I worked on a database (in a desktop GIS) that used PICK style record, field, value, sub-value separators. This worked for us because all data were text based.

I worked on a database (in a desktop GIS) that used PICK style record, field, value, sub-value separators. This worked for us because all data were text based. But it didn't work for us because we used characters 0xFC to OxFF as the separators which burned us with international customers. We'd have been better off using control characters for control. But as you correctly point out, we had to introduce escaping.