'Journey' From a Game to a Work of Art
Journey A non-violent game
Today I will tell you about my experiences playing the game called Journey.
To briefly describe the game, we can say that it is a simple journey game. So, what has this game done differently, why is it a work of art for me and how has it managed to become one of my favorite games?
There are many reasons for this: The drawings, the fluency of the animations, the music, the storyboard, the shortness, the mentality behind the game, in short, the whole game.
Let’s open a little more.
What makes this Game a work of art is that it offers you a complete life experience. To give an example, it is like a movie that has no sequel and ends by telling its story. When you start the game, you don’t even know what your character can do, and the game doesn’t tell you much. It develops slowly, you learn the story of the game, you try to complete your journey with your character, and when you complete the journey, you feel satisfied and you really feel that it’s over.
The reason why it is so good is that every stage is in the dose, the music is great, the drawings are great, the narration is great, the transitions are great. Let me leave a screenshot from the game.
So what was this game about?
What is the logic of going from point A to point B in a game?
They aimed at a point that many games failed to achieve, we can learn directly from “Jenova Chen”, who is the Game Designer of the Journey.
In him speech at the GDC conference, Jenova Chen stated that he realized that the emotions that current games cause and target are generally violent, although the companies do not want to produce online content such as violence, etc.
They wanted to experience a different feeling, the sense of discovery. But a game where you just wander around alone wouldn’t be impressive enough. Journey also brought a solution to this situation with an interesting mechanic, there is no interface in the game in general and the game is co-op, the most interesting part of the job is that another player who is close to the part you are playing comes to your game, suddenly the sand is moved by someone. and you see that another player is trying to discover the game from afar, and suddenly you start to explore it together with another player.
They wanted to experience a different feeling, the sense of discovery. But a game where you just wander around alone wouldn’t be impressive enough. Journey also brought a solution to this situation with an interesting mechanic, there is no interface in the game in general and the game is co-op, the most interesting part of the job is that another player who is close to the part you are playing comes to your game, suddenly the sand is moved by someone. and you see that another player is trying to discover the game from afar, and suddenly you start to explore it together with another player.
Since there is no collision between the players in the game, the players cannot harm each other and even get boosts when they touch each other, so you can get different experiences every time you play.
Sometimes you can’t come across anyone and you have to overcome all the difficulties on your own. Sometimes you come across players in white dress who are masters of the game and you have the opportunity to see all the Easter eggs at once.
Everyone who plays this game helps each other because people playing this game have no choice but to be nice to each other.
This game ultimately becomes a journey and a memory about your experiences on this journey.
Here’s how I would describe your chances of playing Journey over and over. Think about your favorite place to go, it could be a cafe, a beach or whatever, the more you go to that favorite place with other people or alone, the more likely you are to play this game again.
If you are interested in game development, definitely watch the conferences about the Joruney game, I say that both the marketing and the developers had very good experiences in this project.
If you are a developer or game development enthusiast
It is an important conference where you can see the decisions that “Jenova Chen” wanted to tell while designing Journey, the problems she experienced in the tests, extending the release date of the game, etc.
A technical conference where “John Edwards” talks about how they managed to render sand so big and stylish in Journey for the Playstation 3.The game already tells everything I want to tell about this game.
If you want to give yourself a relaxing and peaceful time, I would definitely say try this piece.