Journey Escape

Journey Escape is an action game released by Data Age for the Atari 2600 in 1982. As members of the rock band Journey, players need to guide the band to an escape ship after a concert while avoiding fans, photographers, promoters, and barriers.

Players control each of the five members of the band one at a time; the goal is to navigate each member past the various obstacles on the vertically scrolling screen and reach the famous Scarab Escape vehicle (which was featured on the band's album 'Escape', released just prior to the game). Time is limited; if any of the band members fail to reach the target before time runs out, the game is over. Once all band members reach the escape vehicle, the game repeats.

Players begin the game with $50,000 which acts as sort of a score; when certain obstacles are hit money is lost. Additionally, hitting obstacles also slows the player down which can end up costing precious time. To help out, loyal roadies and the band manager also appear from time to time; if players run into any of these friendly characters, they are granted temporary invincibility and can run straight through any obstacles.

Characters that appear on the journey are as follows:

• Love-Crazed Groupies:
  Represented as hearts with legs, groupies cost $300 on contact. They also slow the player down.
• Shifty-Eyed Promoters:
  Appearing as men with hats, promoters attempt to corner players and "make an offer you can't refuse". $2,000 is lost on contact with promoters, and like other obstacles time is lost.
• Sneaky Photographers:
  Photographers appear as yellow circles flashing off and on. $600 is lost for contact with a photographer, however this is only the case when the flash is visible.
• Stage Barriers:
  Large barriers used for crowd control. No money is lost for contact with a barrier, however it will slow the player down costing precious time.
• Loyal Roadies:
  Contact with a roadie (appearing as a blue humanoid) will grant a short amount of invicibility.
• Mighty Manager:
  An additional $9,900 is awarded for contact with they mighty manager. Additionallly, a long period of invincibility is granted allowing players to run straight through obstacles.
• Scarab Escape Vehicle:
  The final goal; After each band member reaches the escape vehicle, the game proceeds to the next level. If players miss the vehicle and it scrolls off of the bottom of the screen, they can attempt to reach it again by continuing on, however there is typically not enough time to make it.

If any time remains after a band member reaches the escacpe vehicle, the leftover time is applied to the next band member. At the end of the level, extra time leftover earns extra cash plus an additional $50,000 is added to the player's score.