Contributor: Kyle Smeby

It's an interesting sensation, moving objects with your mind. You know why the object is moving, you know you're responsible, but you just can't seem to get a handle on how you're doing it. I can say this because I've played both installments of the Journey to the Wild Divine Project, "The Passage" and "Wisdom Quest".

The Journey to the Wild Divine consists of sitting (and sometimes standing) in front of your computer with blue clamps on three fingers of your left hand. These clamps are the sensors that connect you to the "light stone" (named for its cool blue ground effects lighting) and in turn to the computer. The sensors measure your pulse and galvanic skin response and, in essence, how calm or excited you are. It is through attaining and sustaining either calmness or excitement, or by controlling your transition between the two, that you complete the game's many challenges. Your primary means of doing this is by controlling your breath.

This is a very challenging game for anyone caught up in the thick of western culture and bias. In order to achieve a number of objectives you must get very calm--a far cry from most of today's games which require you to mash on keyboard or controller. Even for those objectives which you must get excited, the game expects you to do so in a controlled manner. Furthermore, between objectives you slowly drift through one beautifully rendered 3D landscape after another. At first I enjoyed looking at the scenery, but after playing for a few hours I wanted to jump from challenge to challenge and became frustrated. I had to laugh at myself when I realized that this may have been done intentionally. This game is largely about calmness and enjoying the journey after all. I haven't ceased to enjoy watching the transition movies that carry me around the amazing landscapes since then. Although they did cave to pressure and have since released a patch for the first game that allows you to skip the movies.

With all that said, I have to admit, I'm not really very good at these games. Fortunately the sequel, Wisdom Quest, has a difficulty setting so I can play on the easiest setting and my wife can breeze through the most difficult. The difficulty setting was a very welcome addition as I would like to build up my abilities in this game and the original was just too difficult for me to make much progress.

From a practical standpoint this game is one of the first ways I was able to see a benefit to many of the things I once made fun of "hippies" for doing. Looking at my heart monitor reading from the game, when I was a smoker, compared to my wife's (then girlfriend), who was practicing yoga and meditation was a strong wake up call for me. I've since quit smoking and have been attempting to live a healthier lifestyle and as a fun benefit I've seen an improvement in my ability to play this game. It's not often you can see that kind of feedback and know you're making progress.