[Jedi2016]

Hm.. it was a small team to begin with, if most of them leave, I'd be more inclined to follow their next game than whatever comes of the entity still known as thatgamecompany.

[upnorthsox]

Yep seems like they just imploded. I guess we'll get to find out if Genova Chen was the real talent there or if he's full of himself.

[JPT]

Now we hopefully get more games like Journey from 3-4 different sources.... japp thats my positive spin on it

[-tkf-]

Originally Posted by upnorthsox

Yep seems like they just imploded. I guess we'll get to find out if Genova Chen was the real talent there or if he's full of himself.

Flow, Flower and Journey was made by who?

[upnorthsox]

Originally Posted by -tkf-

Flow, Flower and Journey was made by who?

Thatgamecompany?

[patsu]

Originally Posted by upnorthsox

Yep seems like they just imploded. I guess we'll get to find out if Genova Chen was the real talent there or if he's full of himself.

Heh heh, I'm thinking about the same thing. Their community manager posted on GAF that development of their next game has already started.

[-tkf-]

Originally Posted by upnorthsox

Thatgamecompany?

I think he was at least 50% of that,

"So much of my work at Thatgamecompany was really supporting Jenova's visions for the types of games he wanted to make, and I felt like I have done everything I needed to do there, and that he's in a great place now to go on and continue with some of the other people at Thatgamecompany, to take that to a whole new height."

[upnorthsox]

Well the credits are over 80% Sony Santa Monica, that's another big group of very talented people he's losing.

Hey, he may be the visionary we all hope he is, but when that many leave so abruptly it makes you pause and think.

It could just be that they don't share his dream of playing with the big boys and would rather work "Indie".

It could also be that his next project is a FPS and they'd rather just not.

[BoardBonobo]

I think it sounds more likely that they all just wanted freedom to create their own projects, rather than stay just supporting one vision.

[deathindustrial]

Back to the game itself, the ending was not what I expected.


The game is beautiful but I It felt like I was playing something written by Wisdom Tree with its "You will get all the virgins you want when you die" go to Heaven ending. I guess it could have been worse, they could have gone with "Oh, what a terrible dream" as the finale.

If you aren't religious then this is a rather bleak game - your Journey is progressively more difficult, ultimately pointless and doomed to failure. What makes it stranger is that even though you have been resurrected you still end up alone. Could have been written by Lars Von Trier.

=)


Post mortem discusses the religious nature of the game and management problems. . .

http://www.gamespot.com/features/rel...ortem-6367138/

Cheers

[Cornsnake]

Originally Posted by deathindustrial

Back to the game itself, the ending was not what I expected.


The game is beautiful but I It felt like I was playing something written by Wisdom Tree with its "You will get all the virgins you want when you die" go to Heaven ending. I guess it could have been worse, they could have gone with "Oh, what a terrible dream" as the finale.

If you aren't religious then this is a rather bleak game - your Journey is progressively more difficult, ultimately pointless and doomed to failure. What makes it stranger is that even though you have been resurrected you still end up alone. Could have been written by Lars Von Trier.

=)

I liked the ending.

Even though I'm not very religious. It's like that old cliché "the journey is more important then the destination". The game managed to bring that across very well. That last bit when you're walking through the blizzard, the top of the mountain disappeared out of view, and all you're left with is your buddy, before both collapsing in the snow. I wouldn't have minded if the game ended there. But I was also quite happy to be brought back together with my buddy to play that very last bit, and walking side by side into that bright light together. I fully expected to be dropped back at the beginning, alone again. I was still happy about it because I looked back on a pleasant journey.

[tuna]

I think there is basically no "game" to Journey, but walking/flying/swimming through the world with another person felt pretty good. Not anywhere near the quality that Flower has, but an interesting experience anyway. The ending is pretty pretentious though.....

[fearsomepirate]

I was underwhelmed. Not worth $15.

The best part of the game was wandering through what felt like a fully architecturally realized world with a real history. The last time I felt that way was in PoP: SoT. Metroid Prime and SotC are also examples of this. Particularly interesting is the history of the world revealed in the mosaics you find throughout the journey, especially how what they represent is very much open to interpretation. There's a lot of sad, melancholy history hinted at in the glyphs dotting the landscape.

The worst part is how little game there actually is. It shows occasional flashes of quality when it is clearly drawing from the PoP well of 3D platforming, but it does it all too infrequently. I'm just not really into this idea of "art games" not really needing to be games as long as they are pretty and moody. There's just no reason to not have more of the kind of puzzling there was early on...especially since the game's lack of text or instructions really lends itself to that kind of gameplay.

The ending left me wholly dissatisfied. I just felt like there was no real conclusion at all. As many times as the camera focused on that mountain, I was expecting some kind of grand denoument to my journey through the wasteland. One of the murals appeared to prophesy my journey to the mountaintop, so I was expecting it to mean something. The impression I got from the sages and murals is that getting to that mountain is really really really crucial, but I just hadn't found out why. Maybe I was rejoining the other Desert Kitties in the last remnant of civilization. Or maybe I was going to sacrifice myself to regenerate the world. Or stop the war machines. Or pick up a pizza to take back to my family back home. Something. Instead, I got...some yellow sparklies floating around the sky while the credits rolled, that may or may not be my avatar, and restarting from the beginning. I don't buy "It's called Journey, not Destination." Sorry, when the camera and setting clearly emphasize an intriguing, mysterious, clearly very important destination over and over again, the title of the game isn't a valid excuse for a completely anticlimactic arrival.

[patsu]

I have not gone back to the game yet. Left at the fifth level. At that time I felt that I was progressing too fast.

I suspect it's the sort of game where I need to clear my mind and explore leisurely. I also bumped into a dragon and lost a large chunk of my scarf. -_-

fearsomepirate, did you play Demon's Souls or Dark Souls ?

[fearsomepirate]

I played Demon's Souls, which I thought was overall pretty good. Not perfect, but very good.

[KongRudi]

Finally got around to trying this one out this weekend.
I played this one in two sittings..

First day I played to the base of the mountain, then I had to leave.. Then a few days later I continued..
It were a fantastic experience.. The final leg of the journey, it's so amazing.. And the music, wow..
When I completed the game, the first thing I did were to restart it.
And I accidentally got into the last level once more, and it were just as amazing the second time.

Yesterday, I spent my time on youtube and watch three 'let's play' videos, from start to end of other people's journey..So I now seen the game from start to end 4.5 times..
It's annoying to watch in the start, before they get the hang on it. My favourite part of watching others, is the first time they meet a bad-guy..

I really like the end aswell.

Do not read spoiler unless you've finnished the game..
It were so cool when I realised that the
shooting stars coming from the mountain, in my journey throughout the game - were other people who completed their Journey - and are on it's way back to the starting point again, while watching the credits.

This game won't be deleted from my hard-drive.
If you havn't played it, give it a try, you won't regret it.These kind of games dosn't come along often.

[-tkf-]

Sorry if this is a repost..

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jenovachen/

[patsu]

I haven't gone back to the title since I left half way. 8^P

Kid is slightly older now, and deserves more attention.
Coming off work, it's really hard for me to find time to sit down at home to play a game uninterrupted these days.

[BoardBonobo]

Originally Posted by patsu

I haven't gone back to the title since I left half way. 8^P

Kid is slightly older now, and deserves more attention.
Coming off work, it's really hard for me to find time to sit down at home to play a game uninterrupted these days.

Ever since the first one arrived I've not had an uninterrupted session due to the little darlings. Even at 4am they like to come down and see the 'cartoons' daddy watches. Not that I carry on playing as they wouldn't sleep for months with the content of most games. They once persuaded me to chase a frost spider in Skyrim, when it turned round and filled the screen they both screamed and ran... Giant spider about to eat me from the tv synddrome or GSAtEMftTVS as it will be known in later years...

[Scott_Arm]

Was this published by Sony? Just curious, because they're a multiplatform company going forward. Interested if this will show up on 360 or not.

[Cornsnake]

Originally Posted by Scott_Arm

Was this published by Sony? Just curious, because they're a multiplatform company going forward. Interested if this will show up on 360 or not.

Yes. It was part of a three game deal they had with Sony. Flow, Flower and the last one was Journey.

It's nice that they are multiplatform now, that way more people can enjoy their work. Hopefully they'll find a publisher that'll give them the support and freedom Sony gave them.

[upnorthsox]

I'd say it's probably too late for 360 though, maybe x720.

[BoardBonobo]

Originally Posted by Cornsnake

Yes. It was part of a three game deal they had with Sony. Flow, Flower and the last one was Journey.

It's nice that they are multiplatform now, that way more people can enjoy their work. Hopefully they'll find a publisher that'll give them the support and freedom Sony gave them.

Not to be overly cynical and jaded but I doubt they will enjoy the same freedom unless they have the assets to publish themselves.

[Cornsnake]

Originally Posted by BoardBonobo

Not to be overly cynical and jaded but I doubt they will enjoy the same freedom unless they have the assets to publish themselves.

That's probably true. I don't see a lot of publishers funding something as innovative and therefor risky game as Journey. Or delaying it for a year like that.

[Scott_Arm]

They raised $5 million from a venture capital firm so they could do multiplatform development. http://thatgamecompany.com/general/2929/