Enjoying stories and pizza since 1987.

**This post contains a few spoilers.**

Journey is quite a game. It’s definitely one of those things that everyone should experience; kind of like Star Wars or pizza.

By the way, if you haven’t played Journey yet and have a PS3 you should probably just go and play it right now. On the other hand if you don’t have a PS3 and live in the Perth area, contact me and I’ll bring my PS3 over.

Each time you finish the journey and start another, your robe has more gold patterning added to it. The second time I played the game I had acquired a decent amount of patterning and thought I was pretty special, but then I came across someone wearing an all-white robe.

At first I thought it was an NPC but quickly realised that from the way they were ‘chirping’ and flying that it was definitely another player.

We met each other with a flurry of chirps and proceeded to try to fly as high as we could, straight up into the sky, using the ‘advanced flying technique.’ It’s basically where you time your chirp to go off near the other player while they’re in the air, which subsequently replenishes their flying power and then they do the same for you. And in this way you can keep each other flying for quite some time without touching the ground.

After getting pretty high we decided to embark on our journey together. As we’d both played the game before we knew how to navigate each area and were able to get things done pretty efficiently.

We came across some more sprawling desert and began flying over the dunes together, keeping each other afloat until we found a really steep bank. We landed at the top in preparation to ski down the other side. But right then I needed to pause the game for a few minutes as someone had to record their favourite TV show! I was stressing out because I was going to lose my companion if they walked into the next area without me. And if that happened I would never see them again!

Finally the TV show was being recorded and I changed the channel back to Journey. I saw that the white-robed player was still there! They were just running little circles around me in the sand at the top of the dune.

After a quick chirp together we skied down the dune and continued on flying through the desert.

As we progressed through our journey my companion would sometimes disappear. And I would have to locate them by the faint white glow on the edge of the screen. And when I found them they would always be waiting at the entrances to hidden areas. They would show me everything there was to know about these hidden places including all the little easter eggs. (Obviously I’m not going to give away too much here as that’s for you and your companion to find out.)

Towards the later stages of the journey, as we were nearing the mountain top, I lost my companion again, but for quite a while this time. I had no idea where they’d gone. There was no white glow at the edge of my screen…

Maybe they’d flown ahead up the mountain and finished the game without me!

I just drifted for a while wondering what to do. I decided to back track a bit; maybe they were waiting for me by another hidden passage and I just hadn’t seen them yet. I drifted down the mountain a little and then I saw them.

I chirped at them and they chirped back and started flying up the mountain again. I followed.

But then they stopped again and flew off the path. They chirped at me so I chirped back, and they just started flying around in the air nowhere in particular…

Then I got it. They just wanted to fly with me for one last time before we travelled up to the top of the mountain and finished our journey.

We flew around for a good five minutes just like birds flying together with no real purpose or direction.

And then after awhile, we migrated to the top of the mountain and landed in the soft snow.

I began walking through the mountain-top crevasse, but stopped when I realised my companion had stopped again. They started walking around in the snow.

It looked like they were just walking aimlessly around so I just stood and waited for them.

But then slowly I saw they were making deliberate changes in direction, and I could see the rounded top of something being formed. And before they had finished the shape I could clearly see that it was a heart. A snow heart! I was blown away, and a rush of emotion came up. No, I didn’t cry.

I retraced the shape of the heart for them and when I finished we just stood there for a while and chirped to each other.

Then we started down the crevasse together, side-by-side.

And then slowly, as we travelled further through the narrowing crevasse, our bodies drifted together and formed one in the white nothingness…

* * *

After the credits there’s a screen that displays the names of all the companions you travelled with on your journey. After my first journey this screen was filled with about eight names. But this time there was only one…

Makoto, thank you for this wonderful journey. It was truly awesome and I won’t be forgetting it any time soon.