PLEASE NOTE: This product has been discounted due to minor damage to the box. Our Dents & Dings products are not ideal for the collector looking for a mint copy of a game, but for those that are less concerned about the box appearance. All damage is superficial and has not impacted the game components in any way. All Dents & Dings products are final sale and are not eligible for return.

Escape: The Curse of the Temple is a cooperative game where players must escape (yes...) from a temple (yes...) which is cursed (yes...) before the temple collapses and kills one or more explorers, thereby causing everyone to lose.

The initial game board is made up of a row of three square tiles, each showing a combination of two symbols, say, two green adventurers or one green adventurer and one blue key in one corner of the tile. All of the explorers begin in the center tile – the safe room – and each player starts with a hand of five dice. Each die will have five symbols:

• A cursed mask – this die is put aside when rolled.
• A golden mask – each of these symbol counteracts two cursed masks, either your own or those of another explorer in the same room.
• A red torch or blue key – these symbols are used to enter rooms, access treasure, or activate gems.
• A green adventurer, which appears twice on the die – you will need these to move from room to room, and to activate some gems.

Escape is played in real-time, with players rolling dice and taking actions simultaneously. You need to roll the right symbols to enter a room, and if you're at an open doorway, you can roll to reveal the next tile in the stack and add it to that doorway. Some rooms contain combinations of red and blue symbols, and if you (possibly working with other players in the same room) roll enough red or blue symbols, you "find" magic gems, moving them from a separate gem depot onto that tile.

The real-time aspect is enforced by a soundtrack played during the game. At certain points, a countdown begins, and if players aren't back in the safe room when time is up, they lose one of their dice.

Once the exit tile is revealed, players will attempt to escape the temple by moving to that tile, then rolling a number of blue dice equal to the magic gems that haven't been removed from the gem depot. Thus, the more gems you find, the easier it is to get out of the temple. When a player escapes, they gives one die to a player of their choice. If all players escape before the third countdown, everyone wins; if not, everyone loses, no matter how many players did make it out.

Escape: The Curse of the Temple comes with two expansion modules that can be used individually or together. With the "Treasures" module, some rooms contain treasure, and when you reveal such a room, you put a face-down treasure chest on the tile. Roll the symbols on that chest tile, and you take the treasure for use later: a key lets you teleport anywhere, a path lets you connect two rooms that otherwise have no door between them, and a medic kit heals all players instantly (putting black dice back into play). With the "Curses" module, some tiles "curse" players by forcing them to put one hand on their head, keep mute during play, or otherwise do what you wouldn't want to do while escaping a temple!