Whoever said you couldn't compare Apples and Oranges? In this column, I'm going to attempt to do exactly that. My mission here, which I've for some reason chosen to accept, is to select cards from different card games, and compare and contrast them. To at least give me some basis for comparison, I've decided to stick with only cards that share the same name, since a lot of the time Decipher likes to reuse the same verb names between games, as a sort of "in joke". For today's card, I'm throwing a banana into the mix as well, so I'll do a review of the Lord of the Rings, Star Trek 2E and .hack//Enemy cards, "Escape".

Lord of the Rings - Two Towers Set
Escape - Cost 0
Shire Condition
Vitality +1
Stealth. Bearer must be an unbound Hobbit. Limit 1 per character.
Skirmish: Exert bearer twice to cancel a skirmish involving him. Any Shadow player may remove (1) to prevent this.
"Suddenly Merry and Pippin realized that without moving they were now outside the circle...."
http://www.decipher.com/lordoftherings/cardlists/twotowers/large/LOTR-EN04300.html

Star Trek 2E - Premiere Set
Escape
Interrupt
When any number of your personnel facing a dilemma are about to be killed or placed in an opponent's brig, discard a random card from hand to prevent that. Those personnel are stopped instead.
Jean-Luc Picard's log entry on the mission at Kolarus III included a notice to the Starfleet Corp of Engineers, commending the members of the Argo design team.
http://www.decipher.com/startrek/cardlists/secondedition/large/ST2E-EN01127.html

.hack//Enemy - Contagion Set
Escape
Action
Earth Element - Destiny 2
To Flip - Spot [E]. Your PC must be in a fight. You must flip this card before drawing destiny.
Place a storable monster in that fight in its owner's portal.
You can run away from the smaller ones.
http://www.dothackenemy.com/TCG/Card.aspx?gameID=9&cardID=83

Now, to compare the cards in a number of different areas...

Image.
All three are good action shots of somebody in the middle of an escape. LotR gives a blurred shot to show movement. ST gives a "flying" shot to imply rapid movement. And .hack gives a running shot to show movement. I think all three cards tie here.

Function.
LotR lets somebody run away if he thinks it looks like a bad situation, ST lets somebody get away when he's about to die. And .hack lets somebody avoid a fight he doesn't think he can win. So LotR and .hack take more pre-planning and are proactive cards, whereas ST is a response and a reactive card. LotR can only affect a specific subgroup of people (Merry and Pippin, in this case) whereas ST and .hack can affect anybody. LotR does give the nice little vitality bonus, that lets you use the function a second time without healing, Trek and .hack can only be used once, then it's gone. The other drawback of .hack is that due to the random element of destiny, you might be wasting it. Because unless you know what that top card is, you can't be sure if you'll win or lose before you activate this card. So there's an element of risk involved there. I think this category is won by the LotR version, just for the ability to use it multiple times. And in a well thought out skirmish, you almost always have time to use this ability as a react, even if having the card in play first requires you to be proactive.

Cost.
LotR and Trek cards are free to play (points/twilight-wise), but have other costs attached with using them. Trek requires a random discard as a cost, LotR requires a double exert. .hack requires your 1 card per turn allowance to play, but has no other cost attached, aside from spotting another [E] card in play somewhere (probably armour on one of your PCs). Also, LotR can be auto-nullified by your opponent, whereas Trek can't (unless he has specific cards in hand, like Amanda), and .hack can't at all. .hack wins this category, by the basic lack of cost.

Timing.
LotR and .hack can play immediately after you draw them and use whenever you want, but Trek you have to keep in hand until used. But conversly, Trek and .hack can be used as a surprise, whereas LotR your opponent sees the card ahead of time and is warned that you can do that. So .hack has the best of both worlds, and wins this category as well.

Lore.
LotR has a book quote that's hard to instantly place, even by those that've seen the movie and read the book. It can be seen as just confusing. Trek has a well detailed little tidbit, made up by Decipher but based off of a one liner that Picard spoke during the movie. It makes good sense to anybody that's seen the movie but might be hard to understand to anybody else. .hack's lore is more based off of the game rules, and is basically correct. However, there are a few storable monsters considered large by most, so it's not entirely correct. Definitely don't like the LotR lore, .hack is too bland, so Trek definitely takes this category.

In summary...
With a final score of LotR - 1, Trek - 1, .hack - 2, and 1 tie, it seems that the new guy has won! Next time... cards from dead games...