. With thrilling and immersive gameplay, you need to create an escape route in a world of other prisoners and ruled by routine. From roll call to lights out, you’re banged up. There’s no get out of jail free card in this game, you need to break out. Are you up for the challenge or are just going to sit there in your cell? You need all your wits and skill to bust out. No walls are going to hold you, you need to escape! While under the careful watch of the guards, you’ll need to get used to prison life while you use strategy and daring to swipe useful objects from under their noses. Make innocent looking items into useful tools like shovels for cunning escape plans or handy weapons to survive in a fight. Escaping requires cunning, strategy, the right equipment and staying at least two steps ahead of the guards. Bribe and fight your way through the prison ranks. If your fellow prisoners like you enough, recruit them and create your own gang. You might even take over a prison! The guards are out to stop any escape attempts, so you’ll have to avoid suspicious behaviour by attending roll calls, working a prison job and hiding your stolen contraband. Features: ● Addictive prison simulator game, steal spoons and forks, use them to dig a tunnel out of your cell. ● Over 6 themed prisons, try to escape from minimum security jails or fearsome big houses like Alcatraz ● Find, steal and trade items to create dozens of crafting combinations to aid your escape ● Use the exercise yard to increase your strength, handy for scaling walls ● Find other prisoners to trade swag with, you’ll need duct tape, a screwdriver or nail files ● Dodge contraband detectors. if you pass through one with contraband in your pocket, the heat meter rises to 99 percent ● Adapt to life behind the steel doors with prison routines and jobs and master the game's six penitentiaries, there are three extra prisons waiting to be challenged. ● Push yourself to survive and increase your strength, speed, and intellect. There are multiple ways to break out and escape, you just need to find them. The Escapists is a thrilling sandbox strategy prison simulator that challenges you to bust out in a number of different ways. You want to break free but you're banged up and you need to escape! How you survive and do that is up to you, but when you’re out of your cell, a rigid daily schedule is designed to keep you in line. You're expected to work at one of several jobs during the day, exercise and showers are mandatory. The Escapists is tough game, just like jail. Can you dig a tunnel right under the walls of the prison? Or even steal a guard uniform to blend in with your captors? Addictive and tense, it’s a real challenge to escape your first prison. Commit a few inside crimes, there are dozens of items to find, steal and smuggle. Some are contraband you can sell or trade for more useful gear. Create clever makeshift weapons and tools, a bar of soap in a sock is useful in a fistfight. Materials purchased or "borrowed" from your fellow inmates are used to craft tools and other items like wires, a bottle of bleach, a piece of timber, a bar of chocolate, a plastic comb, and much more. If you’re smart enough, you’ll figure out ways to make your escape. There are dozens of items to find and use to get out of your cell, including a pickaxe, wire cutters, zip lines and more. The Escapists is an addictive strategy prison simulator game that challenges you to break out of jail. Don’t be a prisoner, be an Escapist! Download The Escapists today, it would be a crime not to. You can’t check out and you can never leave, unless you have an escape plan… http://escapistgame.com/ https://www.team17.com/
Tiny Armies
Engage in fast-paced conquest battles with tiny armies. Strategize your moves across various terrains and challenge opponents solo, locally, or globally via iMessage. Enjoy quick gameplay sessions with a visually striking presentation.
- Fast-paced conquest gameplay
- Strategic unit movement
- Terrain-based challenges
- Solo and multiplayer modes
- iMessage battles
- Quick gameplay sessions
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Epic battles of tiny proportions! Tiny Armies is a fast-paced game of conquest. Swipe your units to conquer the enemy and strategize as you encounter lakes, mountains, and forests along the way. Play handcrafted levels, endless random maps, or battle your friends face-to-face in local multiplayer for gloriously tiny bragging rights! Quick bursts of gameplay with a striking presentation, designed for Apple Watch, iPhone, and iPad. Invade your friends' message threads with the Tiny Armies iMessage Sticker Pack featuring brave knights and animated tiles! - Reviews - "Tiny Armies is a fast, lightweight, easy-to-play, game of conquest. This one's worth buying on your iOS device." - Pocket Tactics "Tiny Armies should be standard issue for all Apple Watch owners. It places an effortless punch right on the button that delivers a knockout." - The Zarf "This is the type of game you'd expect to play on a watch. Once you start playing - oh my gosh - it's like wait, they're attacking me! I'm not just swiping. It's not passive. These guys are moving trying to eliminate me. It's actually quite fun." - Apple WatchCast "One level of Tiny Armies takes a mere minute which makes it perfect for short play sessions. The game is fun and fairly challenging, you’ll need some good tactics to play a couple moves ahead and take down Red." - 5 Minute Games
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Tiny Armies at $0.99 against The Escapists's $4.99. The Escapists's advantage is review sentiment (69% vs 55%) and ratings volume (3.3K vs 311). On rating, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
The Escapists costs $4.99 and Tiny Armies $0.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.4 for The Escapists against 4.3 for Tiny Armies. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: The Escapists has 3.3K ratings behind it against 311, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 69% of The Escapists's written reviews are positive against 55% of Tiny Armies's.
The Escapists ships an update every 2 months, Tiny Armies monthly. Both last shipped on October 24, 2026.
| Parameter | The Escapists | Tiny Armies |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $4.99 | $0.99 — better |
| Rating | 4.4 (3.3K ratings) — better | 4.3 (311 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 69.4% of reviews — better | 54.7% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 3.3K — better | 311 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Best chart rank | #69 — better | #154 |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch |
| Requires iOS | 9.0 — better | 16.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 469 MB | 11 MB |
| Age rating | 9+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Team17 Digital Limited | Brothers Flint |
Customer experience
The Escapists
Tiny Armies
User reviews
The Escapists
From 3.3K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Great game
- 🚀 Lots of content
- 💡 Challenging and fun
- 🚀 Worth the money
- 🚀 Addictive gameplay
Room to improve
- 🐛 Frequent crashes
- 🐛 Glitchy guards
- 🐛 Disappearing items
- 🐛 Aspect ratio issues
- 🐛 Broken crafting recipes
Tiny Armies
From 311 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🎮 Simple and intuitive gameplay mechanics
- ⌚ Excellent Apple Watch integration
- 👥 Fun local multiplayer/pass-and-play mode
- 💰 Fair monetization with no ads or IAP
- 🎨 Minimalist and elegant visual design
Room to improve
- 🎲 Excessive reliance on RNG and randomization
- 🤖 Weak and predictable AI behavior
- 📊 Unbalanced map generation causing unfair matches
- ⏱️ Very short campaign (under 1 hour)
- 😴 Repetitive gameplay becomes boring quickly
Bugs and requests
The Escapists
Reported bugs
6 issues- Guards attack players for no reason
- Infinite solitary confinement loop
- Desk hole detection glitch
- Job board not working
- Crashes on loading screens
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- Incompatibility with newer devices
Requested features
7 requests- Multiplayer mode
- Female character options
- Guard mode
- Custom prisons
- More prisons/content
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- Crafting recipes guide
- Map feature
Tiny Armies
Reported bugs
8 issues- Stuck on initial 'Swipe Up' screen on newer iPhones
- iMessage version doesn't register certain swipe directions
- Apple Watch swipe input not detected
- App crashes or fails to install on some devices
- Swipe controls unresponsive on iPhone 15
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- Characters trapped in spawn zones by mountains
- Fog of war reveals AI knowledge of hidden tiles
- Game occasionally uninstalls itself
Requested features
12 requests- Level/map editor for custom gameplay
- Online multiplayer functionality
- Additional campaign levels and content
- Difficulty settings (Easy/Normal/Hard)
- Dark mode option
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- Customizable game settings for skirmish mode
- Random player start order toggle
- Power-ups or special abilities
- Improved AI with multiple difficulty levels
- Music and sound effects
- Better obstacle placement logic
- Replay/undo functionality
In-app purchases
The Escapists
No in-app purchases
Tiny Armies
No in-app purchases









