Posted August 09, 2010
Let me get the "bad" out of the way first... "The Journeyman Project" is a seriously flawed and buggy game. I do not have time to describe every problem in detail, but I will give any potential players some good advice. 1. save often 2. ALWAYS be patient, WAIT for ALL of the computer actions to complete one at a time, because you can easily crash the game, or trigger a bug, by spamming the controls. This won't happen in every room, but it happens a lot. 3. There are two bugs that are not crash-related that will affect your game irreparably. The first one is in the castle. When you walk along the wall, be slow and wait for 5-10 seconds as you walk. There is a spot where you have to turn left on the wall, if you wait for it, the wall will be blown up. If it doesn't happen, you walk forward and you die. If the walk won't blow up before you walk forward, you triggered the bug and the game will be impossible to complete. Go back until you are able to trigger the catapult correctly. The second major bug happens at the end of the game, and will subtract one puzzle point from your score. I don't know what triggers it., but it has something to do with retrieving the artifacts at the end. Save before you do that, and keep trying. Just for reference, you should already have 18 puzzle points when you reach the final level. The final two points are for retrieving the items correctly and then beating the game.
Okay, now on to the good. "The Journeyman Project," is frequently fun, entertaining, and it has fantastic graphics for it's time. This is somewhat marred by the tiny viewing window you are given, but I think it's a worthwhile trade-off for a smaller area to pixel hunt in. There are quite a few puzzles in this game, and they are all relatively straightforward. If you manage to get through without bug problems, then you should have no trouble at all finishing the game. This does not mean it's easy, it just means that the puzzles make sense in the story. Other adventure games of the time (and of today) increase their difficulty by implementing obtuse puzzles that have no bearing on the game, and simply give you a sequence, or other mathematical equation to figure out. I don't really care for those kind of puzzles in a game. I like my math outside of a game setting. Journeyman doesn't do that to you. It keeps the puzzles based on the mystery that you are trying to solve, and it does it well.
I also found the story to be entertaining, and even the campy humor was fun. It is totally of it's time (early 1990's) and I thought that the inside jokes and stylistic references to that time period were a blast. The locations and characters were also fun, and the history that you get to interact with is also interesting. You are encouraged, but not required to read the supporting historical documents through a system of "research points." I missed 2 points for research somehow, I think I didn't read something to the end, so be careful with this.
Which brings me to my conclusion. You have to be careful with everything in this game, because you can die or lose points for something really small. Also, the hyperlinks and cursor indications are buggy and broken. The cursor will not always change when it should (which is how you are suppose to know that interaction between objects is possible) and some things, like the links in the news reports do nothing to indicate that you can link to them. Also, it is extremely easy to miss an object in this game because the movement scheme is horrible. You have to move very slowly and look up and down and turn around in circles in EVERY SINGLE screen in the whole game, or you can miss something important. Because the game is so buggy, you can't try to rush through, because it will crash, or trigger a game-breaking bug. So you have to be patient to play this game, and listen to the history that the computer tells you, and read all of the documents. If you are not interested in those aspects of the game, then it may not be for you. Otherwise, it's a time capsule of fun just waiting to happen!
Okay, now on to the good. "The Journeyman Project," is frequently fun, entertaining, and it has fantastic graphics for it's time. This is somewhat marred by the tiny viewing window you are given, but I think it's a worthwhile trade-off for a smaller area to pixel hunt in. There are quite a few puzzles in this game, and they are all relatively straightforward. If you manage to get through without bug problems, then you should have no trouble at all finishing the game. This does not mean it's easy, it just means that the puzzles make sense in the story. Other adventure games of the time (and of today) increase their difficulty by implementing obtuse puzzles that have no bearing on the game, and simply give you a sequence, or other mathematical equation to figure out. I don't really care for those kind of puzzles in a game. I like my math outside of a game setting. Journeyman doesn't do that to you. It keeps the puzzles based on the mystery that you are trying to solve, and it does it well.
I also found the story to be entertaining, and even the campy humor was fun. It is totally of it's time (early 1990's) and I thought that the inside jokes and stylistic references to that time period were a blast. The locations and characters were also fun, and the history that you get to interact with is also interesting. You are encouraged, but not required to read the supporting historical documents through a system of "research points." I missed 2 points for research somehow, I think I didn't read something to the end, so be careful with this.
Which brings me to my conclusion. You have to be careful with everything in this game, because you can die or lose points for something really small. Also, the hyperlinks and cursor indications are buggy and broken. The cursor will not always change when it should (which is how you are suppose to know that interaction between objects is possible) and some things, like the links in the news reports do nothing to indicate that you can link to them. Also, it is extremely easy to miss an object in this game because the movement scheme is horrible. You have to move very slowly and look up and down and turn around in circles in EVERY SINGLE screen in the whole game, or you can miss something important. Because the game is so buggy, you can't try to rush through, because it will crash, or trigger a game-breaking bug. So you have to be patient to play this game, and listen to the history that the computer tells you, and read all of the documents. If you are not interested in those aspects of the game, then it may not be for you. Otherwise, it's a time capsule of fun just waiting to happen!