Call it a coincidence. Our own (be it temporary) commander and chief Ian Bogost writes a post on Journey’s Atari music game, Journey Escape, the same day MTV’s Stephen Totilo decides to run a piece on music games featuring, you guessed it, Journey Escape. With our own chat room filled with pleasantries such as “how is this @&#$^ possible??” and “the next time I see Totilo I’m going to %&#*@^#(*!&@)$(*@#&(*!&$@*()$ him up,” I snuck away to steal Totilo’s awesome vintage clip of Jouney talking about their game on MTV. Note to self: never talk about how some game blows your mind or you look like an idiot in 20 years. Michael Jackson, Journey And Other Musical Acts Responsible For Questionable Games [mtv]
One more item from my collection. This one’s neither rare nor particularly unfamiliar to many (although this copy is still factory sealed, perversely), but it makes for an interesting provocation.
In 1982 Data Age created Journey Escape, based on the then hugely popular band Journey’s album Escape. In the game, you have to help the band reach their “scarab escape vehicle” (from the album cover) after a concert, while avoiding “hordes of Love-Crazed Groupies, Sneaky Photographers, and Shifty-Eyed Promoters. For some reason the band manager looks like the Kool-Aid Man. A less successful Journey arcade game followed in 1983, from Bally Midway.
What’s interesting to me about this game is that it is one of very few attempts to licence and adapt bands or music to videogames.
