The Journey to Wild Divine Biofeedback Software & Hardware for PC & Mac: The Passage
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Product Reviews of The Journey to Wild Divine Biofeedback Software & Hardware for PC & Mac: The Passage
Product Review: Pretty good - a bit 'new-agey' though
Summary: 4 Stars
I finally received this product in the mail after knowing about it for a year. I can't say I'm a huge fan of Deepak Chopra. He presents some good ideas, but from what I can tell he seems to consider meditation to be more of a mechanism for mind and body control, leading to bliss and relaxation, rather than a tool for unbiased self knowledge, to come to terms with all the things that one rather might ignore. I find this bias is reflected in the game.
As a game in itself, it is pretty good - its graphics and its originality - and learning to relax and chill out may be useful for some people. I didn't find the process as compelling as I expected, though. I found I was able to learn some of the skills pretty fast, and other places I seemed to get stuck. One potential drawback is that if you get frustrated, and try to start forcing things to happen, it can defeat the purpose of meditation.
The science of biofeedback is fairly new, and I can see its potential in the field of preventative health. I just wouldn't put the same New Age spin on things as Chopra does.
Product Review: A Fantastic Tool - And It's Fun!!
Summary: 5 Stars
The Journey to the Wild Divine is a great game, and so much more. My husband and I both have really enjoyed it. It is a pretty sophisticated program with beautiful imagery - definitely worth the cost.
The game makes learning to control your breathing, heart rate, and thoughts almost effortless. The effects of playing stay with me for several days - I feel calmer, more focused on positive images and ideals, and more "settled" in my current situation. It has provided me with meaningful tools and perspectives that transfer over into my life.
One tip - read the Companion Guide before and during your game. It will help you navigate and add a great deal of food for thought in the process.
I would highly recommend the game to anyone, and am very grateful to the creative Souls who produced it for our pleasure and growth.
Product Review: Spiritual and Scientific Together As One, Again...
Summary: 5 Stars
This product came to my attention while investigating www.whatthebleep.com and I recommend it emphatically for anyone who has bi-polar and ADD or ADHD children or adults in your family. This wonderful bio-feedback video game will help everyone learn to control their own body. With that, one can start to control their emotional issues by closing their eyes and focusing on the kite or the levitating ball or the magic carpet or even the fireplace and calm him/herself or wake him/herself up at work. Sometimes the stress just gets overwhelming at work, and 5 minutes of this meditation game - you're back to your old self again. It's fantastic!!! Get it now and please don't wait. No mouse or Keyboard, just your thoughts, breathing, pulse rate and galvanic skin response makes your world move in this learning tool. It is worth the price and so much more. I have 6 computers, I plan to open a small store and I will sell this to people and let them try it on my computers. This is a must for anyone who lives and works in the new millenium. Buy it! Now!Product Review: Take me away Wild Devine
Summary: 5 Stars
I so completely love this experience. The beauty and graphics are so three dimensional that they just pull me in and the guides and guide books lead me. It is fun and rewarding to learn the biofeedback to nurture myself. I become calm and peaceful now just turning this on because I know all the joy and serenity that awaits me. I am taking it slowly and enjoying all of the experiences because I want it to last and last. Product Review: Not your ordenary game
Summary: 4 Stars
System:
Apple PowerBook
Chip 1.25 Ghz G4
1Gb RAM
ATI Radion Mobility 9600; 64Mb Vram
This is on the face of it an adventure game. A Myst style wander around solving puzzles and looking for objects way to relax. The twist of it is that it uses biofeedback to control what is happening. You use a standard point and click to travel from place to place. Once there the puzzles are operated by using the biofeedback to raise or lower your "energy" level. I don't know if they are using temperature, pulse rate, or galvanic response but it works surprisingly well. It is really cool to see kites or balloons, or balls, or whatever floating up or down and being able to control them just by thinking. The hard part I found was that just as I would almost get relaxed enough to reach my goal, I'd think "Yeah!, I did it!' and my energy level would crash so I'd have to start over. The puzzle where you are stacking rocks was the most interesting for me because you had to raise and lower your energy to set the rock down in just the right place. Overall the temple complex where you wander around is quite beautiful. The graphics are similar to earlier Myst games or the Buried in Time series. There are a few places where they use fog to obscure objects and it doesn't come off too well but overall the graphics are not bad. This is a fixed frame Myst style game though, not a full 3D environment. The complex is also very large. I've been playing it a couple times per week over the last month and I haven't explored it all. What's more because the puzzles are the focus, not "winning", you can, and are in fact encouraged to go back and replay puzzles over and over. The puzzles are arranged roughly in order of difficulty so when you first start they are easier and get harder the deeper you progress.
This brings me to my few complaints. I thought I had read that all functions were controlled via biofeedback, this isn't the case. You use a normal point and click interface to get from place to place and the biofeedback is only for the puzzles. This isn't bad except that the game often assumes that you want to move in the direction you turn. There were a number of times I would click to turn right see what was there only to have the game turn right and walk down the path. This was especially annoying when I then had to go around the long way to get back where you started.
The music is very mixed. The instrumentals are very relaxing and beautiful, I would love to get some of them to play on my iPod. The vocal pieces are like bad '60s psychedelic new-agey religo-babble. I literally found myself turning the volume down while the singers were on because they were so annoying. Fortunately the majority of the music is instrumental. In a similar vein, once you get past the pseudo religious stuff at the beginning your guide does tell you how to play and how to make the biofeedback system work. Anyway she only is there to instruct you through the first couple of puzzles. After that you should have a good idea how to play. If you get stuck you do have You can click on Deprak Chopra at the bottom of the screen and he'll tell you what the goal of the puzzle is. After a while you also pick up two other guides. One is an energy gauge that shown you how close you are to your goal. The other is a pair of eyes that appear on the screen just as you enter a puzzle. Their color depends on whether you need to raise or lower your energy for this particular puzzle. They help a lot. Oh, and don't make the mistake I made. The finger sensors go on with the spring loaded doors on your fingernail and the body on the fleshy part of your finger. I started with them upside-down and the game kept complaining that it was not getting a signal.
Overall the game plays well and is really a lot of fun. It is very peaceful and relaxing and I've even learned some meditation skills which seem to be doing some good. I have noticed I sleep better after playing the game for a couple of hours. It's not a twitch and shoot game, but if you're looking for something different you might give it a try.