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Product Description

The Longest Journey is a fantastic science fiction/fantasy adventure seen through the eyes of April Ryan. Her destiny is to start a journey where she travels between two worlds to save mankind from total destruction. April's charming personality and street-smart attitude is her only weapon against evil forces. April Ryan pulls you into the game, making you a part of the adventure as you interact with her friends, enemies and the environment as the amazing journey unfolds in front of you.

Before embarking on The Longest Journey, check your preconceived notions of reality at the door. While this may play like a traditional adventure game, the story is anything but conventional. As art student April Ryan you'll soon discover you have the ability to bridge two worlds--the 23rd-century, science-oriented Earth that you live in, and its counterpart, Arcadia, where magic is reality and technology is the stuff of legends. Telling you more than that would spoil the story, but suffice it to say that your ability to cross between the two worlds must be used to save both.

The game spans four CDs and needs all that space to hold both the gorgeous graphics and hours of high-quality speech. Everyone you meet has plenty to say, and you'll want to listen to everything because the game contains some of the most brilliant voice acting ever recorded. Each character has such a distinct and engaging voice that you could play this game with your eyes closed and it would maintain much of its beauty, although you likely won't want to blink after your first glimpse of the game's detailed environments. The graphics run at a feeble maximum resolution of 640 x 480 but are packed with enough atmosphere and animation that they look great even on a large monitor.

The Longest Journey obviously excels from a technical standpoint, but it's the writing that really makes it memorable. April maintains a diary that can be read to give players further insight into the game's strange events, and into April's mind as well. Lengthy conversations that seem tedious at first later serve to really make you care about the game's characters. They become more than simply people who exist to dispense items or tell you where to go next, and it's fascinating to watch April develop as she slowly absorbs the gravity of the situation into which she's been thrust. This game may seem like the longest--and most boring--journey at the beginning, but after a few hours adventure fans and anyone else who likes a good story will probably wish it would never end. (Note to readers: this game has an ESRB rating of Mature, and contains a lot of adult language.) --T. Byrl Baker

Pros:

• Outstanding production values
• Terrific writing
• Should run well on practically any computer

• Many of the puzzles are too contrived
• Game gets off to a slow start

Customer Reviews:

• A Great Game
  Clearly this game is one of the best adventure games out there. I've been reading a lot of the reviews, and I must say...people who gave this a bad review based on talking alone mustn't have read the manuel. I thought it was a bit much at times, too. However, if one were so inclined to read the pamplet, one might learn that notes on a conversation are taken, so that one might skip dialog and just read the notes, which gives one the hints without having to listen. Also, many people who give this game a bad review are missing the point of the game alltogther. The game creates a new world reallistically. It has some cursing, but as far as I'm concerned it isn't uneeded, but adds to the reallism of the game. For a genre that is surely in loll, this game gives justice to the point-and-click adventure game....more info
• One Awesome Game
  After the change in game programmers at Lucas Arts thought that I would never see another great adventure game. Boy, was I wrong. TLJ is one of the best games I have ever played! The graphics are beautiful, the music is captivating, and the puzzles are challenging.

  When I first purchased this game I played it for several hours a day, every day, often staying up until sunrise. In TLJ you play April, an 18 year old art student who is trying to figure out who she is and what her world is. It is truly a metaphor for any person coming of age or figuring out who they are at any stage in their life!

  The point and click interface makes it much easier to get around the game than fishing for keystrokes. The story itself is riveting and unfolds in unpredictable ways. The characters are witty and well rounded. The more you talk to them, the more you find out about them and they have very interesting personalities. Choices that you make affect how the game plays through but not the ultimate outcome.

  I have recommended this game to everyone I know and they have all loved it. Be aware of the fact that you do need about 2 GB of free space on your hard drive to fully install the game but then you won't need the CD again for regular game play.

  By this game now and prepare for the fun!...more info

• A masterpiece
  This game is simply one of the best PC games, and the best PC adventure game, ever made.
  
  I first heard about this game after playing and enjoying Syberia I and II. They are similar point-and-click adventure puzzle-solving games, with a strong central character and intriguing storyline. However, I quickly discovered that, if the Syberia titles are thought of as appetizing hors d'oeuvres, then The Longest Journey is a full five-course meal with all the trimmings!
  
  The main reason this game stands out compared with other adventure games is the extremely deep storyline and characters. There is lots of dialogue, so it is not for people with short attention spans. The voice-acting is absolutely superb. The actress who plays April Ryan, the central character, deserved an Oscar (if such things exist for PC game acting).
  
  April is the lynchpin of the whole game, and if you are like me you will quickly fall in love with her. What makes her so appealing is her whacky sense of humour. April is always wise-cracking, and is guaranteed to make you crack up even when all she is doing is routine game-mechanic stuff like: you can't go through that door, you can't combine those objects, etc. The many other characters she meets in the course of her adventures are also well-acted and often extremely comical.
  
  The fact that the game doesn't take itself too seriously helps the player come to terms with the hocus-pocus storyline and often highly improbable situations and puzzles. That said, the story, which takes many hours to complete, is also extremely deep, absorbing and often moving. April proves herself to be a genuine heroine, who triumphs against her own insecurity as well as the many bizarre challenges she faces in the course of her travels.
  
  Without wanting to give too much away, it's an epic Wizard-of-Oz, Alice-in-Wonderland style fantasy adventure, where April goes to all sorts of weird and wonderful places and meets all sorts of weird and wonderful characters and creatures. Along the way she has to save the world, which involves getting out of one sticky situation after another.
  
  You'll notice that so far I have heaped all this praise on the game without even touching on the actual gameplay! If you've played inventory-based, point-and-click adventures, then The Longest Journey's game mechanics are a pretty standard affair, but great fun for all that. In general I found that the puzzles were not-too-easy and not-too-difficult. They were nicely-challenging without becoming frustrating. True, there is one particularly notorious puzzle near the start, but you'll crack it with patience.
  
  If you enjoy this game as much as I did you will feel emotionally drained at the end of it. I was sad when it was all over, and missed April and her friends. I hope that the recently released sequel, Dreamfall, will capture at least some of the magic of this wonderful game....more info
• Could the story get any more immoral?
  Most people have found the long dialogues the worst part of the game, but that's probably because they didn't listen. The premise of the game is so revolting and immoral that I find it surprizing that nobody has commented on it. You see, the game is about the "balance" of science and magic, or, as the game frequently emphasises, between rationality and chaos. This is bad enough in itself, being similar to saying that you should balance health and disease, happiness and suffering, and life and death. What depth of depravity must a man sink to before he would put a rationality, the very cause of the western civilization's prosperity and happiness, on equal footing with the aimless bumbling of a corner lout that is instead the cause of all its ills and misfortunes? But the game does not stop there. It continues to deride rational thought and insinuate the view that one must be irrational to be good, or to be happy. For example, the Vanguard makes its evil Guardian of the Balance by separating him into his rational and irrational counterparts, the rational man being evil and hated. He is then made "whole" at the end, reunited with his irrational part, and thus made "good". Even the main character, April Ryan, is shown to progress from being a mostly rational human being into a mystic, rejecting her science and logic in the end. I would suggest you think twice before buying this game for your kids or even your adult friends. First consider whether they would understand the message and recoil from it, like any rational person would at the sight of a direct threat to his mind, or whether they would just let it come into their "open mind" and reinforce their beliefs that thinking is evil, wishing is a substitute for action, and science is their enemy....more info
• A very rich game; just wish it were harder
  As a veteran of puzzle-oriented games, I find they fall into two categories generally: heavy on plot, or heavy on intellectual puzzle-solving. "Journey" is of the former type. I love the fact that there IS a very well-developed plot and there ARE very well-developed characters, but the solutions to puzzles are dropped in your lap most of the time, between the protagonist's conversations and her journal. A couple of times they weren't obvious, and then they were nearly impossible to come up with.

  That being said, my husband and I are having a wonderful time playing this game. As a woman, I can say that having a female protagonist for a change is a great thing, although I do wish some of the women would be in NON skin-tight clothes occaisionally, but I'm not about to tell the gaming industry who their primary audience is. The graphics are lovely, except that for some reason, the well-rendered characters with fairly realistic movement are completely incapable of interacting realistic with any of the objects. We don't know what's up with that.

  My only other small nitpick is the language. For myself, I find it very entertaining/refreshing, but I was thinking that having a toggle would be nice. I would have loved to share this game with my preteen cousins, because the story-telling way of leading you through the puzzles would be very good for younger players. However, if I gave this to them, my uncle would never speak to me again, I'm sure.

  I would *definitely* recommend this game, particularly if you want something that tells a story and whose puzzles aren't in the same league as, say, the MYST family....more info

• El Mejor Juego de Aventura !!
  Cuando uno termina este juego lo va a extra?ar y quisiera que saliera otro igual.. Este juego es tan diferente a los demas juegos de aventuras porque tu entras en el juego tienes que tener toda tu atencion en el porque si no te pierdes.
  Yo lo compre porque es un juego original.Se lo recomiendo a todos.. en este juego nesecitas tener mucha inmaginacion.Algunas piezas son dificiles si no estas de lleno en el juego asi que no crean que es un juego simple que solo es la logica y ya. Vas a extra?ar este juego cuando lo termines. Ademas tiene buenas grafica, buen sonido. Todo es excelente!!...more info
• You'll play it over and over!
  The Longest Journey is an absolutely wonderful game, and golly, do you get your money's worth! While the Myst series is satisfied with five ages and perhaps one character to interact with, Longest Journey serves up over 100 locations (!!) and more than 50 characters!
  
  And the locations are wonderfully realized and amazingly diverse, taking you from the realm of science to the realm of magic, from an apartment building to an art school, from a modern bar to a medieval pub, from an undersea kingdom to a mountaintop city of flying storytellers, from a mall clothing store to a merchant ship, from an office lobby to a wizard's laboratory, even from a subway to a space station!
  
  And the characters...fully believable people, people you like and admire, people you come to know as friends, and people you miss when the game is over. As the lead character, April Ryan, becomes swept up in important events, you see her grow and change as a person, from a college student on her own, full of self-doubt, to a courageous defender of what she believes in.
  
  A few persons have criticized the adult level of some of its language. Even though that's a minor, even trivial part of the game, the game doesn't compromise by talking down to you. April is a bright, normal college student and she talks like a college student. Nothing she says is surprising or unusual considering her character or the circumstances.
  
  The Longest Journey has been been criticized for being "talky," and there are a lot of times when you have to listen carefully as characters converse. This isn't an FPS; it can require a little patience while you learn about the people and places you visit. But your patience is well rewarded with richly drawn locales and fascinating characters.
  
  The only thing that prevents me from giving it five stars is that the talkiness takes over at the end. The game has one of the few truly complete adventure game endings, where all of the storylines are wrapped up in interesting and entertaining ways (Riven just stopped, for example, and with URU, you don't know when it's over; you just wander around and finally figure out that there's nothing left to do), but too much of the ending involves listening to other characters talking instead of interacting yourself with the game's story.
  
  Considering the vastness of the game, however, criticizing the talkiness of the ending is a mere quibble. You'll love this game, you'll become friends with the characters, you'll be sorry to see it end, and you'll play it again and again....more info
• Quick Tip:
  If you are considering buying this game but are apprehensive because of complaints of too much dialogue or walking time, there's an extremely easy way to fix it so the game goes much quicker:
  -there is a SUBTITLES option in the options menu
  -you can press ESCAPE to skip through animations or dialogue
  
  With the subtitles on you can just read through the dialogues, then press escape when you're done- it makes things go waaaay quicker. Escape also allows you to skip walking around and other animations, so it takes barely any time to go long distances. That said, you have to be careful not to miss something because you're going too fast, and its worth it to listen to the dialogue every once in a while because its (for the most part) well written and generally well acted as well.
  
  This is definitely one of the better games I've ever played, and worth the time just for the story. It was very easy to become attached to the characters- I soon found myself whistling for Crow even when he was not needed in the hopes of having a little chat. :-) The puzzles are generally fairly straightforward, with only a very few being obtuse to the point of annoyance. Some of them are actually a little contrived, but like I said- what really made the game was the personalities. Extremely enjoyable and highly recommended.
  
  ...more info
• A Long, Linear Journey
  I've been playing adventure/RPG type games since back with the orignal King's Quest. Prompted by the glorious reviews of gamers and magazines alike, I decided to pick up a copy. I was impressed with the game, but there were some bovious flaws.

  The storyline moves slowly, which I didn't mind at all, but many of today's gamers will find this game meticulous to the point of boredom. Because the developers have you spend so much time learning about your quest (in fact, your still learning information up until the end), you are able to fully understand the depth of each character.

  The graphics are fantastic, overall that is. The backgrounds, and the architecture of buildings is marvelous. The player models however, could use some definite work. From time to time, your character (April) will try to sit or lie down, and the motions are jerky, will the model dipping into the ground or other objects. The scinema sequences however, are quite possibly the best I have ever seen.

  With this game being targeted at adults ( for strong language etc.), I would have expected much more difficult puzzles. Many "puzlles" simply mean paying attention when someone talks to you. And the few true puzzles you find, are mind-numbingly simple for anyone who has experience playing adventure games.

  The actual game went along in an extremely linear fashion. While talking to AI character;s you do get a "choice" of what you say, but that choice amounts to nothing more than a preference as to the order of the questions. You are basically required (at one point or another) to ask every character, every question you can.

  I appluad the effort and the graphics. The story was captivating and well-thought out. The gameplay was slightly too linear for my liking, and the puzzles just too simplistic. Often, it felt as though I was being led around by hand to whever I need to go. Also, the inability to die (April simply won't follow your command if it would kill you, or potentially stop you from beating the game) seemed unnecassry to me. While, I have had the experience of getting the the final battle in a game before and not being equipped correctly, I feel that the ability to choose your path, and learn from your mistakes makes the game much more enriching.

  Despite the few character model flaws, and the small gameplay issues I have, I still enjoyed this game. It is the best adventure game in a LOOONG time, and I would recommend it to everyone from a first time gamer, to a very experienced puzzle master....more info

• Great Game
  Excellent game. I loved the fact that you can't get killed, not matter what you do wrong. There is a LOT of needless profanity, but enjoyable adventure. It got a bit gabby at times but you have the option of skipping parts of those conversations. I also loved that it was not an adventure game that you could sit down and finish in one day. It is long, but if I'm going to fork out the bucks, it better be. ...more info
• Its some sort of talking software.. or like a ex-girlfriend.
  The game has some good graphics, decent animation. Mainly, this software is some sort of a dialogue-talking-software-something, I suppose this software could be considered a game, but this game sure talks, talks and talks. Theres not a whole lot of action, but theres a lot of long durations of dialogue. I did notice something about this game, the main character cannot be killed, even on purpose. In fact, other characters cannot be killed by April Ryan. Too bad. It would make the game more interesting and definitely add "more plot" twists. Imagine grabbing that guy thats waiting for the train and shoving him in front of it. Or letting that thing eat April for dinner. Or ripping off that paraplegic by stealing his hoverchair and riding off with it. That'd be cool. Well,..no action because its a talking game. I finished playing it. To me, this game has no replay value, because it will play the same dialogue again and again. No actual different choices or actions, the game will play exactly the same. Okay......more info
• more please
  i loved this game, one of the best adventure games i have played, the puzzles are sometimes a bit hard, and i have to admit, i used a walkthrough for some of it, but the graphics and the character in general are very good. a good length game to took me several hrs to complete, the ending was a bit of a let down for me but over all very very good worth buying, and will look out for a sequel....more info
• thoughtful & fun!~~!!
  simply put, a great game, both thoughtful and fun. if you
  are looking for an adventure minus blood & guts that will challenge
  and surprise, this is it. can't recommend it highly enough....more info
• haven't finished the game yet but...
  it has kept me entertained so far. I like this genre of games but there is a little too much dialogue for me. Some sections are very long and wordy and you just have to sit and listen. The graphics are good so far.

  The only other issue is that it was extremely difficult to finally get downloaded correctly on my machine. I e-mailed the company for help suggestions several times with no response so that was very annoying. Finally got it up and running on another machine. That's my reason for only 3 stars... if the installation would have been more hassle free I would have given it 4....more info

• Please may them stop talking!
  If you have ever had the experience of forcing yourself through a book that you weren't particularly enjoying, but felt compelled to finish, you know how I feel at this moment having just completed the Longest Game - err Journey. Well it was not really the longest game - about 40 hours total - it just seemed that way.

  If you have played any of the classic adventure games, Kings Quest, Monkey Island etc. . ., you know the drill. Slowly move your cursor over every scene looking for the stuff you can click on. Talk to everyone you meet as long as there is new dialogue to hear. Run back and forth through the same screens over and over again so you can use object 'a' on person 'b' to get object 'c'. Try combining every item in your inventory with every other item no matter how silly it seems in the hope of producing a new object that you can use on person 'd' to get object 'e'. This is the same dull, I mean fun stuff to be expected from any adventure game and this one rarely breaks with tradition.

  One nice difference it adds is that you can never die and even better yet, you can never get into a situation in which there is no way to progress from your current save game and are forced to restore to earlier saves looking for the point where you took the wrong path. You may get stumped by a couple of the very illogical puzzles, but you can rest assured that all of the pieces to the solution are available. This very linear game will never let you into another area of the game unless you have everything you need or still have access to the areas you need to gather them. Big plus.

  However the game manages to create a brand new flaw that will no doubt serve as a warning to future game designers. It has endless dialogue. Eyes glaze over endless dialogue. Shout at the characters to just shut up already endless dialogue. And you will need to listen to all of it (or hit escape repeatedly to fast forward through it) to solve the game, because repeatedly you will be required to elicit a certain line from a character, before you can access another part of the game or get needed information from another character. This single flaw, destroyed most of my enjoyment of the game and drives it down to the level of just ok.

  Bottom line. If you love adventure games you will probably be willing to overlook the endless talk and appreciate the game's many virtues, nice graphics, wonderful voice acting, strong storyline, varied locals and well defined characters. If you don't like adventure games, don't be fooled by all of the rave reviews. Its charms are unlikely to appeal to those who don't like the genre....more info

• Just buy it
  I cant begin to tell you how great this game is, just buy it you wont be dissapointed... not only is it good to start seeing the F word used in games it proves that games a growing up with the people who play them......more info
• Like Listening to my mom talk
  More than half of the time that I played this game was incredibly usless conversation. Instead of answering yes or no to a simple question people have to tell you their boring, and completely irelavent life story. This game could have been rated "E" but someone had to add about 5 million swears, which if I may add simply added to the long, boring conversation. To find anything useful in this game you have to go completely and utterly off track of the game. Some things were too hard too find eg. They expected you to throw bread on a rubber duckey so a seagull would pop it, find a clothes line, find your ring, get this stupid pointless machine to work, take something form the machine, blow up the rubber duckey once you find it after it pops, take off a band-aid on the rubber duckey, combine the duckey, with the pliars and clothes line, and lower it to get a key in some subway tracks that you use for two seconds later on. I'd give the backrounds a 7, the cinemas a 7, and the people in the game a 3. Overall an, atmost, okay buy....more info
• Yack Yack Yack
  This game is nice, good puzzles and problem solving skills. The problem....too much TALKING....alot of what some of the characters have to say is purely BORING. Keep the dialoge direct and to the point the game would have been much better. Not one of their better games....more info
• Profanity and pro-homosexual propoganda
  I bought this game because the reviews I read were glowing and it looked like it had good graphics.
  
  When I got home and loaded it (it took forever to install) I discovered that the game was 95% just walking around and talking to various characters. Some of the characters are homo-sexual and the language was terrible. I don't want to listen to profanity or some gay woman telling me about her sexual life. I just wanted to play an adventure game. I didn't want to hear all the gay talk. After about a half an hour I had had enough of this game.
  
  This game was totally boring with reguards to gameplay.
  
  The content was vial.
  
  The profanity was plentiful and totally uncalled for.
  
  I give this game my lowest rating.
  
  ...more info
• Great Game
  I'm normally a strategy gamer but I heard so much about The Longest Journey, I decided to try it. I bought it used from Amazon, and have been playing it nonstop since I received it.
  
  The story is excellent so far - it could stand on its own as a fantasy novel. The writing is great. Some people have criticized the game for the use of 4 letter words, but the dialog really reflects the way young people speak. Most people, if they're honest, will admit that they spoke that way when they were 20.
  
  My only quibble with the game is that some of the solutions to the puzzles were too obscure. I believe that, without internet access, lots of players will not be able to finish the game. This would be a shame, as the story and dialog are so good, everyone who plays should be allowed to play through to the end, even if they can't solve the puzzles....more info
• Great Screenplay, not a game, tedium from too much talking
  This is not a game. It is a soap opera with dialogue taking up all of the game play time. Granted, it is very well done, but I am at chapter 6 wondering if I have the patience to continue with the overly repetitve nature of the "talking THREADS" needed to proceed to the next 'scene'. This is really a movie, with the pretense of being an interactive game. Granted, it is a well done computer mouse click movie, but why pretend it is a game?

  To be fair, I am male, so nonstop chatting about everyting I see is not something that entertains me. I guess this is a 'chick flick' sort of ?game?.

  If you love to hear people blather on and on and on and on and on and on and on ad nauseum with nothing happening in between, this is for you.

  I feel like giving this one star due to the absolutely ridiculous amount of dialogue one must plod through (fully 99% of the 'pretend game' play) but I will be generous and give it 1 extra star for at least being creative. But I still insist this is NOT really a game, but a movie....more info

• The Looooongest Journey
  I just wanted the talking to end. The dialogue is inane and endless and you have to talk to everyone and hear absolutely everything they have to say to progress in the game. I personally didn't like any of the characters and found April, the main character, particularly annoying and perhaps one of the most bland and corny characters ever created. The puzzles were mostly simple and action nonexistent, so all in all, bored as hell. The only plus would be graphically speaking. The worlds are rendered beautifully, but you have to go back and forth through them so much, even that wears on you....more info