Journey (2012)
Journey is a 2012 platform video game made by ThatGameCompany and Sony Computer Entertainment.
A robed figure wakes alone in a vast desert, a distant mountain crowned with light on the horizon, and starts walking toward it. Journey is a short third-person adventure with no words, no map, and no on-screen chatter. You slide down dunes, wake strips of ancient cloth, and piece together the story of a fallen people from murals and ruins. Sometimes another traveler appears, a real person you cannot speak to and can only sing a single note toward, and you cross the sands together for as long as they stay.
Quick answers
What is Journey about?
A robed figure wakes alone in a vast desert, a distant mountain crowned with light on the horizon, and starts walking toward it. Journey is a short third-person adventure with no words, no map, and no on-screen chatter. You slide down dunes, wake strips of ancient cloth, and piece together the story of a fallen people from murals and ruins. Sometimes another traveler appears, a real person you cannot speak to and can only sing a single note toward, and you cross the sands together for as long as they stay.
When was Journey released?
Journey was released on 13 March 2012.
Who made Journey?
Journey was made by ThatGameCompany, Sony Computer Entertainment and Annapurna Interactive.
Similar games
Explore Journey guides
Journey in our writing
- Companion guide: Cozy Games: The Complete Guide to Wholesome Play
- Companion guide: Deserts & the Wasteland
- Companion guide: Solarpunk: The Complete Guide to Hopeful Green Futures
A few thoughts on Journey
Journey works best in one unbroken sitting, ideally without knowing much going in. Come to it for the feeling more than the challenge: the scale of the sand, the pull of that far light, and the odd tenderness of meeting a stranger you can only sing to. Let it stay quiet.
Emotional games that stay with you after the credits
Journey tells a wordless story of a fallen people and a lone traveler, landing its feeling through image and music instead of dialogue. These games chase the same emotional payoff by other means, building characters and choices that ache, the kind of playthrough you sit quietly with afterward. For when a game should move you, not just entertain.
Quiet games where the world tells the story
Journey hands you no map and no chatter, just a mountain on the horizon and murals to read as you cross the sand. These games share that trust in exploration, letting you piece meaning together from the environment and rewarding curiosity over instruction. Calm, atmospheric worlds made for wandering rather than being told where to go.
Games built on the pure joy of movement
Half of Journey is the feel of it, surfing down dunes and gliding on ribbons of cloth until motion itself becomes the reward. These games put that same delight in movement front and center, tuning running, jumping, and momentum until traversal alone feels great. Play them for how good they are to simply move through.