Game demo’s can be a difficult thing. Sometimes they can cloud your judgement on a game you were previously excited about, even though you know it’s not the finished article, and other times you don’t really get an idea of the game at all and end up dismissing it completely. For me, Journey fell into the latter.

I first came across Journey at a stand at Gamefest in 2011. It was a single stand with one tv, one controller and no one there to explain the game. It was, to me, just a red “thing” running about in the sand and I had no idea what I was meant to be doing, I think I played it for a few minutes with my best friend trying to give me some idea about the game before putting the controller down and moving on to something else.

Thankfully I have now seen the error of my ways. Journey is one of the most beautiful and haunting games that I have ever played.

Journey is from thatgamecompany who previously gave us the game Flower, which as you will remember was about the life of a……you guessed it, a flower. On paper that doesn’t exactly sound riveting stuff but in practice Flower was a massive sleeper hit for those who like games to be more than guns and ammo. Journey is of the similar ilk where the gaming norm gets thrown out of the window and it’s for the better. There are no life bars, no hit points, no head shots, no QTE’s, no levelling up, no swords, shields, arrows in the knee, no dragons, no terrorists, no rpg’s, no aliens, no bloodshed, no violence and no side quests.

I know some of you are now reading this going “and No Point” as what is the point of a game that has none of the above….well the point is that it’s all about the Journey! (see what I did there!!)

Gameplay wise Journey is very simple, you play as a nameless wanderer, you start the game on the outskirts of a desert and in the far off distance you can see something shining atop a mountain, that light is your aim and your only constant companion through 90 percent of the game. You can head off piste a few times but you can never get too far before you’re back on the path to the light. You will pass through deserts, ruined cities, ancient temples and more but the mountain is your goal.

In Journey you walk, you jump and you “sing”. That’s it, that’s all you can do but it’s enough. When you start the game all you can do is walk and auto jump up some small steps, then you acquire a piece of a scarf, a magic scarf, that allows you to jump. Singing allows you to communicate with the cloth creatures that inhabit the world you travel in, sometimes they will be trapped and you will be required to sing to release them, other times they will be floating freely and you can sing to call them to help with jumping over a larger gap. The interface is simple and it works perfectly, once you get the hang of it and the timing right you can spend a fair amount of time airborne.

As you move around you can find more pieces of the scarf which will allow you to jump further and higher, it makes parts of the game easier the longer the scarf you have, though the more hardcore players may try and complete it with only one singular piece.

At the end of each “level” you will find an altar which you can activate, then your traveller will sit and meditate and you’ll be granted a bit more information regarding the history of the ruins and how they came to be this way. Then it’s onto the next “level”, I say level but one of Journey‘s (many) brilliant aspects is that even though there are defined start and end points the game itself is very fluid and each level is more a natural progression closer and closer to the end rather than a sudden stop/start feeling.

The other aspect I just want to mention is the “multi-player” component. Now again this isn’t your typical online experience. There are no leader boards, no DLC and no one shouting “SUCK IT NOOOBS” into your ear every 5 minutes. In fact there isn’t even an option to play multiplayer, it simply happens. On your adventure you may suddenly come across another you, an exact copy of you. This isn’t you but someone else. thatgamecompany have seamlessly integrated multi-player into the game in such a way that when I came across someone else I was genuinely excited and happy to see them. I had no idea who it was, who they were or where they were but we spent the remainder of the level together, jumping, running and singing. On my first play through I spent most of the game in the company of someone else, initially I thought it was the same person but it wasn’t until the end of the game that I found out it was lots of different people. You share a brief experience with them and then they are gone, somehow that makes me happy and sad.

I shan’t say anymore on the gameplay itself as to explain more would be to spoil it for you and I really don’t want to do that.

Journey‘s visuals are stunning, each vista, each grain of sand, each glint of sun is perfectly balanced to the game, I will be honest and say that there were moments that I stumbled during gameplay as I was too busy watching the scenery. I think that was part of thatgamecompany‘s plan as one particular section is designed so you concentrate on the background rather than the game and it’s so worth it. For such a relatively small size download the game certainly packs a visual punch and hats off to thatgamecompany for their hard work. Aurally as well the game is pitch perfect. Music is perfectly timed, soft and gentle till the gameplay speeds up and suddenly the music has your heart racing and blood pumping as you get swept up in the rush to the end, then suddenly it drops off and the music you hear can break your heart. Amazing.

As you have probably figured out from my emotive review, Journey is an experience for the heart. It’s beautiful, heart warming, touching, poignant, heart breaking and epic. Despite it’s small size and play time, you can expect to finish it in around 2 hours, Journey will stick with you long after the game has ended. It may not be to everyone’s cup of tea but for me it is the perfect antidote from the current slew of RPG’s. Journey is an experience that only requires you to sit back, open your eyes and maybe your heart.

Journey is a Playstation exclusive. It is currently available to download from the Playstation Network if you are a Playstation Plus Member. It will be released to the general public on Wednesday 14th March priced at £9.99.

© 2012 – 2014, zero1gaming.com. All rights reserved. On republishing this article your must provide a link to this original post