Chen Talks Journey And Expanding The Gamer's Horizon

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Journey is absolutely our most anticipated Network title of the year, and that's because games like Flow and Flower impressed the hell out of us.

And if you're the least bit intrigued by thatgamecompany's new project, you really need to check out a new PlayStation Blog interview with Jenova Chen. Just about every last response to a question is intriguing; it seems to come from someone who's a cross between a game developer and an artist...or maybe even a philosopher. Here's his reply to the question, "would you say it redefines multiplayer?"

"We’re not really redefining. We make games for PS3 owners, but we also make games for their relatives or children. I don’t think your grandma is going to know what a [multiplayer] “lobby” means. I don’t think most children will understand what [internet] “latency” means. So after we eliminated the lobby concept, we had very few choices — other players have to be able to connect at any time, not just the beginning of the game, and a player has to be able to finish the game by himself he can’t find someone. All these technical issues came in with that one decision to get rid of the online lobby.

We didn’t try to redefine multiplayer, we just wanted to create a more intuitive experience. If your grandma asked, 'what’s Journey?' I’d tell her 'Journey is just like hiking. You go to hike a mountain, and there are other hikers you might meet and if you like them you can hike with them.' And that’s it."

He also spoke more about the gameplay, and we consider it an awesome addition to the information we already had. Drink it all in, because he's explaining exactly how we'll travel in this unique interactive adventure; "surfing on waves of sand" is just a supremely cool way of moving about. So make sure to read up on all the new details concerning control, goals, obstacles, and artistic inspiration. Then, when they hinted at Chen's enjoyment of shooters, he also added that he likes fighting games, but he also clarified: "...as I get older, what's the point in pulling off another infinite combo? What does that do for your life? It's not useful. People still play chess because strategic thinking is useful." In regards to other designers Chen believes might be pushing the envelope:

"Quantic Dream. Team Ico — everything they make is very rich and deep emotionally. I think LittleBigPlanet is also very interesting. It’s not so much emotional as it is a different frontier. I also really appreciate whoever makes the best first-person shooter. Blizzard is always great, they have a lot of craft. We need those things too, because the game industry has to cover all sides. It’s not that I’m against fighting games or shooters — they need to be there, and they need to be good."

...don't ever let this guy stop making games.

Related Game(s): Journey

Tags: journey, thatgamecompany, jenova chen, journey psn

1/11/2011 9:03:26 PM Ben Dutka

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