The first time I escaped in Crazy Ace, I thought I'd basically beaten the game. I remember leaning back in my chair, feeling that familiar mix of triumph and completion. Then I discovered the Rivals system, and my entire perspective on what it meant to "win" was completely rewritten. This is where the true endgame begins, a layered puzzle that separates casual players from those who truly dominate. If you want to see the final credits, your focus must shift entirely from mere survival to becoming a master strategist, and that journey starts with understanding that your initial escape was just the tutorial.
Let me be clear from my own experience: ignoring the Rivals is the single biggest mistake you can make after your first successful run. I learned this the hard way. I spent probably five or six runs just focusing on optimizing my escape route, gathering resources, and avoiding unnecessary risks. I was getting out consistently, but I felt stuck. The game had become repetitive. It wasn't until I randomly stumbled upon a door marked "Computer" and decided to investigate that I realized I was playing a completely different game on the surface. Each Rival has a redacted dossier, and at first glance, they seem like flavor text—fun, irreverent bits of lore about these other prisoners. But that's a trap. The real treasure, the absolute key to progression, is buried within those files: the passcodes. There are eight Rivals, which means there are eight unique passcodes you need to collect. All of them. You can't just get seven and call it a day. You need the full set to unlock a mysterious vault, and trust me, what's inside is worth the obsessive effort. This vault is Redacted's true endgame, the final boss of your patience and deductive skills.
So, how do you tackle this monumental task? The first proven strategy is to re-map the entire prison in your mind. Your goal is no longer the exit; your goal is finding those "Computer" rooms. They are scattered throughout each run, often in out-of-the-way or high-risk areas I used to avoid. I had to change my entire routing strategy. I started prioritizing paths that led through administrative wings and abandoned tech sectors, even if it meant dealing with tougher guard patrols. The payoff is that inside each Computer room, you get to unredact a single paragraph from a Rival's dossier. Now, here’s where the numbers get intimidating, but also where a solid plan becomes your best weapon. There are 10 paragraphs for each of the eight Rivals. That means there are 80 individual files hidden in the game world. Let that sink in. Eighty. And the absolute best you can hope for in a single, perfectly optimized run is to find four, maybe five of these Computer rooms. I've personally never managed more than four in one attempt, and that was a legendary, nearly flawless run where I got incredibly lucky with the room generation. This mathematical reality leads directly to the second strategy: embrace the long game. You are not meant to complete this in a handful of runs. You are in for a marathon. This requires a shift in mindset from seeking immediate gratification to valuing incremental, permanent progress. Every paragraph you unlock is a permanent entry in your master dossier, so no effort is ever truly wasted.
My third strategy is all about efficiency and note-taking. This might sound tedious, but it’s what elevated my gameplay from random searching to targeted hunting. I started a physical notebook—yes, old school—where I track which Rivals I have passcodes for and which paragraphs I've already uncovered. The game doesn't do a great job of telling you what you're missing, so you have to create your own system. When I enter a Computer room, I'm not just randomly picking a Rival to unredact. I'm making a strategic decision based on which Rival has the most incomplete dossier or which one I suspect is closest to revealing their passcode. Sometimes the passcode is hidden in the very first paragraph you find; other times, it's buried in the eighth or ninth. There's no pattern, which is both frustrating and brilliant game design. This leads to the fourth strategy: pattern recognition in the lore itself. While the passcode placement is random, the information in the dossiers often gives subtle hints about a Rival's behavior or location. One Rival's file mentioned a fondness for the kitchens, and I started having more luck finding his Computer rooms in areas adjacent to the culinary sector. It’s a weak correlation, maybe even placebo, but in a grind this long, any potential edge, no matter how small, feels like a major victory.
The fifth and final strategy is perhaps the most important: managing frustration. You will have runs where you find zero Computer rooms. You will have runs where you finally find one and it gives you a duplicate paragraph for a Rival whose passcode you already have. I estimate that based on the 80 files and a maximum of 4 finds per run, you're looking at a minimum of 20 successful, highly-focused runs to complete the set, and in reality, with duplicates and bad luck, it's probably closer to 35 or 40. That's a huge time investment. The key is to celebrate the small wins. The joy of finally getting that last passcode after weeks of trying is a gaming high I won't soon forget. It’s a test of your dedication. Unlocking that vault isn't just about seeing the end credits; it's about proving to yourself that you have the strategic patience and adaptability to master Crazy Ace's deepest secrets. The game doesn't just want you to escape; it wants you to become the most informed and relentless prisoner who ever lived. And in my opinion, that transformation is the real reward.