• Estimated trophy difficulty: 3/10 (personal opinion) (Platinum Difficulty Rating)
  • Offline trophies: 30 (5, 20, 4, 1)
  • Online trophies: 1 (1)
  • Approximate amount of time to platinum: 36-50 Hours (Estimated Time to Platinum)
  • Minimum number of playthroughs: 1 story playthrough + some sandbox games.
  • Number of missable trophies: None
  • Glitched trophies: Yes, 1 - Prison Hotel
  • Does difficulty affect trophies?: Yes, custom settings won't earn you trophies in prison architect or warden games, except Failure To Communicate (see walkthrough steps 2 & 3)
  • Do trophies stack?: No
  • Do cheat codes disable trophies?: No cheats available.

 

Prison architect is a simulation game where you are the architect of a prison. You decide what your prison looks like, what areas it consists off with options to built a canteen, infirmary, a guard room, solitary confinement cells or an execution chamber. You have many options to tune it to your liking.

With some research you gain full control over your prison, deciding on regime, food, punishment and logistics. You get to decide on how to deal with informants, rampant contraband, gang warfare, full scale riots and more!

There are 3 different playable modes:

1. Story mode (a tutorial & campaign mode)
2. Prison warder, where you play in a pre-build prison which all have their own challenges
3. Prison architect mode, where there is nothing to start will and all up to you to make it happen!

You'll have to play all three modes for the platinum trophy, DLC is not required but does speed up the process. The trophies effected by the DLC have tips on the bottom to show how the DLC can help you

Enjoy the game, enjoy the guide and as always, all feedback is welcome!
 

Step 1: The story
First off, play the story as it's like a nice packaged tutorial and will only take about 5-10 hours but it goes over most options in the game (which are many) and each story becomes a bit bigger until story 5 where you start your prison from scratch. Make sure to do all optional requests as well for the trophies.

Trophies gained in this step:

2,000 volts
Cosa Nostra
Crowd Control
Reformation
Freedom
Throw The Book At Them


Step 2: Prison architect
The idea of this step is simple start a prison, make it big do all of the prison architect trophies in it. In the trophy details you will find how and when to do this if it's in order but most can be done on the way to 500+ prisoners. It's important to know before you actually start that you should play on one of the standard settings (county, federal or super max) is you change any setting out of the standard it will change to custom, the custom difficulty will not get you trophies except for Failure To Communicate .

Trophies gained in this step:

Spare The Rod
Don't Put Me In The Dark
Stone Walls
Iron Bars
Confined
D.B. Cooper
Samuel Norton
Wait and Hope
Get Busy Living
Prison Economics
The Justice System
Rehabilitation and Reformation
Prison Hotel
Minimum Security Prison
Working Prison
Prison Industrial Complex
I Read A Book Once... Green It Was
Failure To Communicate (gang related, custom difficulty)


Step 3: Prison warden
There are 10 pre-made prisons in prison warden mode. The prison warden mode is extremely easy on "County" difficulty so put it on, run it fast and move away. Come back an hour later, check if you are at day 11 and you're good. Playing 10 days full speed is about 1 hour in real life so this step is another 10 hours.

Trophies gained in this step:

Visitation
Inspectorate Of Prisons
Oh My God, They Found Tom


Step 4: Download a map/clean up
You need to download a map (no need to actually play the map) and if you didn't play at 11:11 AM or PM yet, then use this step to get it.

Trophies gained in this step:

It's Not What You Know
HM Prison Services
Double Eleven
The Chief

[PST Would Like To Thank NemoG for this Roadmap]

Prison Architect Trophy Guide

Printable Guide
Show completed trophies
Show secret trophies

44 trophies ( 20  19  )

  • You've served your time and unlocked every Trophy in Prison Architect

    Get all the other trophies to unlock this one.

  • Complete all optional objectives on 'Death Row'

    Play the story mission 'Death Row' (first mission) and follow all other instructions but remember to press to get an overview of all objectives. Also, make sure to build all the optional improvements to the cell/execution room before clicking the snapshot.

  • Complete all optional objectives on 'Palermo'

    Play the story mission 'Palermo' (2nd mission) and follow all the other instructions but remember to press to get an overview of all objectives. Alcohol and drug programs take a while (specially alcohol) but you can move on to do the laundry objective, don't click the snapshot before these objectives are done or you will skip and miss them.

  • Complete all optional objectives on 'G.A.B.O.S'

    Play the story mission 'Palermo' (3rd mission) and follow the instructions to calm the riot (see below for possible glitch) then follow all the other others you have been given but remember to press to get an overview of all objectives, though don't click the snapshot until you have done all of them.

    I had a glitch whereby I could not take over the South cell block for an unknown reason, as in I did calm the riot and placed my guards but it didn't check the objective box. It was the last prison I tried to calm. Later my brother gave it a shot and he did the South before West and it worked fine so I recommend doing the South first (after the center) and West last (with the fire).

  • Complete all optional objectives on 'Conviction'

    Play the story mission 'Conviction' (4th mission) and follow all the other instructions but remember to press to get an overview of all objectives, though don't click the snapshot till you've done all of them (again, you will be waiting for programs to finish).

  • Complete all optional objectives on 'Bootstraps'

    Play the story mission 'Bootstraps' (5th and last mission) and follow all the other instructions but remember to press to get an overview of all objectives, though don't click the snapshot until you have done all of them.

  • Complete all of the Prison Stories

    Complete all 5 missions (though completing the optional objectives doesn't matter) and the trophy will pop.

  • Unlock all Snapshots

    (Collectible)

    Snapshots are obtained for doing/achieving certain actions in game and most, 145 out of 155, you will get during the story mode. Others you can get during the Warden and Architect modes. You can find them during the game in rooms like Kitchen and workshop. Note that building the room is not always enough, because sometimes it's an action "snapshot" that's needed. See the list below for details:

    • The Warden - Might show up in the warden office is he's in there (the actual "warden" no other warden type).
    • Yard Fight - Might show up during a fight in the Yard.
    • Prison Life - When an inmate is in a cell this can show up.
    • Solitary Confinements - When an inmate is in a solitary confinement cell it can show up
    • Bang-up - When an inmate is in a solitary confinement cell it can show up
    • Phone Home - When an inmate uses the phone (in the year per example) this might show up.
    • Kitchen - It might show once a cook starts cooking.
    • Canteen - When inmates are in the canteen for food this might show up.
    • Hygiene Matters - It might show up once a Janitor started cleaning
    • Medical Attention Required - An inmate or Guard needs to be treated by a doctor then it might show up.
    • Recreation Incarceration - It may show up when you build the common room (no action needed).
    • The Gun Show - In-mates use weight machines in the yard this can shows up.


    In the main menu you can view your snapshot album via options & Extras and the title of the snapshot is the room you can find them in.

  • Run a prison in Prison Warden mode for 10 in-game days

    Pick any prison warden prisons (the pre-made prison from "new game", "Prison warden" mode) and run it for 10 days. I however advice to play "The Lap of Luxury map" as it will also give you the Inspectorate Of Prisons Trophy. You don't have have to run it in a good way, simply press and 2x and you speed up the game. The trophy will pop on day 11 (after 10 have passed). Make sure you don't get fired or bankrupt in those 10 days. On full speed, 10 days of in-game time takes about 1 hour in real life.

  • Run every Prison Warden prison for at least 10 in-game days

    As stated in Visitation, you speed up your game to make time pass quickly but don't worry about the prison too much you can do all other trophies in architect mode. However this is a good moment to have a go and try to get Failure To Communicate & Oh My God, They Found Tom so see these trophies for details.

    There are 10 Warder prisons so make sure you do all of them but there is no way to know which one you have done and still have to do so I advise to start at 1 and move up from there. Remember you can choose a Warder for each game which might help you through these 10/11 days (the Lobbyist and the Pacifier are a great help here.) and you can set the difficulty to County. I recommend playing until day 11, as the game has some glitches in its day counting so make sure you play for 10 full days and so wait for day 11 before quitting. NOTE: If you have the DLC, then you can play "The Lap of Luxury" and get this trophy at day 11. Credit to shanethegooner for this tip.

  • Download a prison from the World of Wardens

    (Online)

    Simply choose a random map from the World of Wardens menu then download it but you don't have to play the map for the trophy to pop.

  • Stopped a riot of 50 or more prisoners in Prison Architect or Prison Warden mode

    Start a new game and build one massive room! Make it a holding cell, put 70 beds in it, hire 2 guards, get 70 inmates then wait but don't worry about food as this angers them and gets them riled up quicker. Once the riot starts, hire 30+ guards and let the emergency riot squad come and calm it down.

  • Execute a prisoner on death row in Prison Architect mode

    There are few steps you have to take for this trophy:

    1. Make sure you have an execution room. Note that there isn't a dedicated room for this so build a normal room then place an electric chair in it.
    2. Test the chair so you're sure your utilities can handle it (like in the story mode).
    3. Have a death row inmate handy. At the intake menu you can select which type of prisoners you want to arrive the following 8am. Select a death row (black suit) prisoner and he will arrive the following day.
    4. When you select your inmate and view his details, you can see if you're advised to execute or hold off for now. You can ignore this for the trophy but it will impact your game if you execute him too early.
  • Build a prison with 100 prisoners in Prison Architect mode

    See Confined.

  • Build a prison with 250 prisoners in Prison Architect mode

    See Confined.

  • Build a prison with 500 prisoners in Prison Architect mode

    What you got to do is have a prison with 500+ cells and inmates. For Prison Economics you have to build 500 cells and for this trophy you need to populate them with inmates. Before you hit 500, you will bypass 100 and 250 thus giving you the Stone Walls & Iron Bars trophies.

  • Sell a prison and make over $1,000,000 profit in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    When you go to "Report" (press ) and select "Valuation" you can see the profit that your prison has made. You get + value for many things, examples are the buildings, your staff, prisoner Capacity and cash on hand. You get value (penalties) for deaths and escapes in the past 24 hours. Also you have a starting $1,000 which doesn't help (though this depends on your difficulty). When your value is at $1,000,000 and you sell the prison (also in this menu) the trophy will pop. You can also quick view the value of your prison by pausing the game (press ).

  • Have a cash flow of $50,000 or more in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    In the upper right corner of the top information bar, which is always on screen, is a number that's either red or green, this is your cashflow. You want it to be 50,000 in green. When you go to report (press ) and select Finance you can see your daily income and outgoing cash flow. The trick is to get +$50,000 in total, when you run a big prison and you don't get it by just playing you can safe your game then stop all programs and fine most (or all) personal, that helps. It also helps for the Spare The Rod Trophy. This isn't too difficult in a 500+ prisoners game but if you need it for clean up or you don't want to take the risk within your main game, then Blaystro has a few more tips:

    • Without prisoners: On a big map, build a huge Forest with enough Workmen (200+), Gardeners (50+) and an Export room big enough next to the road. Build several Staff rooms for your staff to be more efficient. This method works perfectly in any game to reach a huge cash flow with a few prisoners.
    • Create a new prison. Put the intake to 0 for few days until 110+ prisoners are waiting, then you can accept all them at once and put them in a giant Holding Cell. BINGO!
  • Unlock all Bureaucracy items in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    Start Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty (i.e. County, Federal or super max but not custom). To research something, do the following:

    1. Build an office.
    2. Hire a warden.
    3. Go to prison running (press ) and select Bureaucracy
    4. Upgrade all from left to right, when you upgrade a person (security, Legal, finance and maintenance) which then unlocks new researches you need to hire new unlocked personnel and built them a new office as well before you can continue in that track. Example: To unlock cleaning, you must first unlock Maintenance then build an office and hire a foreman. Only then you can start to research cleaning.
    5. All upgrades cost time and money and must be done inside the same prison/game for the trophy to pop.

    This is a good trophy to combine with Prison Industrial Complex and I Read A Book Once... Green It Was.

  • Achieve a reoffending rate of 25% or lower in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    When you pause the game (press ) you can see your reoffending rate and you can lower it by doing the following:

    • Programs (see I Read A Book Once... Green It Was for details).
    • Give work time to follow programs and reform (by working).
    • Minimum drugs and alcohol (see Rehabilitation and Reformation).
    • Have good health (good food + yard time).
    • Security, have a secure (safe) prison but don't suppress your inmates.
  • Complete every Grant available to one prison in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    Since the latest update which added the psych ward DLC it also added a new grant. Thus prison economics wont pop unless you start a new prison on medium/hard which enables insane prisoners and then do the grants again. I think it was have 10 insane prisoners, psychiatrist and insane cell block. You will also need to buy the DLC if you have the digital version.

    If you have the physical copy of the game delete it and run your prison on 1.00 version for it to pop.

    Grants are like mini missions inside the game that you can accept or not and it will bring you some extra cash. There are 22 grants in total, do all of them within one prison/game and you get the trophy.

    To check out the grants, go to reports (press ) and select "Grants" and when you accept one, you will get a mission to complete which will give you money (most grants give you money upfront and after completion). You can check out all your jobs by pressing and your grant objectives will be added here.

    Normally you can only accept 2 grants at the time unless you've research "extra grant" within the finance branch of the bureaucracy menu (see Wait and Hope for info on how to research stuff). Most grants are easy to follow expect the following 4:

    1: The nutrition grant, this requests some changes in the menus:

    1. First, accept the $1,000.
    2. Go to the "Reports" (press ) and then "Policy".
    3. Press to go to "other policies" then change the "nutritional policy" to low variety & low Quantity meals.
    4. Press to get to the "Regime" menu (also within the "Reports" menu) now change it so that you have only 1 "eat" timeslot.
    5. Wait two days.
    6. Change the "nutritional policy" to high variety & high Quantity meals.
    7. Change the eat timeslot in the "regime" menu back to normal (either 2 or 3 eating moments) and wait two days.
    8. Don't forget to put the "nutritional policy" back to normal once the grant is done.


    2: Carpentry Apprenticeship program request you to make 10 superior beds.

    1. You need to have a workshop.
    2. You need to have the carpentry apprentice program (education).
    3. Prisoners need to pass the program.
    4. You need wood (make a Forestry area) .
    5. With the wood, your graduated prisoner can build beds.
    6. After the beds are built make sure they get exported via the export zone.


    3: Tool cleanup, requires you to remove the supply of stolen weapons and tool. You do this via the shakedown emergency action. Sometimes you need more than 1 shake down to complete it. This is not glitch, just that not all weapons are found in one go.

    4 psych ward DLC

    There is also a hidden grant called 'government bailout' which is triggered by having a loan of 10k, less than $500 and negative daily profit. An easy eay to get negative profit is enroll in lots of carpentry courses for $500 each, trigger the grant and then cancel all the programs you created.

  • No deaths, escapes or riots for 10 in-game days in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    The trophy description is a bit misleading, as I planned to not have prisoners and hold out for 10 days but that doesn't work. The trophy popped for me on day 14, with my first inmates arriving at day 4 so counting from the first day until 10 days have passed, won't get you the trophy.

    The best thing to do is take it slow, no one said you need 100 prisoners so if you have only 1 or 10 then that's fine. You will possibly get this during your normal play so don't worry too much but if you need a boost, simply read the CEO letter, build just the minimum (a holding cell, kitchen etc.) and let only 1 prisoner join you for the first 10 days.

  • Get 100+ prisoner's Drug & Alcohol needs below 25% in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    You can check the needs of prisoners via then going: "Reports" => "Needs" and can start programs to lower the Drug and Alcohol needs:

    Drugs:

    1. Build a medication room, fully equipped.
    2. Have a doctor in your crew.
    3. Have programs researched (see Wait and Hope).
    4. Start a Drugs program.
    5. Wait until the inmates pass the course.


    Alcohol:

    1. Have a common room with at least 8 chairs.
    2. Have programs researched (see Wait and Hope).
    3. Start the alcohol program.
    4. Wait until the inmates pass the course.
  • Remove a gang from a held territory in Prison Architect or Prison Warden mode

    For starters:

    • Gangs are an optional feature, enabled by turning the "Gangs" option on the New Map screen. Note that this will change your difficulty to custom and prevent you from getting any other trophy.
    • More dangerous/higher security prisoners are more likely to be gang members and can be identified visually by their full body tattoos.
    • Gang members help each other in fights.
    • Gangs will attempt to take control of areas of your prison (like Yards and Common Rooms etc.).
    • If they are unchallenged, the territory will turn their colour and they will have ownership of it.
    • The player/warden cannot build or change room setups within gang territory.


    For the trophy:

    Once a gang has claimed a territory, they must be evicted to remove their influence. This can be done via the "evict" option (once a territory is claimed, you can select it and press to evict it, you;ll get a warning that this might be painful and you confirm to evict by pressing ).

    Any gang members within the territory will immediately turn hostile and try to re-capture their territory from your guards. Once you have defended the territory for 24 hours, the ownership reverts to 'Unclaimed' and will give you the trophy.

    Tip: if you have the DLC then hire Nero as your warden, as this will speed up the process 100x as you start with gang leaders.

  • Exceed 50 prisoner's cell entitlement at once in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    GLITCHED

    To do this you need to upgrade 50 cells to increase the cell standard (by adding a TV, bookshelf, shower head, radio, windows etc.) and to see the current state, go to "Prison running" (press ) then select the "logistics" menu and scroll all the way to the right to the "cell quality" option. Now your cells light up. Red is bad (below entitlement of the inmate) Orange is ok and Green is great! (above entitlement). When you have 50 in green the trophy is yours.

    If start a new game and you build +/- 70 cells, leave them empty until all are finished then get 70 new inmates in (so not 1 cell is below entitlement) and the trophy will pop. This will not work in a running game as I tried and it didn't work.

  • 100+ prisoners have less than 10% 'Critical' needs in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    Press to open the "Reports" menu, then select "Needs" to see the needs of the inmates (you need a psychologist to see this). Now make sure less then 10% of your inmates are in the Red zone (the count of how critical their needs are is also displayed on the bottom).

    The easiest way to do this is to combine this trophy with Prison Hotel and start a new game, then build 100 cells without any inmates (which takes time as you don't start with enough cash to build all of them) when you have 100 + cells, (aim for 105 or so). Get 105 inmates in every cell in 1 go and you will get both trophies straight away.

  • Export 100 license plates from a single prison in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    Export 100 license plates, this takes a few steps but isn't hard:

    • Have a workshop with a (few) Workshop Press(es) the quick built workshop has this.
    • Have education researched see Wait and Hope for more info.
    • Have an education/program that teaches the workshop safety. You can start the program via the program menu within the reports menu (press ).
    • Once inmates pass the program, they can work in the workshop so make sure to assign them to the workshop via the logistics menu within the "Prison running" (press ) menu.
    • Now they have built some license plates for you, make sure to have an export area. You can build this via the construction (press ) and rooms menus (you don't need walls for this "room") but construct it next to the road so the plates don't catch dust in your storage room.


    After 100 have been exported, then the trophy will pop.

  • Discover and repair an escape tunnel

    If there is a tunnel then you will get an icon with a small scoop in screen, pause your game (as for some reason tunnels disappear fairly quickly). Once you see the tunnel, remove the tunnel via the construction Demolition tab, select the "Remove tunnel" option, now select the tunnel and your workers will repair the tunnel once you resume the game. Once repaired the trophy will pop. You can choose to hire J.W. Periwinkle as warden to have a higher chance to find tunnels if you need help.

  • Purchase your first plot of additional land

    First make sure you have "Land expansion" researched:

    1. Go to prison running (by pressing ) select bureaucracy (you need a Warden with on office for this) research Finance (see Wait and Hope).
    2. Build a second office hire an accountant, now you can research "Land expansion".
    3. Once researched, you can purchase a plot by hovering over (selecting) one of the bordering areas but the price depends on the size.
  • Have 10 prisoners pass General Education in Prison Architect mode on a standard difficulty

    This will take a while so try to start early on in the game:

    1. Make sure you have "Education" researched in the Bureaucracy menu (see Wait and Hope).
    2. Have a classroom fully fitted.
    3. Go to "Reports" (press ) then select "Programs".
    4. Start a new program "Foundation Education Program".
    5. Build a fully equipped second classroom.
    6. Wait for the first program to finish (some inmates got to pass
    7. Start a second (not instead but parallel to the foundation) program "General Education Qualification".
    8. Wait till 10 inmates have passed the course.
  • Play the game at 11:11 (am or pm)

    Either play the game at 11:11 (AM or PM) or change the settings of your PS4 to manual time, set the time to 11:09, return to the game, make sure you are in a game and not in the main menu then play for 2 min and you will get it when the clock turns to 11:11.

DLC: Escape Mode

13 trophies

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