Metacritic Games

Ape Escape (Playstation)

As Spike, it's your responsibility to make sure that a bunch of monkeys don't become masters of this planet. They've travelled through time and with the inspiration of their evil monkey leader Specter they plan to keep you and every other human locked away in an amusement park.

Sony Computer Entertainment
Platform, Adventure
Players: 1
E (Everyone)
Developer: Sony Computer Entertainment
Released May 31, 1999

Overall Metascore

This is a weighted, normalized average of all individual scores given by critics, on a scale of 0 (worst) to 100 (best).

90 / 100

Critic Reviews

100	Official U.S. Playstation Magazine This awesome platformer makes use of the Dual Shock in creative ways. [Mar 02, p.34]
100	Hot Games This is one of those games that just screams out fun whenever you play, even though technically apes aren't the same as monkeys. An absolutely essential part of any platform fan's collection.
95	Cheat Code Central Platinum The genius is in the innovative gameplay and Ape Escape overflows with it.
95	IGN The best 3D platform game on the PlayStation. Hands down. It's not only innovative, it digs deep into the analog control's inherent movements and brings out a breadth of fantastic gameplay elements that are unique to the game.
95	Electric Playground Employs the most effective and rewarding controls ever developed for a platform-action game... An instant classic.
94	TotalGames.net Tremendous fun... Gameplay is rarely this pure. Get monkey spanking!
90	Games Domain The level structure and overall design is top notch, resulting in a game which is fun and which instils the player with a feeling of progression.
90	Happy Puppy Quite basically, this game rocks... Plus it lives up to the peak level of story, animation, and performance that is expected from an adventure game these days, so it isn't just sitting back on its new control's gimmick value.
90	All Game Guide One of the most enjoyable 3D platform games to swing onto the PlayStation in quite some time. It's also one of the most innovative.
90	PSX Nation A refreshing twist on one of the oldest genres.
88	Absolute Playstation The wealth of control and freedom of movement will make gamers wonder what took so long to implement something of this nature.
88	GameSpot One of the best 3D platformers to date, brimming with innovation, originality and fun.
86	Gamezilla! Getting used to the controls can be a bit challenging at first, but you will soon be rowing the raft and netting monkeys with ease.
85	Electronic Gaming Monthly The amazing 3D actin game that made capturing monkeys popular again. [Jan 2004, p.188]
83	Game Revolution The right stick control feels truly intuitive and you'll wonder why you haven't used it more often.
83	Gaming Age If there was some more powerful hardware behind it, some more tweaking done to the control, and a little more variety in the gameplay (capturing monkeys for over 30 something levels can get tedious) it would have made this a definite A game.
80	Total Video Games It's not that great to look at, but you will be gripped for a long time, this has to be the best platformer on the PlayStation to date.
80	Gaming Maxx If you're starved for a platformer you'll find plenty to do here, but personally, I'm content to let the apes run free. For now.
75	GameCritics Ape Escape borrows too heavily from games on other systems and doesn't deliver enough to help it stand out beyond the Mario clones flooding the market.