Journey
2012
- platform
- adventure
- indie
- fantasy
- single player
- multiplayer
- co-operative
The story
A third-person adventure game in which the player, controlling a robed figure, makes a pilgrimage through a desert landscape to a rugged mountain with a beacon of light in the distance while uncovering the history of their people, rescuing and cooperating with friendly creatures, avoiding predatory ones and communicating with other travelers.
What it’s like
Golden desert dunes under a warm, bleached sun, with long sweeping vistas that shift into blue-white snow and drifting cloth banners in the wind, all rendered in soft, painterly polygonal forms that glow at the edges. The score is a gentle, swelling orchestral thread that rises and falls with the player's movement, and the chimes and whispers of other travellers carry the emotional weight more than any words do. The vibe is wistful and quietly awe-struck, a slow, contemplative sun-warmed solitude that opens up into shared, wordless companionship. It suits a rainy Sunday, a late evening alone with headphones, or a long quiet stretch when you want to be carried through something beautiful rather than challenged. Pacing is unhurried, with long glides and gentle puzzles that ask for patience rather than reflexes, and the arc follows a lone robed figure slowly finding connection with strangers along the way. Intensity is very low: there is no gore or cruelty, and the threats are brief, dreamlike and easily escaped, so dread stays faint. It is for people who want a meditative, emotionally resonant journey they can sink into, with a gentle feeling of hope at its core.
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