The Longest Journey

The Longest Journey benefited greatly by being released after a long lull of quality adventure games which allowed it to gain more following than it otherwise may have justified. It has a promising premise yet it fails to reach great heights due to simple puzzles with the only occasional difficulty being due to pixel hunts and incredibly dry and monotonous dialog. Still the story progresses satisfyingly and the overal experience is a solid but average adventure game.

I'd been looking forward to playing this game for years and was quite happy to see it appear on GOG.com. Reading all the reviews I was prepared for quite a ride and one of the best adventure games ever made but having finished the game I can't help but feel disappointed. The game's pace is too pedestrian, characters talk way too much - especially non-essential NPCs, puzzles either make no sense at all or are tedious logic solving games. I wish the creators had focussed a bit more on fleshing out the game worlds (hello empty underwater "city") instead of giving fishermen and landlords a script the size of a phonebook. The "unforgettable" story is in fact quite forgettable and the unnecesarily complex background history of the game world is too much to remember. As for originality, the creators have borrowed heavily from Blade Runner, King's Quest, The Neverending Story, Star Wars and the Abyss, but an original game this does not make. Voice acting got on my nerves but luckily there's an option to turn it off. All in all while I'm glad I finally got to play The Longest Journey I can only recommend it to hardcore adventure fans.

The Longest Journey tries its hardest to keep you hooked with typical storyline tropes like vague implication and initially random-seeming events that keep you propelling forward to find out what's going on. Still, these old storytelling tricks can't hide the flaws inherent in many typical adventure games. Obvious moments where some items can be closely examined and others can't, which must mean they can be interacted with? Check. Completely nonsensical combinations of items? Check Moments of "imminent" danger where you're allowed hours to figure out what to do? Check. Completely unrelated and uninteresting fetch quests? Oh holy HELL, check. And then at some point about halfway through, not even the storyline can hide the flaws of this game. You get sacked with an oh-so-hilarious bird sidekick (that's sarcasm, kids), the mythos and storyline of the world you're in becomes second place and lost, and moments of exposition to plug up plot holes drone on and on to the point of exhaustion, which wouldn't be that horrible if the story being told was engaging. Lead character April Ryan's reactions to events were probably the most interesting and "real" feeling part of the game. "Why me? Why do I have to save the world?" ,she asks in exasperation. At some point, me the player began to wonder why as well. And when I took down an enemy with the use of a calculator...I just stopped caring. Sometimes less is more, and no more is this apparent than in the story of The Longest Journey. While adventure games are expected to transport you into a strange and fascinating world, the universe of this game starts off being the first, and finally ends up failing at being the second. Buyer beware.

Let me start by stating that as a Norwegian I'm possibly disqualified to even rate this game and that it was wonderful just to have an adventure game my native language. Even so this game has one of the best stories I personally have experienced in any computer game (It might share the top spot with Gabriel Knight 2). If you're even slightly interested in adventure games you owe it to yourself to play this one.

I do not usually play adventure games nor do I usually write game reviews... but this game is definitely worth the effort. First of all, I did not play this game when it was initially released, so this is not a nostalgia review. Long story short: buy this game and you will like it. If you hesitate for some reason, just wait until it is on sale and get it for almost free. Just do not let the graphics fool you. This game is not about bland, “realistic” 3D models like most modern games are, it is about the journey. And the journey is indeed long and interesting. The story line is an outstanding, unique mix of Sci-Fi, Cyberpunk and Fantasy genres. Every NPC in this game is unique and memorable, every dialogue has a sound and the voice actors did a great job. And the humor is great and used when it is relevant. Every puzzle is doable and logical. They vary in difficulty of course but even difficult ones are doable. The one about “the eye” (if you know, you know) took me a long time, but still it was doable and logical too. It is one of those good old games that will take you about 20 hours to complete (not quite long according to the “modern” standards) but the content of this game is so unique and there are so many different events in it that you will feel way more attached to this game and its characters than you do in most bland, modern games that take you 200 hours to complete. The only problem that I had with this port, was a couple of random crashes after cut-scenes. But reloading the game and skipping a scene, resolved this issue. Everything else worked flawlessly.