If you’ve followed me at all over the years, you’ll know that my favourite game franchise of all-time is Ape Escape. It was the game that launched alongside the iconic DualShock controller on the PlayStation, and had two sequels, a countless number of spin-off games, with PlayStation even teasing it’s comeback a few years ago, before totally fizzling out.
Even though more recently with the launch of its PlayStation Stars platform, where Ape Escape statues made up the majority of the launch offering, there’s still absolutely zero murmurs about a return for the iconic franchise, so I took it into my own hands with DALL-E to envision what this could look like.
For those that don’t know, DALL-E was made by OpenAI which is basically the AI platform that is taking the internet by storm this week. It basically uses a bunch of AI learnings to give you a series of images, or a response to a question, or a bunch of creative ideas. This is also being seen with ChatGPT, a platform that utilises GPT3 and basically allows you to have a conversation with an almost human-like figure that also runs off this same AI framework.
What I was able to do (through friend of the site Ewan), is plug a bunch of terminology around Ape Escape into DALL-E and have it spit out some pretty incredible concepts. Let’s be honest, I’d take anything Ape Escape at this point, but if any of these turned out to be true I’d be pretty happy.
AN APE ESCAPE GAME IN 2022
I started off with a simple task. Just show me what an Ape Escape game would look like in 2022. To be honest, it didn’t leave me feeling anymore hopeful in getting an Ape Escape game this year.
A CYBERPUNK APE ESCAPE GAME
Let’s be honest, I want this art on a t-shirt.
A NOIR APE ESCAPE GAME
Ape Escape meets Batman? I’m in.
AN APE ESCAPE GAME IN THE STYLE OF ZELDA
I’m in. If Zelda can have dozens of iterations, why can’t Ape Escape?
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE NEXT APE ESCAPE GAME?
Hey, if there were real, I’d take it based on that first picture alone.
THE NEXT APE ESCAPE GAME – THE REALITY
When “The Next Ape Escape game” was typed in, we were presented with the most likely of scenarios. A mobile-looking Ape Escape game, which is what I can totally see happening after 10 years of agony.
THE FAVOURITES
I think without doubt these four images are my favourite of the bunch and if any of these appeared as a teaser or early key art for the next Ape Escape game, I’d be very excited.
A boy can dream, and if 2022 isn’t the year for Ape Escape to return, I’ll always have my silly little concepts to hold at night.
