Expert Mode

The “Expert Mode” section of this Wiki is here to help you to take your Journeys to the next level!

Maybe you have a few journeys under your belt. You’ve found all the murals, chirped at the flower, and played around a bit as a white robe. You know where the Symbols are, without needing a companion or a guide. You still want to play Journey, but you feel like you want more out of it. You may have done some of these?

Well, you’ve come to a good place!

What is Expert Mode?
It's the term used on the Wiki to describe things and knowledge that has been gathered by longterm players over the years and now made public. Its more like "Journey +", since you would gain that knowledge normally only through experience, research and training. More info about Expert Mode: Welcome to the "complete" Journey-Wiki.

Main topics of Expert Mode are:


 * advanced flying techniques, for some things it might be needed.
 * "Glitches", can mean just a random bug or a reproducible glitch, as well as simple game mechanic exploits. We collect them all, some players call them gifts.
 * Out of Bounds, let's call them "extra levels". In Journey the outside-the-map areas are as beautiful and can be even more exciting than the inside.
 * Tricks and Challenges, a collection of simple and harder things to do, work in progress.
 * Wayfarer movements like dancing and slides to do while sitting - are two topics that are not covered yet.

To make sure you got the basics down, please read the Gameplay Basics articles. It might be easy to start advanced flying, but one might bypass the information on how to see if its a different Companion, two types of sitting or which things will cause a disconnect (rather simple things).

Expert Mode is also about general knowledge about how things work in the game. Some Expert knowledge is mentioned on normal level articles, to warn players from disconnect or mention common bugs. The CMATW for example was tested over the years for PlayStation versions and right now its assumed it works the same for PC versions.

The range of Expert Mode is wide. Some of the described things in Expert Mode


 * need to be “studied” to be able to accomplish them. Several tries might be needed and then it still might not work.


 * Are complicated Glitches and it took the community years to find them out.


 * Could be even found out by yourself or through a Companion showing it to you, making it an easy thing.


 * Are missing a detailed description. Investigation on how they work is needed, your help is highly welcomed.

If one of those works only on one version or is just non existent on another, we will mention it at top of that article or at that section. The Steam version is naturally not investigated very much, but should mainly work like the Epic Games version.

About Expert Mode articles
The main pages, links below provide you with general information about this topic. If you are new to the topic it pays of to carefully read the general hints and warnings. Often things work differently on certain platforms, some do not work when using a keyboard, general hints might not be additionally mentioned in every concerning article etc.

A wiki is seldom totally finished. There are new releases, patches and even new finds : in 2019 new discoveries on PS4 were made, but the articles for them are missing right now. This wiki is very unfinished concerning content (so the lists of articles we have cover a lot of Journey, but there is much more in Journey to experience for yourself)

If you do want help, (or just want a good time) you can join the rather active Journey Fan Discord or the Journey Wiki Crew Discord. The latter is for people who really like investigations on specific things in Journey.

We will try to add the spoiler tag on top of every Expert Mode article, so users get the chance to experience them for themselves. Considering the "Random page" feature its easy to stumble upon huge "community secrets", without having the chance to be surprised when seeing them first in game. Many people consider finding out stuff on their own or at least trying things out before just looking up a guide a far better experience, after all.

What makes an "Expert"?
If you like personal help with the expert mode, because you would rather travel and learn than watch videos, feel free to join one of those: Journey Fan Discord or the Journey Forum. The discord is full of friendly people all around the world on all devices waiting to try to connect with you and show you the awesome world of Journey.These are only hints, of course you can just immediately jump into these things, but the following knowledge is recommended to have before starting with Expert Mode.:


 * knowing the Trophies. Not important for Expert Mode are those: Crossing, Companion, Wonder, Return; especially on the Epic Games version where you cant check if you made it. The player base is not as big as it was and split among several platforms, so sitting and waiting for 10 players to just pass you, will take long time and also just disappoint those, that are looking for Companions to play with.


 * with the trophies comes: the White Robe, knowing where the Symbols and Ancient Glyphs are, to be able to show other players. Players developed certain routes to fly to Symbols, so this will help to follow each other aka "where are we going". Many players tend to visit "nice places" - in and out of bounds - on this wiki we called them sights.
 * very good knowledge of the levels and triggers. Not only knowing how to finish it, its about to know
 * - fly distances from banner/flyers to next cloth to recharge scarf without having to land often.
 * - where to speed through with your Companion and where to slow down.
 * Expert Mode is (also) about lets say changing Journey/Glitches. So if you don't know the game well enough, you will not recognise the changes.
 * Example: there is a trick where you can get a Carpet to places where it normally does not fly. If you don't know that this thing normally doesn't happen, you will not enjoy this trick as much as someone that recognises "this is something new now, i never saw this happen before". Thats why it does not pay off to show a first run the OOB for example.
 * Avoiding disconnects when Fancy Flying or activating triggers when you are too far away from your Companion. You need to be able to figure out if your Companions seems to know what they are doing or just a newcomer. Fair warning: With newcomers one needs to be careful, if they are on a straight Journey they might not follow, when you want to do tricks and show things. Some players are also either not playful or just assume there is no more to see. Example: You got into fancy flying and you like to Dive Boost (DB) from the ledge at the end of the Jellyfish room to the first WM attack. Doing so with a companion that either doesn't know how to dive boost or is unprepared, cant follow fast enough and might cause a disconnect here, because he will be behind you while you already saw the machine attacking.In some case the game "has to" disconnect you, because it cant show two states at the same time: intact for them and destroyed WM for you.


 * For certain tricks its needed to trust your companion and either let them go forward, while you stay behind or trust them that they know what to do when you go forward. See also: Common Behaviors Example: there is a Trick where one needs to go to the other level first and the other follows right after. So you would need to hint to them "you go first", they will think you don't want to go further with them, trying to convince you to go with them to avoid a disconnect.
 * An often used "skill" test is the Faceplant, if your Companion also knows how to do it, they are most likely also advanced in the game, either with flying or glitches or both.
 * The more you travel the more you will get experienced in recognising advanced players by their behavior. On first sight they might happily chirp a bit and end it in a FP or show some flying. This is like the first talk with a stranger, getting to know each other, checking each abilities and personality.



Empathy and respect

 * Remember to exercise common courtesy! It’s often better to practice some things offline or with another player who you know for sure is okay with it! arrange a meetup with them.

It’s alright to show newcomers that there’s more to the game than meets the eye, and to try and teach them some tricks - just try to keep it to stuff that won’t be overwhelming.
 * It is largely recommended to have your white robe before you start doing these. Partly because it makes practicing things easier, and partly because it’s recommended to have a good grasp of the game before you try these out. (real "Experts" even go back to Red Robe to higher the difficulty a bit)
 * Also, while a lot of these are universal, some will only work on specific platforms. Since every PC is different with different settings there are many parameters to consider. We’ll try to note when certain glitches are limited to certain platforms or even settings.
 * And have FUN!



Backpack filled with things to know as expert

 * The mountain is always North. If mentioned "left side" it means west... unless it says "when looking towards x, then turn left".
 * Control instructions are given for standard settings and not inverted.
 * Articles will contain abbreviations, since it makes texts shorter and to indicate that its an Expert Mode article, see Glossary to find certain abbreviations and common terms used.
 * PS3-SMALL-75x43.gif PS4-SMALL-75x43.gif offline on PS3/PS4 Playing offline is a good way to explore certain areas or train your flying. As well as having save files for certain levels.
 * PC-SMALL-75x43.gif Offline on PC is problematic, since a recent patch the community is still trying to find solutions. Save backups do not seem to work anymore on the Epic games. Since the Wiki got created when the PC version was not out yet, we are still working on changing controller specific instructions to more common ones. Save backups work on the Steam version, but offline play still seems to require completely disabling the network connection.
 * Common Behaviors article.
 * Faceplant (FP)


 * See also link list below.

Index of "Expert Mode" main articles
If you are not used to the community terms, thus making it hard to search for a specific thing, those pages will help you to find what you are searching for. Flying, glitching or out of bounds and "other tricks".


 * Fancy Flying is the upper term we chose for all advanced flying techniques. If you ever thought you met a hacker, because they were flying really high or running fast on ground, this is the article to look up.
 * Glitches collection of links to articles about bugging the game. Its fun to try to make them happen, trying and failing and being happy when you get it, being more happy when you can share them with your Companion or tell a friend about your experiences. Many Glitches are also connected with going:
 * Out of Bounds areas intro article with vocabulary and hints. You could consider them as extra levels and those are even bigger than the actual level. Full of weird stuff, nice views and adventure! direct links to each OOB level article
 * For advanced glitching you might want to know this: The ID rule. About which companion receives (can see) which glitch.
 * Surfing, Slides and Drops. There are different locations in the game where players can surf the sands, slide down slopes and free-fall down drops. Sliding can be initialised by a Companion, that pushes the sitting player over a ledge.
 * Challenges, was a community term used for the following: a companion starts for example to Zen Jump onto the statue, then waits for you to do the same (and also trying more), also works with flying challenges or Faceplant Jump. It's not about "winning", its about the fun of trying and eventually succeeding.
 * Other Tricks. List of easy to perform glitches or little, well, tricks. Adding some spice to your Journey without breaking it :)

Quotes
"My relationship with experienced companions in Journey in a nutshell:

Mate: i shall now teach you everything i know my padawan. first you must-

Me: Noise! You make noises! Me make noises with you buddy!

Mate: calm down! i need to tell you-

Me: more noises!!!! *Pog*

Mate: stop messing with my camera pleeeeease! q^q

Me: wait for me mama! i'm a good chick! don't leave me! q^q"

- Kirango Rouge, on Discord. 2021-05-13