The Longest Journey is an amazing graphical adventure, where the player controls the protagonist, April Ryan, on her journey between parallel universes. Embark on an exciting and original journey of discovery, where you will explore, solve puzzles, meet new people, face terrifying monsters, learn, g...
The Longest Journey is an amazing graphical adventure, where the player controls the protagonist, April Ryan, on her journey between parallel universes. Embark on an exciting and original journey of discovery, where you will explore, solve puzzles, meet new people, face terrifying monsters, learn, grow, and live the adventure of a lifetime!
Over 150 locations spanning two distinct and detailed worlds
More than 70 speaking characters
40 hours of gameplay
20 minutes of high-resolution pre-rendered video footage
I dont like how the whole narrative of the game is talking down to the gamer like to a five year old.
(what is art, what is real and magic)
And it does so in a very pretentious way. (i also hate all the hipster dialogue and aprils 'voice')
Production values are high, no doubt.
Puzzles are partly way too random, partly way to straightforward.
Conversations and walking/running - too far stretched.
The story consists of gathering certain objects and at the end putting them all together - with hindrances being put in one´s way. Seems too constructed.
The soundtrack is good but forgettable.
For its age graphics are ok.
Seems like other reviewers couldn´t get rid of the nostalgia glasses...
I stopped playing half way into chapter 2. It is just so boring with how slow you walk and the slow animations, plus talking to people seems like a waste of time because they have a ton to say about boring topics that don't seem to matter, The puzzles don't make much sense either. The game just felt like a slog.
I don't own this gem on gog.com as I actually bought it through funcom, but I'll eventually get around to getting it on here, I'm sure (especially now with GOG Galaxy). Anyways, onto my review.
The Longest Journey was my first adventure game that I ever delved into, and boy was it a long game. At first I wasn't sure what to think about it... The graphics were super old looking and were a real eyesore, but something kept me playing. The main character, setting, and story. It just hooked me (although it was a bit slow to do so).
April has this inner diologue about almost everything, but for some reason it never got annoying to me, I actually agreed and emphasized with her. I truly cared for her as a character, to the point where she felt real to me, like someone I knew and loved (like a best friend is the closest example I can think of). By the end of the game I would have done anything to make her happy.
She is a complicated character for an adventure game and it is truly satisfying to go on this long journey with her, and watch as she changes. This is probably the only game where there were was a moment that made me cry, that's very rare for any form of media to do to me. By the time you reach the end of the Longest Journey, you realize you don't want it to end, that you don't want to say goodbye to April or the characters and worlds you've grown to love. It's a very rare game I can say that about. Hell, it's a very rare game that keeps my attention long enough to actually finish it, so the fact that a game as long as this one did it with it's non-modern graphics, kind of says a lot doesn't it?
Makes you wonder maybe that developers need to stop, and take a look at some older games and realize that with modern graphics, they've seemed to forget that the characters and settings are also what makes a game special.
Either way, this is a game that will always have a special place in my heart, followed by Siberia and Siberia 2 (the fact that I was born in Siberia has nothing to do with it, I swear!).
As someone who loves adventure games, I thought this would be a slam dunk. Well acclaimed, 2 sequels, surely this would be a game I'd fall in love with.
But the game stumbles right out the gate with clunky, bad dialogue (starts with that guy you share the hall with, then continues with Fiona and rarely stops with only a few of the characters having well spoken dialogue) then has the pacing of a snail race. Plus one of the puzzles involves you putting candy in a pool of toxic sludge, in front of the person you're supposed to give it to and he still eats it. Then, the very next puzzle involves you making a shadow puppet with a light source that IS NOT, I repeat, IS NOT facing towards the wall the puppet appears on, and you have to convince a person in your way that he's being held up by a police officer using a windup toy monkey. That's assuming you even have the endurance to reach this point because, again, the game has SERIOUS pacing issues.
Then you get to Arcadia and the first person you meet, both right away and in a future chapter, gives so much exposition that even George RR Martin would probably say "You guys need to reign this in a little."
And don't get me started on Crow's whiny dialogue. Or that damn "Why yes, what a silly question!" librarian who takes about 25 years to find a book you request, and there are many, many books he will look up for you. "Oh but you can speed up the -" so what? That just means that, in playtesting even THE DEVELOPERS realized how awful the pacing issues of the game were, and didn't bother to tighten it up. It's like if a surgeon accidentally breaks a tooth while doing surgery on you and then says, "Well just go to the dentist." Shouldn't have been an issue in the first place.
The sequels, while they both have their own issues, are much better. If you feel like you must endure this game before playing the sequels, I recommend a "Let's Play" of it.
Okay ending. Some heartfelt moments. But lots of muck to dig through.