The Halliday Journals is an archive in the OASIS located on the planet Incipio chronicling the life of James Halliday.
Description[]
According to The Curator, every entry into the Halliday Journals is meticulously assembled from personal photographs, old video recordings, surveillance and nanny cams all rendered into a 3D virtual experience. These entries appear as rooms in a hallway visible behind glass windows with the Curator or the visiting gunter being able to manipulate the recording using a holographic console that appears before the scene.
On the Mezzanine is archived every film, game, book and television program Halliday ever saw. Halliday has them all archived to the point that the records show the year and week he saw them and how exactly how many times he did during his lifetime.
In the aftermath of the announcement of Halliday's Easter Egg Hunt, the Halliday Journals appeared within the OASIS. As Halliday told everyone to get inside of his brain, the Halliday Journals became the next best thing and was originally packed with people attempting to find a way to beat the challenges.
After five years of no one beating the first challenge, the Halliday Journals became abandoned by all but the most dedicated gunters like Parzival who visited often looking for clues and had a good knowledge of what was within. Following his argument with Art3mis about the race, Parzival returned to the Halliday Journals to ask The Curator to see a scene from 2029 at the Gregarious Games office party where Halliday and Ogden argued in the aftermath of dissolving their partnership about instituting rules into the OASIS. In this scene proves to be the clue to beating the first challenge when Halliday states that he'd like to "go backward for once really fast, real pedal to the medal." This clue enables Parzival to beat the first challenge by driving backwards through a secret underground tunnel.
Following Parzival's success the Halliday Journals becomes filled with gunters again who enthusiastically greet Parzival when he returns looking for clues to the second challenge. Accompanied by Art3mis, Parzival views a scene from December 2, 2025, just six days before the OASIS went online. In the scene, Halliday and Ogden discuss Halliday's one date with Karen Underwood who would eventually become Ogden's wife. Parzival recognizes the significance of the moment as it is the one and only time Karen is mentioned in the entire archive despite how important Karen was to both men and states a belief that this is because Halliday was so in love with her it was too painful to remember her. On a bet with Parzival, The Curator checks the archives and determines that he is right. For winning the bet, The Curator provides Parzival with a quarter.
After figuring out the clue to the second challenge, the High Five return to the Halliday Journals, having realized that the second challenge is located there. They have The Curator pull up every movie Halliday watched on the week of November 23-27, 2025, the week Halliday went on his movie date with Karen. Using the clue, Parzival is able to select The Shining and the High Five are dropped by The Curator on a platform into a Halliday-designed remake of The Shining containing the second challenge.
During the final battle, Parzival is saved from The Cataclyst by The Curator's quarter and discovers that in winning the bet, he had been granted an extra life. After Wade wins the Golden Egg, Ogden Morrow reveals himself to be The Curator of the Halliday Journals. Though Ogden took on the role for his former friend, he was unaware of the exact details of the hunt and thus he did not break any rules by giving Parzival the extra life when he won the bet.