After the critical success of its emotional, musical adventure Journey in 2012, Thatgamecompany's creative director Jenova Chen had aspirations to reach a much broader audience of players. Journey was popular on console, with an audience that Chen jokingly described as men in their 30s who were conveniently journalists and awards judges, but "teenagers hated Journey," he said. I must have been an outlier.
So Thatgamecompany decided to make an MMO, a genre that's definitely popular with teens, but rarely synonymous with the wholesome, friendly experiences with strangers that Journey was known for. During an interview at GDC earlier this month, Chen told me all about the challenges of designing a non-toxic social space in Sky: Children of the Light, just ahead of its PC launch.
