Lockup: A Roll Player Tale is a competitive worker-allocation game for one to five players. In the game, players manage groups of minions -- gnolls, kobolds, bugbears, goblins, or insectoids -- locked up in Kulbak Prison. Each round, players try to keep their suspicion from the guards under control while allocating their crew to different locations within Kulbak.

The player with the strongest crew in each location at the end of each round gains the most resources, hires the most powerful crew, and builds the most powerful items, increases their reputation. The player with the highest reputation at the end of six rounds, wins the game.