EXP Podcast #767: 2025 Journey Debrief

One lonely traveler, one big mountain.

Our annual springtime ritual continues!  It's the time of year when our eyes are watering and we can't quite tell if it's due to the return of seasonal allergies or because of the sheer majesty of thatgamecompany's 2012 masterpiece: Journey.  As always, we share our thoughts on this year's playthrough and we also review a bit of the 2012 video game landscape, review what we were playing, and put Journey in context with other big releases of the year.  Hope to see you in the desert next year!

- Here's the show's stand-alone feed
- Listen to the podcast in your browser by clicking here, right-click and select "save as link" to download the show in MP3 format, or click play below.

 

 

Show Notes:

- Run time: 35 min 46 sec

- Music by Brad Sucks

EXP Podcast #733: 2024 Journey Debrief

Hey, does this dune look familiar?

It's finally Spring again around these parts, which means it's time for one of our favorite annual rituals: the yearly Journey playthrough!  For whatever reason, Jorge and I both had cautionary tales of resource scarcity and environmental collapse on the brain (I blame Barrett and the rest of Avalanche) and it just goes to show that you can still get something new out of a game every time you play it.  Twelve years on and we're still finding new treasures in the desert.

- Here's the show's stand-alone feed
- Listen to the podcast in your browser by clicking here, right-click and select "save as link" to download the show in MP3 format, or click play below.

 

 

Show Notes:

- Run time: 36 min 40 sec

- Music by Brad Sucks

EXP Podcast #513: Gris Debrief

"Wall-worthy artwork."

This week on the EXP Podcast, we debrief the artfully crafted Gris, one of our top contenders for prettiest game of 2018. The first game from Nomada Studios, Gris brings a ton of inspiration from Journey, drawing not just themes, but almost entire sequences - so you can imagine why Scott and I would be so interested in this game.

Check out the podcast, then try out the game and let us know what you think!

- Here's the show's stand-alone feed
- Listen to the podcast in your browser by clicking here, right-click and select "save as link" to download the show in MP3 format, or click play below.

- Runtime: 36 min 52 sec
- Music from the Gris soundtrack

Journey: 2017 Anniversary Playthrough

Five years ago, thatgamecompany released Journey! It's one of our favorite games, so Jorge and I make a point of celebrating it by venturing back into the desert on the anniversary of its release. This year we streamed the whole thing and even managed to discover a few things we never noticed before (has anyone else spotted the rainbow?). It's become a very rewarding annual tradition and we hope you can join us next year!

4th Annual Journey Anniversary Playthrough

Playing Journey every year on the anniversary of its release has become a bit of a ritual for Scott and I. This year, we captured the experience on YouTube. Check it out below!

New Perspectives on 'Journey' and 'Earthbound'

Each year the journey is a little different

This week on PopMatters is all about revisiting some familiar games: Journey and Earthbound.

I don't get the chance to replay that many games.  More accurately, I don't make the time.  There's always something new and shiny.  There's always countless responsible-adult type things to focus on.

It's not like I have a problem playing the same game for what some might say is an excessive amount of time.  Spelunky, Titanfall, Mario Kart 8, Smash Bros.; I've sunk dozens of hours into each.  There's a common theme though: they're all unscripted.  There's no real story, so everything that comes up is either procedural or driven by my interaction with other players.

I seem to forget that even in a story-driven game, there's lots of variety between sessions.  Sometimes it's just picking up on small elements I missed the first time, but mostly it's reinterpreting things based on what has happened to me since the last time I played the game.  I remember reading Invisible Man as a kid and thinking it was fine.  I read it again as an adult was in awe.

The nice thing about Journey is that it remains an incredible game and continues to impress with its attention to detail.  Earthbound is following the trajectory of Invisible Man; what was once cool is now quickly becoming a masterpiece to me.  These games haven't changed on any mechanical level; it's the intervening years that have changed my mindset.

Journey as Ritual

Only two years since release, and I'm already playing Journey as Ritual.

This week's PopMatters article is about my personal experience and introspection, but if you are interested to read more about rituals as they relate to games, there is plenty of more insightful pieces than my own. I quote Janet Murray in my article of course, who's Hamlet on the Holodeck touches briefly on the process of entering into the game world. Arnold van Gennep's discussion of preliminal, liminal, and postliminal states in The Rites of Passages is also significant, which Devin Proctor discusses in relation to games right here. The anthropology of games is a rich field for those interested.

For many, any time a player enters a game, leaving their self-behind and taking on a new role, they partake in a ritual. In this piece at least though, I wanted to differentiate the traditional process of play from one in which you explicitly play a game as a ritual. I entered Journey open to a particular experience, primed for it. Going it mostly alone though changed the experience for me into one of self-reflection.

I explore this self-reflection through faith and religion because it provides a familiar language for me to express those ideas. After rereading the article, I realize it sounds like I'm finding my faith again, which is certainly not the case. Rather, I am finding a connection between the safe introspection through play as ritual and the safe introspection one can experience through religious ritual.

I would be remiss here if I didn't mention the fantastic work of the folks over at Christ and Pop Culture. They consistently delve into personal issues of faith as it relates to games and entertainment and I respect them immensely for their passion and sincerity. I would be honored to reflect their artful candor in my own work even a little.

Returning to Journey

Journey was released approximately one year ago and, to celebrate the occasion, I joined some folks in replaying the game last weekend.

I've already written and spoken more thousands of words about this game, but I always manage to come away with fresh perspectives after every playthrough. Even after a year, Journey remains one of the most impressive games I've ever played. Here are some of the thoughts that came to mind as I watched the credits once again:

Seeing people min/maxing Journey weird.

Even a year after its release, I managed to come across numerous companions on my adventure. A few of these people had clearly played the game before, as they quickly found the hidden runes and obscure murals in each level. One person in particular would dash through the levels as fast as possible, collecting the runes and opening the gates to the next area as if she/he were being chased.

It strikes me that I didn't see such behavior when I played Journey for the first few times last year, as people were still strangers to the desert. It actually made for a somewhat stressful dynamic, as I was much more apt to wander around the levels while my partner was all business.

The drop-in, drop-out multiplayer is extremely elegant.

Without any obvious loading, server messages, or invites, meeting and subsequently parting with people feels organic. It also rewards you for paying attention to your companion, since you can only tell the difference between partners via visual and behavioral cues. I hope future, passively-online games like Bungie's upcoming Destiny are taking note.

The music is (still) amazing.

The various recurring motifs and themes are almost like another character. I made a point to pay close attention to the way the music cues and loops, as it always seems to reach a crescendo right when something dramatic is happening. The more I listen, the more I start to view it the music as akin to level design, it has a huge impact on framing the in-game world and the overall experience.

Journey is a triumph of restraint.

It's hard to find any extraneous material in the game. Besides the initial onscreen prompts that teach you movement basics, all communication with the player happens without menus, voice overs, or tutorials. There aren't any wacky side quests or score chases. Every moment of the game feels meticulously refined.

I dilly-dallied and still completed my journey in under two hours. Even so, the narrative ride offers a better sense of discovery, hardship, and eventual triumph than most 50-hour open world games I've played. You can tell a story about a difficult quest without any grinding.

The sand surfing through the ruined city and the final ascent to the mountain are some of the best moments in video games.

Not much else to say here except that I imagine they will continue to be stand out moments far many years to come.

If anyone else revisited Journey last week, I'd be interested to hear your impressions. And if you missed it, don't worry: I'm planning on making one more run this weekend. If come across a traveller in a white robe, it just might be me!

'Journey' and Seeing the Best in My Fellow Gamer

This week over at PopMatters, I wrote about Journey's role in inspiring some inspiring thoughts about online communication.

Like pretty much everyone else who played it, I was pretty impressed by Journey. Beautiful, triumphant, masterful; I agree with it all. For me, the challenge is honing those emotional impressions into lessons I can learn from.

I decided to take a closer look at why I felt so optimistic after playing the game. A big reason was because I felt like all the people I met were having a similarly upbeat experience. Think about that for a second: random, public multiplayer interactions as positive experiences? That's a rare thing.

So how did thatgamecompany pull this off? I argue they did it by distilling communication and then letting me unwittingly fill in the gaps with my biases. Without voices, character customization, or mechanically-detrimental multiplayer actions, it's nearly impossible to act like a jerk towards another player. When you can't yell at or hamper another player, the worst you can really do is ignore them, a decidedly neutral action. In the vacuum of explicit communication, I was free to project my predispositions on others. Since I wanted to believe everyone was having a good time, experimenting with the game, and generally being polite, that's all I saw. The limited nature of the communication made me feel closer to my multiplayer friends.

There's actually a somewhat disturbing implication here: is Journey just a big confirmation bias experiment? Was I really connecting with those other people, or was I projecting only what I wanted to see and then agreeing with the things I wanted to believe while ignoring any other behaviors. If the key to making a pleasant random multiplayer experience is limiting expression, are we really ever going to get to know other people. Sometimes, communication is simply ugly.

These are all questions for another day. For now, I just want to enjoy the opportunity to see the best in my fellow gamer.

EXP Podcast #164: Journey Debrief

At long last, the much awaited Journey from thatgamecompany is available on PSN. Jenova Chen's discussion of his own creations always seem so lofty, can his team deliver what Scott and I have so eagerly desired since its announcement? Join us while we discuss our personal experiences, how Journey is more "gamey" than we imagined, and how the game tells a story. We go quite long in this one, so we appreciate everyone who puts in the time to listen. The task of discussing Journey is not an easy one, but we hope you enjoy this voyage with us nonetheless. As always, we would love to hear your thoughts on the game. Please leave them in the comments section below.



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Show notes:

- Run time: 53 min 11 sec
- Music, "Apotheosis" and "Final Confluence", by Austin Wintory from Journey. Find more of his work here.