izigame.me

this is a fascinating concept for a game like this. not "politically correct" at all, but this is a game where beating and shooting your prisoners is more or less the 'right' way to play, so y'know what, I think I can live with it lmao (though it does get disturbing at times when symptoms are represented incorrectly, as someone who struggles with/has loved ones who struggle with mental health issues and breakdowns). I was very excited to play it, since I have a particular interest in psychology and the history of psychiatric treatment.
mostly I'm just really disappointed by the gameplay. there's essentially no difference between regular inmates and criminally insane inmates, you have to make an entire section entirely dedicated to them if you want to keep them happy, and they'll probably just cause more problems than regular ones. there aren't any sort of unique gameplay features or mechanics associated with having a psych ward, unless you count the psychiatric office, which is pretty much just a reskinned version of the psychologist's treatment from the base game with some fancy little addons that don't do much at all. the criminally insane inmates don't behave any differently from each other despite the flavor text, they're all just the same flavor of bla bla i crazy now run around giggle. I would've liked to see more realistic and varied depictions of mental health issues, even if they were still dramatised and cartoonish (it is meant to be fun, after all)
in the base game, you can choose to mistreat and abuse your prisoners, or try to reform and pamper them. I like having that choice. this dlc only really allows you the option to employ medical practices that are horrifying and outdated when used irl. I don't mind that it is a feature, because again, it's a video game where you can do some horrible things, and I like having that option. it isn't even an option here, though, there's literally no other way to treat criminally insane inmates than heavily restraining, abusing, and drugging them.
I usually just close my prison off to them as much as possible and dread the idea that I might somehow get a criminally insane inmate and have basically nothing to do about them. one of my regular inmates ended up going insane, and now I honestly have no idea what to do with her, since I don't see an option to send her away, and "replace prisoners" isn't doing anything. I'm considering executing her so that I don't have to fund an entirely new segregated ward just because one of my inmates lost it.
I'm probably going to end up disabling this pack unless I can find a mod that makes it worth playing. it's a shame when modders working for free have to pick up the slack for AAA studios that make millions, even billions off of broken code.